Why America hates football (soccer)

While people from Oslo to Athens and from London to Vladivostok were avidly following the European football championship in June, Americans ignored it. In the United States, the only way to see the Greece-Portugal final, or any other match in the tournament, was to make a special, costly arrangement with a satellite broadcasting company or to find a pub that was showing one of the games. Any such pub would invariably be located in an obscure corner of a large city and filled with people speaking languages other than English. Euro 2004 was the latest episode in the long history of American indifference to the world's favourite sport, which continues despite strenuous efforts to put the game on the same footing as America's three major team games: baseball, American football and basketball. Why have these efforts failed?

One reason has to do with the existing popularity of the big three. Even in as large and wealthy a country as the United States, where the national appetite for playing, and even more so for watching, games is enormous, the cultural, economic and psychological space available for sport is limited and that space is already taken. Baseball, American football and basketball have long since put down deep roots, claimed particular seasons of the year as their own (although they now overlap) and gained the allegiance of the sports-following public.

A fourth team sport, ice hockey, is widely played across the northern tier of the country and has a professional league with teams located across the border in Canada and throughout the United States, even in cities whose climates are so benign that ice has never formed in them: indeed, the franchise in Tampa, Florida, won this year's championship. The presence of four major team sports - more than in any other country - has made the barrier to entry in the competition for the affections and the dollars of American sports fans extraordinarily high, so high that even the world's most popular game has not been able to surmount it.

One in particular of those three sports - basketball - poses a singular obstacle to the national acceptance of football. The two are too similar for them both to succeed. Each belongs to the family of games whose object is to put a ball (or similar object) in a goal.

Because the two games are similar, they have the same kind of appeal. Both are easy to follow; you can immediately understand the point of each one. The rules and strategies of cricket, baseball, rugby and American football, by contrast, are less straightforward. The action of a basketball game and of a football match are easier to follow than that of other team sports as well because the ball is larger than in cricket and baseball and is never hidden in a tangle of bodies or a scrum, as it is in American football and rugby.

Football and basketball are also easier to play than the other team games. They do not require elaborate equipment and satisfactory informal games can be staged without the full complement of players. And both football and basketball players can perfect their skills practising entirely alone.

Spectators see the same thing in the two games: episodes of spontaneous coordination, with players devising and implementing schemes for scoring. They see, that is, acts of creation. If architecture is, as is sometimes said, music set in concrete, then football and basketball may be said to be creativity embodied in team sports.

The two games are both played partly in the air. Basketball players spring off the floor to launch shots at the basket and soar to capture missed shots as they bounce off the rim, even as football players leap upward to intercept a kicked ball with their heads to control it, tap it to a team-mate, or redirect it into their opponents' goal. Football and basketball are therefore the team sports that most vividly evoke a common human fantasy: to leave the ground and fly through the air.

This is why, perhaps, football and basketball are the team sports with the widest global appeal. It is no surprise that each of the two has established a beachhead in the last great expanse of unoccupied sports territory, the People's Republic of China. Their marked similarities, however, also mean that the two sports duplicate each other. They provide the same satisfactions. For spectators they are, in a sense, alternatives. North Americans don't need football because they already get what it has to offer from basketball.

There is, too, the problem of the frequency with which football matches end in a draw. Americans want conclusive results from their games. Baseball and basketball have rules forbidding draws: the two teams must play until one of them wins. Draws were more common in American football until two decades ago when, responding to the national irritation with them, the managers of the sport changed the rules. Now collegiate games cannot end in draws and professional contests very rarely do.

Most American sports fans would regard the method used for deciding international championship matches that end in a draw even after extra time - the penalty shoot-out - as absurdly arbitrary and no more fitting a way to determine a winner than flipping a coin.

There is a remedy for what is, in American eyes, football's gravest defect. The game's rules could be changed to make scoring much easier, which would mean that even if the match were drawn at the end of 90 minutes, one or the other team would almost certainly score in extra time.

Altering the rules to encourage scoring is an old and well established practice in American sport. In the course of the 20th century, baseball, American football and basketball each did so several times. The changes helped to sustain, and indeed to expand, the popularity of all three, since, as one astute student of baseball put it, 'offense [scoring] is making things happen. Defense is keeping things from happening. People would much rather watch things happen.'

To do the same thing for football might well require dramatic modifications in the way the game is now played - the abolition of the offside rule, for example, or awarding points that count in the final score for corner kicks, which, as in prize fights that do not end in knockouts, would give an advantage to the side that makes the most determined efforts to score.

Why has this not happened in the US? One possible reason is that such changes would make the American version of football substantially different from the game played everywhere else, and here Americans are reluctant to be out of step with the rest of the world. If that is the case, then the failure of the world's most popular sport to gain full acceptance in the world's most sports-obsessed country suggests that there are, after all, limits to American unilateralism.

· Michael Mandelbaum is one of America's leading authorities on US foreign policy and international relations and the author of The Ideas That Conquered the World: Peace, Democracy and Free Markets in the Twenty-First Century (Public Affairs)

Double darn!

Well, how 'bout we give them only one stick alternating possesions after 3 stick holders are retired by the goalie who uses his hands to deliver the ball to the stick holder who attempts to put the ball in play by hitting it with the stick and after doing so running to fixed stations at four corners of the playing field. If the ball delivered by the goalies backup players arrives at the station before the hitting player or the hitting player is touched by the goalie backup player with the ball when not on a fixed station or the ball is caught before hitting the ground the hitter is out. Scoring would be one unit per hitting player reaching the fourth station "safely"?Also make the ball smaller and harder-no air- and limit the goalie and backups to 9 players on defense and allowing up to four players on offense if each can safely reach a station?
Ahh, this is getting complicated....

It's a free country, go play soccer if you wish or go to game(match) whatever, but certainly don't expect to see much of it on TV. Soccer fans just don't add up to a sizeable audience for broadcasts on a regular basis.
The Manchester United team played a Solider Field a week or two ago and the game drew 60,000 fans, but it wasn't on TV because everyone who wanted to see it was there.
I still think it is painful to watch and is good, cheap exercise for kids.

Sorry but the baseball chess match isn't as sophisticated, cerebral or subtle as the chess match going on in soccer between the players and the ref, forget the chess match going on between the teams, baseball can't come close to competing with that.

Well, we will just have to disagree about that. The whole dynamic between two baseball teams--right handed vs left handed, when to bunt, when to fake a bunt, when to look like you will fake a bunt, when to steal, playing each batter differently, and on and on is WAAYYYY more sophisticated than some skinny guy moving his shoulders one way for 45 minutes, and then move them another way for awhile.

And the chess match in baseball is not only between the picther and the batter, it is between every single player, coach, umpire and manager on the team. And it plays out for much more than just the one game--some chess matches last most of a season or longer. Smart fans can catch on to it when watching the game.

Baseball is just light years ahead of soccer when it comes to subtly and sophistication. That is just another reason why baseball is a vastly superior sport than soccer.

You might have something there.

Speaking of making up new games, why hasn't anyone started a Rollerball league (the original not the abomination of a remake)? That was a great game, the stuntmen that worked on the movie loved it, the only major injury that happened during the making of the movie happened when the stuntmen were "practicing" in between second unit sessions. Any game that stuntmen play for fun should be a sport, you know it's gonna be really exciting and require a lot of athleticism.

But again it's a one on one battle in baseball, in soccer it's 11 on 11. It just doesn't rate. Baseball was dsigned specifically to be simple, it's cricket made easy, they deliberately took out vast quantities of complexity to make baseball.

99% of the chess match is between pitcher and batter, until somebody gets on base none of the rest of the chess match matters at all. As for righty vs lefty, that only happens late in the game or in the post season, for the first 5 to 7 innings of a regular season game the rotation is king. Righty/ lefty, doesn't matter, it's this pitcher's turn, he's got 5 innings if he's stinking 7 if he's not, let it roll.

The only game baseball is lightyears ahead of in subtlety is basketball, and that didn't used to be the case, but the current NBA has destroyed the fundamentals of the game. Any game where 80% of the time 90% of the guys on the field aren't moving anything but their fingers doesn't have enough happening to be subtle. Baseball is a straightforward no BS game, that's what makes it so popular, that's why kids play it so much. It's beauty is in it's simplicity, it's greatness is in the relaxed atmosphere and lack of trickery.

Baseball, aside from sandlot or little league, is vastly more sophisticated than what you describe. 90% of what happens in a baseball game does not happen on the field, but in the minds of the managers and coaches.

I agree with you about NBA basketball, though. I used to be a huge NBA fan back in the 1980s when Magic, Bird and Jordan, among others, displayed superb fundamentals and could play the game flawlessly. Today's NBA is slammajamma-did-you-see-my-highlight-on-SportsCenter crapola. Players can't play defense, make jumpshots or even pass well. Of all the pro sports, basketball has actually devolved to a lower form over the years.

The problem is 90% of a player's time during a baseball game is spent doing nothing. They're waiting for their turn at bat, or waiting for the batter to actually hit the bloody ball so that maybe, if play goes in their direction, they can do something. and what you said just proves my point, yes the coaches and managers get to do all kind of interesting stuff, but the players primarily do what they're told. In soccer and hockey it's the PLAYERS working out how they're going to react to the other team and more imporatantly how they're going to force the other team to be reactionary. In baseball you've got 5 guys strategizing, and three of them are coaches, in soccer you've got 12 guys strategizing and 1 of them is a coach. Just by the number of people making decisions and the level of participation they take in the game you can see that soccer is a more complex sport than baseball.

And in the end the heart of baseball is the mano-a-mano pitcher batter duel, nothing else that happens on the field matters if the batter can't put wood to the ball. A classic example of this was the first game the Marlins won in their series against the Cubs, the Cubs had 29 at bats in the entire game, there's probably at least two members of the Marlins' starting line-up that never actually touched the ball in a defensive manner, the pitcher pitched the whole game so the bullpen didn't matter at all. And with only 29 at bats frankly nothing my beloved Cubs did on either side of the ball mattered. One pitcher, in series and repeatedly, beat every batter on the Cubs, except for one walk and one lucky base hit. And it was a beautiful game, one of the best games I've ever watched even though it destroyed my team, and it didn't have enough subtlety in it to fill a thimble. And of course that pitcher got the start because it was his turn in the rotation, so it wasn't even like the coach said "let's give him the ball and see what happens", it was his turn and he dominated, we won the one-on-one chess match 27 times out of 29 attempts. Doesn't get much simpler.

Stadiums might be expensive.

As far as soccer,I am of the opinion that the game reflects socialist tendancies with the game set up to provide equality of outcome not clear winners and losers. Wouldn't want to hurt the losing sides feelings.

Also did not grow up with or playing soccer. We had american games to work off energy; backyard football-tackle no pads or helmet, baseball, softball sometime with out fielders gloves, basketball, dodgeball.

I have watched soccer on tv and even in person when my niece played in goal but it is really way down my list of things to do or watch. Actually making a btach of bread or cannolis is much more rewarding as there is a tangible result after the effort.

Cannoli Shells:
1 3/4 C unsifted flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons regular sugar
1 egg slightly beaten
2 tablespoons firm butter cut in small pieces
2 ounces dry white wine
1 egg white slightly beaten

Sift flour with sugar and salt. make a well in the center; in it place the egg and butter. Stir with a fork, working from the center out, to moisten the flour mixture. Add the wine, 1 tablespoon at a time, until the dough begins to cling together. Use your hands to form the dough into a ball. Cover and let rest 15 minutes.

Divide dough into 4 equal parts.

Set the rollers on a pasta machine to the thickest setting and pass a piece of dough through the rollers decreasing the thickness of the roller gap 1 increment at a time until the dough is thin 1/8 to 1/16 inch thick. Use flour to keep the dough from sticking together.

Oil the cannoli forms.

Measure your cannoli forms and cut the dough into squares one inch shorter than the length of your forms. Starting at the corner of the dough square roll the dough around the form and seal with a dab off egg white.

Fry 3 or 4 at a time in a deep fryer at 350 F for about 1 minute until golden brown. Drain and let cool. Carefully slip the shells off the forms. Repeat until all the dough is used.

Filling:

1 Pound whole milk ricotta cheese
3/4 cups powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup heavy cream whipped very stiff

Beat the ricotta until smooth. Fold in the powdered sugar and vanilla. Fold in the whipped cream.
Chill for several hours

Fill each shell with the filling mixture and dust with powdered sugar. Use a pastry tube or small spatula.
Do not fill the shells more than one hour before serving or they will get soggy.

Stadiums should be too expensive, just take your standard roller derby setup, give it hockey glass, reinforce it a little for the motorcycles, and add an air-cannon.

Nothing socialist about soccer, it's just a game where defense rules and nobody has come around to making a huge leap in offensive concept that will break the stranglehold. The frequency of ties is really a World Cup thing and it's all because of how they setup the tie breakers for the round-robin, it punishes teams more for giving up goals than it rewards them for getting goals and losing. This causes World Cup teams to focus on not letting the other team score, a 0-0 tie is better for you in the round robin than a 1-1 tie, that's bad for the sport. It would be better if the changed the tie breakers to the point where 0-0 ties and 1-1 ties are equal, or better still make 1-1 ties better than 0-0 ties, that would make people want to actually score goals and be less concerned about their own end. Outside of the World Cup things are a bit more open, not a lot because defense still rules the game, but a bit.

I'm not insulting anybody just telling the truth. In soccer, much like in hockey, there's a lot of movement with the sole purpose of trying to teach the opponent to do one thing in reaction to you so that later in the game you can do something he doesn't expect catch him out of position and get a scoring opportunity. And historically American sports audiences don't like that kind of subtlety, they don't enjoy sports where tilting your shoulders one way is all about setting the other player up for an embarassment in 20 minutes.

Just about everything in soccer and hockey is more subtle than the difference between an 0-2 and a 2-0. In the world of flow oriented sports there is nothing about baseball that's even remotely subtle.

No, every sport has subtlety and misdirection. In football you run run run, then hit them with the play-action pass, or run the same route several times early on then lure them on the same one before cutting the opposite direction. In baseball pitchers set up certain pitches innings in advance; base runners play cat-and-mouse games with fielders/catchers/pitchers. Soccer's lack of popularity here has nothing to do with its subtleties; American sportsfans enjoy them in whichever sport they follow.

Every sport does have them, but not every sport has them as deeply entrenched into the heart of the game, and not every sport has them discussed during the game on TV.

No American sports fans don't enjoy subtleties in whichever sport they follow. In the football, baseball and basketball fan communities most of the fans don't give a damn about the subtleties at all, as is shown quite clearly by the coverage. The commentators aren't gonna talk about thing the fans aren't interested in, they aren't talking about the subtle aspects of these games for a reason. Watch a soccer game and listen to how much the commentator talks about subtle body position changes and how it effect the play and the game as a whole, then watch a football game and listen to that. It'll tell you everything you need to know about why soccer isn't popular, what's important to soccer isn't interesting to your average American sports fan.

Watch a soccer game and listen to how much the commentator talks about subtle body position changes and how it effect the play and the game as a whole, then watch a football game and listen to that.

I do watch football, and the commentators do discuss the subtleties and the strategies. In fact, I quite often tape the Redskins game and re-watch it later on Sunday night to go back and watch for these things which are easy to miss with kids running around, etc.

The same is true with baseball. Earl Weaver, the former manager of the Baltimore Orioles, wrote an entire book about the decisions he made during one average game years ago. Every pitch is different depending on whether its a 3-1 count or a 3-2 count, fielders are shaded constantly one way or another, etc. And any decent commentator is going to tell you more than you'll ever remember about each move.

Soccer is not special or unique in this regard. In fact, with its lack of structured plays, I would argue that it lacks much of the strategy required to be successful in football.

A tie means it was a tie, there's nothing socialistic about it, it's a tie. Maybe being raised in a hockey household I accept ties as simply part of the game. And depending on your soccer league (and hockey league) they might not end in ties, many have what's called the "shootout" five guys in turn getting break aways on the other goalie. They make sure there isn't a tie, but I never liked them, it's like switching to a different game in a desperate search for finality, they are exciting but I don't like them as a tie breaking method and hope the NHL never goes to it.

Exactly, it's all about what the people want to watch, Americans aren't into low action high contemplation game. No hit, just how it is. I don't think it's a problem with soccer or America, it's just how it is.

I don't cook, but I do like a good cannoli.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.