National Pastime: How Americans Play Baseball and the Rest of the World Plays Soccer.It's an interesting read, written by a sports economist. In sum, he argues that baseball could have easily become the "world" sport, but things got in the way. What makes it very interesting is that he details how soccer and baseball evolved in the U.S. at the same time.
Please excuse me if I gave the wrong impression. I understand what you’re saying, that nationalism drives the interest in the World Cup games. I didn’t think you were saying anything else.
I looked at that book you recommended and I’m going to get it since, as it turns out, baseball is the only sport that I enjoy and I’m always interested in books on its evolution, and this one really is different in that the author parallels its development with that of soccer. Hmmm.
It was nice of you to pass this information along.