Posted on 04/14/2008 2:26:11 PM PDT by WesternCulture
Hmmm, I see the subject of flop-’n’-bawl has already come up on this thread...
It’s just hockey on grass with less fighting, using legs instead of sticks.
All American sports involve hand/eye coordination. Soccer, which could be played by the Venus di Milo, does not. It also is willing to settle for a tie. In those senses, it’s not American.
I know that the NHL had a problem with diving and it has pretty much legislated it out of existence. The problem with soccer is you have only one ref on the field. Without flooding the field with refs, or worse, intstituting that abomination of instant replay, that "typical" American will continue to have an excuse.
Football, on the other hand is quintessentially American. I played it for 14 years and have missed playing it for another 36. Glory days and all that.
I think your typical sandlot game (all the way up to college) is quintessentially American. The NFL is a marketing-arm for beer, automobiles, and ED medications.
What about queer kids who's mommies are too afraid to let them play a real game like football?
If anything's gonna turn your son into a homo, it's gay soccer.
That’s funny. I thought a bunch of men in spandex tights crouched on all fours result in the same thing. And why are they always patting each other on the behind?
“Soccer won’t catch on as long as the refs can dictate the outcome of the games”
Yahh, just like the Seahawks vs. Steelers superbowl.
Spandex? Sounds more like mano-a-mano porn by your discription.
In all seriousness, the reason I love football, is that even in the lower ranked college programs, it's played by guys who are super-humanly big, who can perform physical acts that mere mortal men like you and I couldn't dream of executing on the best day of our lives.
We're talking about a 6'7" 320 lb human who could run you down in about 4 seconds and take your lunch money or a 6'2" 250 lber who could jump over my head.
I've got a good friend who was on the Temple Soccer team and almost made the indoor Soccer league here. Don't get me wrong this guy was one hell of an athlete (before his beer and hoagie addiction surfaced anyway) and he was a treat to watch. But we've also been able to take in some Temple Football practices on the sidelines (and TU doesn't have a great team) and the stuff these kids did would make your eyes pop out of your head.
Now maybe that's economics, that drives great athletes in the U.S. towards football, but these kids and men are the finest, most impressive athletes I've ever seen, in the big 5 sports.
Owl_Eagle
”You know, I'm going to start thanking
the woman who cleans the restroom in
the building I work in. I'm going to start
thinking of her as a human being”
That’s a fair reply. When you get down to, most of those guys are inhumanly fast for their size.
To be honest, my real beef with most sports in general is that they’re for couch potatoes. 99% of of the fans have no real connection to the sport. It’s no wonder ED commercials are in heavy rotation during football games, because most of the fans seem woefully out of shape because they aren’t involved in sports themselves.
I catch it here every season because I hang on to every stage of the Tour De France, but the difference between me and your average football fan is that I’m watching a sport that I actually participate in. I do ride several times a week. I can and have ridden a bicycle a hundred miles. Also, I’m not alone. I’ve found that most tour watchers are doers not just watchers. Most are in shape and are participants as well as spectators.
Soccer seems to have a lot of that going for it as well. I see men’s leagues, women’s leagues and more children’s leagues all the time looking for players. The parks are full on weekends.
I just find it a lot easier to respect a sport that draws as many participants as it does spectators.
When I first joined an organized youth football league, none of the backyard football games, wrestling with friends, schoolyard fights, or karate classes had prepared me for what it was like to have someone significantly stronger and more powerful swiftly knock me into the dirt, using his padded shoulder as a battering ram to my midsection. Even though I wasn’t hurt, it was by far the hardest I’d ever been hit and left me stunned and humbled. But I quickly learned I could also use my shoulders to hit and block with in way that would not be possible without pads.
With the plastic armor, a player can be a lot more reckless and tackle and hit a lot harder because he doesn’t have to have to worry (as much) about getting a concussion or dislocated shoulder. Without pads and helmets, the linemen wouldn’t be able to slam into each other at full force the way they do. I realize it doesn’t look too bad on TV; it’s one of those things you have to experience yourself to understand, but trust me, clashing against some big ol’ offensive guard with all your strength, and he against you, can be very jarring, padding or not.
I think the explanation is simpler. We haven’t embraced soccer like other sports (although there are millions of fans here) because we already have our own established sports that have long occupied American sports fans’ attention; namely American football, baseball, basketball, and hockey to a lesser extent. Most people will naturally prefer the games they grew up with and the sports heroes of those games. So the criticism of soccer usually just boils down to it not being one of our games. All our major sports require the use of hands, so many Americans will be turned off by games where you have to rely on your feet. Our games, even baseball, tend to score higher than soccer, so a game where goals are few and far between is not naturally appealing. From an early age, we admire the uniforms and imposing physiques of our sports stars, so a lot of Americans perceive the uniforms and aerobic body types of soccer players as “girly”.
Of course, it works both ways. It’s a rare European that can enjoy watching our football or baseball. The usual complaint about football is that there’s too much stopping and starting. And to someone raised watching soccer, with the ball constantly in motion, I can see why that would be unbearable. Even more so for baseball. Americans will laugh at the looks of soccer players, but I’m sure a man in football pants is comical to many Europeans, as well as the baseball player scratching himself and spitting tobacco.
Some historic basis: A brief look at Wiki indicates that soccer as we know it today began to take shape with the formation of football clubs throughout British universities in the mid-1800s, before spreading throughout Western Europe. Although there have been various forms of ball games recorded in European history since Roman times, until the 19th century these games were mostly crude, undefined forms of rugby. Similarly, the game that would become American football evolved out of university rugby clubs around the same time. Baseball leagues have an even earlier history in America and basketball was invented in the 1890s. By the time modern soccer came about, the US already had an established sports culture. Wiki also claims that the early soccer players were mostly from the upper classes as it was a pursuit of university students with the luxury of leisure, thus the sort of people who emigrated to America most likely wouldn’t have played much soccer.
>>Any activity in which you don’t use your hands in Un-American.
Exactly. I’ve been saying for some time that if I were Czar, I’d ban soccer and force everyone to play lacrosse as an alternative Spring sport to baseball. It’s fast, has lots of action, has physical contact, has scoring, and requires opposable thumbs. Plus it’s American made!
I would. If I knew who he was.
Though I'm sure he's not any relation to Dick Butkus.
Their bias does seep through at points, but the interesting thing is that they lay out a whole lot of facts, such as there was a time in the U.S. that baseball players were unpaid "volunteers" (similar to members of British clubs).
Without getting into all the details, the book suggests (again, from an economic perspective) that it's theoretically conceivable that baseball could have the same "reach" as soccer, but for a few (not necessarily incorrect) decisions the original group of owners made.
*Not work-safe. Not for the kiddies. Very enjoyable :)
He’s mentioned in the Darwin awards as a factor in two honourable mentions. Look him up. And no, he wasn’t the nominee...
Absolutely. They showed a scoreboard a couple of times. Someone won. I just didn't care enough to remember which team.
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