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I think we will see soccer overtake hockey to become the #4 team sport in the U.S. For the time being, however, the football-basketball-baseball dominance will continue to draw most of the very best athletes in other directions.

If I could whisper into the ears of the people running U.S. Soccer, I'd tell them to do two things. First, keep politics out of the game. Unfortunately, U.S. Soccer doesn't seem to have any more backbone than the other major sports, but this would be a place where a little conscious counterprogramming would go a long way.

Secondly, soccer to this point has refused to let television gut the sport. Even before the recent political nonsense, I had largely lost interest in U.S. college and professional football, baseball and basketball because the play of the game has been so radically changed to suit the networks' dictates. The version of the games being played today is pathetically inferior to the sports as they used to be played. The kids raised on the modern version don't know any better, and that's just sad. I find the modern version almost unwatchable.

If television got its hooks into soccer, there would be four scheduled commercial breaks each half, with additional commercials spotted in on every throw in or goal kick. But I digress.

U.S. men's soccer will continue to improve at the youth and collegiate levels. Given the rate at which the NFL and NBA are imploding, I wonder if more of the top athletes might start choosing soccer as a destination.