US Actually Good At Soccer

Jonathan Chait says:

Other Americans take pride in the performance of their country's soccer, although -- given America's huge size and terrible record -- this is a bit like taking pride in your college debate team fighting the local elementary school squad to a draw.

Well, first of all, that's I think far too strong; it's more like taking pride in your large-enrollment college without a history of success winning the YouNeverHeardOfIt Bowl on  December 12th.  Or beating a 5th seed in the NCAA basketball tournament, even if you lose the next round. 

The men's tournament.  Because, you know, there's another one.

And anyone who says that the US stinks at soccer is missing half the story -- it's worth remembering that Americans are very, very, good at soccer, as long as you include, you know, the half of Americans who play in the odd-numbered years.  Just as a reminder, the US Women won it all in 1999 and 1991, and finished a very respectable third in 1995, 2003, and 2007.   So any explanation for anything based on the US being terrible at soccer does have to somehow account for that, I'd say.

Mainly, however, I just wanted an excuse to link to an appalling report on TV coverage of women's sports: here's the report, and here's a depressing interview about it (sorry: I mean that the conclusions are appalling; the study appears well-done from what I can see after a quick read-through).  The interview is in The Nation; perhaps the Sage of Wasilla could do something to get a bit of publicity about this in, er, real America.

Oh, Gosh, A World Cup Post

Apparently, all the political bloggers are supposed to write something about the World Cup this week.  As you might have guessed if you're a regular reader, I'm a great believer in going along to get along, so whom am I to buck the trend?

Not that I have much to add: Jonathan Chait nailed it, as far as I'm concerned:

I don't really care if soccer becomes a major sport in the U.S. 

Chait gives it to both sides: the bashers, and what he calls the triumphalists.  He's right!  As at most a very minor fan, I don't care if soccer is considered a major sport or not, or whether it becomes one.  I don't care about any of the sports that, well, I don't care about: I don't pay much attention to NASCAR, or arena football, or tennis, or golf, or the NBA, and I don't care if they're on TV or not, or if people play them or not.  I care a lot about the health of baseball, but only to the extent that it affects me, as a fan -- so I want baseball to be healthy enough that I can watch games on TV, have access to plentiful information, and have plenty of great analysis available.  Beyond that...I really don't care whether baseball is the #1 sport, the #2 sport, or the #6 sport in America.  Why should I?  I root for the Giants to beat the Dodgers, not for MLB to beat the NBA.

It sure does seem to me that a lot of people do care about it.  I'm really not sure why.  Soccer isn't going to crowd out other sports...once upon a time, I suppose sports were competing for scarce newspaper space, but not any more.  Look, other than baseball, the sport I pay the most attention to is horse racing, and it's in sad shape indeed.  And yet there's more information available to me about racing than there was to my dad when he started playing the horses many decades ago.  I was able to watch Zenyatta's record-breaking win last weekend on my TV (I'm a bit lucky on that; Dish Network has room for both TVG and HRTV, which covers pretty much everything; many cable systems have one or neither, but I could always find the race somewhere online, if I didn't have that).  As far as I can tell, the Racing Form isn't going anywhere, and it's a much improved product over what I started using when I was a kid.  So even in what may be a dying sport, and is certainly a sport in decline, it's a great time to be a fan. 

As for baseball, the only disadvantages about being a baseball fan these days are functions of how popular it is: major league tickets are pricey, and in some places they're hard to come by.  Other than that, it's a golden age for baseball fans, no question. 

OK, I think that fulfills my obligation to say something about soccer.  Want more?  Alex Massie is good, and this piece on the same topic is excellent, especially the parts where he laughs at foolish things that Bill Simmons says.  And I'm enjoying my friend Steven Rubio's fan-perspective WC Blog.