First, a word about co-blogger Ilya Somin’s interesting post “An Underappreciated Advantage of American Professional Sports Over International Soccer”“. Ilya describes an “important advantage of US pro sports over international soccer: soccer often promotes nationalist and ethnic violence and provides propaganda fodder for repressive or corrupt governments, while US pro sports (with extremely rare exceptions) do not.”
“European and Latin American soccer rivalries are commonly linked to nationalistic and ethnic antagonisms . . . Many European and especially Latin American soccer teams are also closely associated with governments. This often allows repressive and corrupt regimes to obtain propaganda benefits from the teams’ victories. . . . In the United States, by contrast, pro sports rivalries are based on geographic divisions that have little or no connection to deeper social antagonisms over race, religion, or political ideology. . . . US pro sports leagues are sometimes criticized for failing to engage the deeper loyalties of fans as much as soccer does in other countries. On balance, it’s actually a good thing that they don’t.”
I think Ilya’s on to something here. What’s most interesting, to me, is that he describes this as an “advantage” of US sports. Another way to say what he’s saying: people around the world care about soccer in a way that is far deeper than the way most US fans care about their sports. It touches a much, much deeper chord, and, as a result, is much more bound up with all those things people care deeply about — religion, and politics, and honor, and the rest of it. I’ve said it before: soccer’s like life, and people care about it the way they care about their lives. Why that is so is a very interesting question — I believe it is inextricably tied in some way to the very nature of the game itself, but I can’t yet quite articulate the full theory for that. But to those of us who love soccer – all 2.75 billion or so of us — that’s not a bug, that’s a feature. Do US sports have an “advantage” because they lack this quality?? Depends how you measure these things. Ilya (like Jonathan Adler) has an unspoken theory of sport standing behind his comments: sports should take us away from the real world, it should provide us a respite from the ethnic tensions and religious divisions and political problems of the real world. I can see it – I just don’t share it. Sure, “promoting ethnic violence” and “providing propaganda fodder for repressive and corrupt governments” are bad things. But the way I see it, it’s a lot like love — many, many terrible things have happened over the centuries because of love, but “on balance” we’re better off for it — as Lennon and McCartney (huge soccer fans, both of them, incidentally) put it: “I don’t care what they say, I won’t stay in a world without love.”
Back to the playing field. Some good news and some bad news, so far, out of South Africa. The bad news is that the early indications are there might really be problems with the new ball they’re using in the tournament. [As for why FIFA, in its infinite wisdom, feels it has to come up with a new ball design for each World Cup, you'll have to ask someone else - it is entirely inexplicable to me]. As is common before each World Cup, there’s been a lot of moaning and groaning about the new ball, particularly from goalkeepers, about the new ball, which is apparently more unpredictable in its flight than others. Most fans discount those complaints — but the first 5 games have provided a little evidence that there might be some problems with this ball. The scores so far: 1-1, 0-0, 2-0, 1-1, and 1-0. Could just be early-round nerves – but it does look to me like the strikers are having some problems keeping the ball under control. Free kicks, in particular — I don’t think there’s been a single one that hasn’t flown wildly over the goal, and these are some players whose abilities on free kicks is truly extraordinary. It’s a little worrisome
The good news, though, is that Lionel Messi was magical in Argentina’s first game. Messi’s the best, and by far the most entertaining through the sheer magnificence of his play, player in the world, though he has been largely out-of-sync when playing for the national team. But not yesterday — back to his old mesmerizing, jaw-dropping ways. He didn’t end up scoring, but only because of four astonishing saves by the Nigerian goalkeeper, Vincent Enyeama, who had what he himself described as the “game of his life.”
Good news, too, for the US, of course, courtesy of one of the most egregious errors by England’s keeper that you will ever see in a top-flight international soccer game. But the US deserved that result — even a 2-1 victory, which they almost pulled off, wouldn’t have been overly flattering; England looked uninspired in the extreme, and in my eyes their chances of winning this tournament went from very slim to none after yesterday’s performance.
BZ says:
As a former coach, I believe there’s going to be complaining about the ball no matter what, whether the ball’s new or old. And watching Tim Howard predict the ball’s “erratic” flight was impressive: position, position, position.
June 13, 2010, 9:23 amCounterfactual says:
- “Soccer touches a much, much deeper chord, and, as a result, is much more bound up with all those things people care deeply about — religion, and politics, and honor, and the rest of it. I’ve said it before: soccer’s like life, and people care about it the way they care about their lives. Why that is so is a very interesting question — I believe it is inextricably tied in some way to the very nature of the game itself.” –
What if the Dallas Cowboys had played a true world championship game football (American style) against a comparable Soviet team after winning the Super Bowl in 1978. Does anyone deny that this would have been game tied in with politics and honor far above and beyond any sports event the U.S. had ever seen? Think of the miracle on ice story whooped up by a factor of 50x.
So sorry, David, the reason you can not articulate the reason that soccor by its very nature is more tied into politics and honor than American sports is that it is not. I suggest that there are multiple sports that would cause the same commotion if most of the countries had that one sport as their main sport and the countries of the world faced off once every 4 years.
Now it is an interesting question why soccer should have assumed the role of main sport in most countries. Its ease to set-up and cheapness of equipment are certainly huge here. Its simplicity to play (it is the only sport my 4 year old can really understand and play) is wonderful. On the downside is the lack of scoring, is there really a question why the scores are 1–1, 0–0, 2–0, 1–1, and 1–0? It’s soccer for God’s sake, what did you expect? Remember, this is a sport where the great opportunity to show soccer off to Americans when the USA women’s team won the world cup in 1999 fizzled when the championship game ended in a 0-0 tie in regular time.
Hey maybe it is the innate nature of soccer to get people riled up. You have all this build-up, then comes the actual game, and there is so little scoring that all that pent-up energy the fans have has to go somewhere, so they have no choice but to go out and riot ;)
June 13, 2010, 9:56 amNunzio says:
The US tied Italy last time and they went on to win.
June 13, 2010, 9:59 amMark Field says:
The point about “politics and honor” was actually made by Prof. Somin. Prof. Post merely adopted it.
Fizzled? What game were you watching? I was at that game and the people in the stands sure behaved as though it was dramatic and exciting all the way through Brandi Chastain’s final kick.
I agree. It’s not just the free kicks — many of the long passes and crosses from the wing are going over everyone’s head. The ball carries too much.
June 13, 2010, 10:02 amORID says:
Full disclosure, I only watched the 2nd half. I didn’t think England looked uninspired; they had numerous chances in the 2nd half and just couldn’t quite connect. I thought team USA badly messed up their golden scoring opportunity on Altadore’s run… putting home the rebound was an easy clean-up. Furthermore, without the keeper’s flub England wins 1-0.
In the 2nd half there were numerous times that Lennon had the ball right around the box without any pressure from the USA defense (would be ironic to be done in by a guy named Lennon, although in my mind it was “Lenin”). On the other side this was happening as well. Rooney had a try that just flew wide, came out of nowhere. Methinks you were too influenced by the pro-USA rhetoric of the announcers.
I can’t wait to see South Korea v. Argentina… haven’t identified any other key games in the group-round play.
June 13, 2010, 10:15 amJ.T. Wenting says:
There will always be grumbling about the ball, and the grass, and the weather, and the time of day, etc. etc..
Small scores are the norm in football matches, not the exception, especially if the teams are pretty evenly matched (as is to be expected in an event like this).
If they’d used the same ball as they did say 20 years ago, the same people now complaining about the new ball would complain about that one.
June 13, 2010, 10:31 amtamerlane says:
Nationalistic/ethnic soccer rivalries really are a bad thing.
June 13, 2010, 10:37 amLitigator London says:
I certainly don’t want to make any excuses for England’s depressing performance – and all kudos to the USA for holding us to a draw – even it it was thanks to our hapless goalkeeper.
Interestingly, one issue which has arisen is the use of the vuvuzelas in crowds. Apparently the French are saying that the noise is so pervasive that it prevents communications within a team on the pitch. The way soccer is played, that’s actually quite important to enable the quick set up of a particular play and that might explain the apparent aimlessness of several teams in this first round.
June 13, 2010, 10:50 amcounterfactual says:
- Mark
I agree that fizzle is perhaps not the right word. The problem is not that any individual scoreless game can not be exciting, but that for a sport trying to overcome the image of many Americans that it is too low scoring, a 0-0 result in the championship game was not the preferred outcome.
June 13, 2010, 11:02 amBob from Ohio says:
I know my kind is supposed to not comment but ha ha ha ha.
Apparently you can be “magical” but not score. No wonder soccer fans riot.
June 13, 2010, 11:02 amMartinned says:
One (other) reason for that is that some of these matches are played at significant altitude. Altitude = lower air pressure = less wind friction = balls carry further, etc. (Check out yesterday’s Argentina match. Their goalie, Romero, was putting the balls all over the pitch, seemingly effortlessly.)
June 13, 2010, 11:05 amMartinned says:
Of course you can be magical without scoring. How dense do you have to be to judge a game only by the scoreboard? Would you feel better about football if they awarded 5 points for a goal?
June 13, 2010, 11:06 amDavid R. says:
I have looked into this and I have found virtually no evidence that either Lennon or McCartney ever took much of an interest in soccer/football. Paul attended an FA Cup final in the mid-Sixties and they included a picture of player Dixie Dean on the cover of Sgt. Pepper, but that’s about it.
Mick Jagger, Rod Stewart, Bono are a different story.
June 13, 2010, 11:10 amgeokstr says:
Sure they did. That’s what the song “Helter-Skelter” was about. (I heard they first considered naming it “Randomly-Haphazardly” but it didn’t have quite the ring to it.)
:-)
Helter-skelter
Meaning
“In chaotic and disorderly haste.”
Seems to describe this “football” to me.
June 13, 2010, 11:27 amTexEd says:
Another great thing about international soccer is that you can watch a game and then get distracted and have to do something else and when you finish that and go back to the game, no matter how long you’ve been away, that SAME game will still be on.
June 13, 2010, 11:28 amG.R. Mead says:
Most of the rest of the world find almost exclusively in soccer, what we enjoy in great measure in real life: Freedom within sound rules to achieve our own goals.
The deepness of identity with soccer elsewhere and the shallowness of our own identity with any one sport is a measure of our continued political health and the relatively fevered state of most everywhere else.
June 13, 2010, 11:30 amDeezRightWingNutz says:
The low scoring in soccer doesn’t help capture the interest of the casual fan, but it’s not a fatal flaw either. I think that the biggest problem is that, between scores in football or baseball, there are discreet events that allow fans to know whether their team is closer or further away from the goal of scoring. Each play or pitch leaves one team better or worse off. Watching soccer is sort of like watching a baseball game in which each batter gets one pitch and the only way to score is via a solo home run.
So may goals in soccer seem to come out of nowhere, that you only get 10 seconds of anticipation (or fear) that a goal is about to happen, or that my team has improved or hurt its chances. I’m sure I don’t understand fully how to evaluate the success of all the interim action in soccer. Also, this problem is compounded by the fact that, even when one team is clearly dominating the action and pressing for scoring chances, it’s still extrememly difficult to score. When the last 20 crossing passes resulted in nothing, it’s rather difficult to get excited about the 21st.
In this regard, soccer is rather like basketball. There’s very little recognizable setup to the score. The crowd doesn’t go crazy when th point guard crosses midcourt. They don’t see a player running the baseline a getting a screen and jump out of thier seats. The shot/score is the thing, not the setup. Well, if that’s the case, you’d better have more scoring.
If there’s no run in baseball, at least there’s often a two-out at-bat with the bases loaded, where the pitcher runs the count to 3-1. That 3-1 pitch is exciting, and the prospect of getting to a 3-1 pitch makes the 2-1 pitch exciting. Every time someone reaches base or gets out, a team wins a battle, and the fans have somethig to cheer or bemoan. I don’t see analogues for this in soccer.
June 13, 2010, 11:43 amMike Giles says:
Every time a soccer match of any import takes place, questions as to it’s lack of popularity in the US, arise. Consider, every popular sport in the US requires some form of footwork, combined with eye/hand coordination. I know that when ever I look at soccer, it’s as if they’re playing half a game. That may be an unfair way to look at it, but I keep waiting for “the rest of the game” to show up.
June 13, 2010, 11:45 amA Non-E Mous says:
Focusing on the “World Cup” part of the post as opposed to “Soccer, for or against,” I would have to say that the refs have been impressive over the first three days. There have been no major awards or misses that shouldn’t have been given. Even now in the Ghana-Serbia game, the ref just made an incredible hand ball call twice in a row.
June 13, 2010, 11:47 amTNeloms says:
David Post simply missed the main reason that Ilya cited: in international soccer the teams are national, so they (a) tap into nationalistic pride and (b) divide into racial and political factions.
That’s why he said American football has an advantage in this regard. Nationalist pride may be a good thing (though Ilya think it’s a bad thing based on previous posts), but I think we can all agree that having teams correspond to racial, ethnic, and political groups is not a good way to ignite passions.
Maybe it’s evidence that there are problems with the ball, but it’s not supporting the goalies’ claims.
It’s probably because the interests of the free market (promoting a new ball to sell to non-World Cup customers) are not aligned with the interests of a quality World Cup. Libertarianism comes back to bite you!
June 13, 2010, 11:49 amrarango says:
I played college soccer back in the 1960s–IIRC correctly an out of bounds ball was brought in with a free kick. I dont know when the throw in was adopted, but bringing in an out of bounds ball with a free kick conceivably would result in more exciting soccer. just my .02
June 13, 2010, 12:12 pmBob from Ohio says:
That would improve the 0-0 ties how?
Baseball games may be low scoring at times but they result in a winner at least.
The World Cup is the showcase but they can’t be bothered with producing winners. Or points.
So people yak about “magic”.
June 13, 2010, 12:18 pmMartinned says:
Americans have always been a little “free” with the rules. (IIRC, even MLS isn’t played entirely according to the correct rules.) AFAIK, the laws of football have always had the throw-in, though you’re right to say that the game would improve if they replaced it with a kick-in. That is one of the reforms that are periodically being proposed here and there.
According to wiki, this is one of the rules established in 1863:
June 13, 2010, 12:23 pmBT says:
Professional sports in the US generally reflects American culture; that is, many choices which are not available throughout the world and no one sport that dominates the way soccer does throughout most of the world. Also we are a very competitive country and that is reflected in the importance we put on things like law school rankings, how much money you make, (or for you lawyer types how much you bill per hour) , how successful your kids are, where you live or how you high you have risen in the corporate world, etc,.
For instance what are the professional sports in the UK? A quick Google search turned up two team sports: football and cricket. Chances are that is probably reflective of most other major markets outside the US with some countries substituting hockey or basketball–an American import. (Just for the record I am trying to stick to team sports and not golf or tennis or other individual sports). In the US, try baseball, football, basketball, hockey, soccer–all played at various professional and amateur levels. One of the great joys of life is going to a single A baseball game in a small market.
If in the US we were limited to one or two professional sports and one of those sports like soccer was played around the world, there’s no doubt we would be as nationalistic as any other country and probably worse. We have a whole lot more choices here which diffuses the intensity that the World Cup brings. Anyway there is my 2 cents.
June 13, 2010, 12:26 pmrarango says:
Martinned–thanks for enlightening me. Genuinely appreciated.
June 13, 2010, 12:26 pmMartinned says:
Winning isn’t everything, especially if you’re a neutral viewer. I’ve never understood the insistence that there should be a winner. Goals are a good thing, especially if they are beautiful goals, but I don’t see why one would have a problem with the match ending in a draw, unless one supports one of the teams.
June 13, 2010, 12:28 pmMartinned says:
You forgot Rugby (two versions), at least. Also, from your argument, I don’t see why you would limit yourself to team sports. If it is a matter of demand for professional athletes, it shouldn’t matter whether the demand comes from a team sport or an individual sport.
June 13, 2010, 12:32 pmMartinned says:
In case you were wondering about the “at right angles with the boundary line” part of the rule, I suspect that has something to do with a line-out in Rugby. Only around the 1880s/90s did rugby and football truly become distinct. Before that, the difference is a little muddled at times.
June 13, 2010, 12:33 pmCan't find a good name says:
In fairness, the 1999 Women’s World Cup final was the most exciting 0-0 game of women’s soccer I have ever seen. (The previous sentence is meant both ironically and literally.)
June 13, 2010, 12:51 pmrpt says:
Apparently soccer has become a whipping boy for conservative leaders Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Gordon Liddy. It’s contributing to the “browning of America”.
June 13, 2010, 12:54 pmLitigator London says:
Rugby Union, Rugby League, Association Football (Soccer), American Football, Lawn Tennis (and other offshoots of Real (Royal) Tennis), Cricket, Racing, Polo, Snooker, Motor Racing would probably be the most popular professional sports.
Many team games originated here, as a consequence of the mens sana in corpore sano ethos of the Victorian educationalists – but not Polo which is an import from Northern India/Afghanistan and Lacrosse which is played principally (as one author puts it) “by English schoolgirls and North American Indians – not, one hopes, against each other”
June 13, 2010, 1:13 pmORID says:
I don’t understand the hatred of soccer, not the least World Cup soccer. It’s the only soccer I watch, it’s on every 4 years, and it is exciting as heck. I think those who complain about low scores or “boring” must not be watching very closely. A low scoring soccer game is infinitely more exciting than a low scoring NFL game (punt, punt, punt, punt, punt). Soccer is all about the scoring chances, working the ball upfield, sometimes kicking the ball over (Serbia’s style).
The only thing that stinks about the 2010 World Cup, no Drogba!
June 13, 2010, 1:14 pmgeokstr says:
Spoken like a true liberal.
That’s why we have a movement in the Western world to not even keep score at kids’ sports competitions. Apparently the liberal presumption is that the “losers”, instead of being spurred on to work harder to get better and try to become “winners”, with all the valuable life lessons that entails, will instead have irreparable harm done to their little egos, resulting in keeping them self-oppressed for their entire lives. There is even one junior soccer (of course) league in Canada where any team that gets ahead by more than 5 goals will be declared the loser:
Win a soccer game by more than five points and you lose, Ottawa league says
Some critics contend the obvious unintended consequence is that kids will learn to lose, big, deliberately, and thus go “undefeated” without ever having to score. That will surely teach them how to get ahead in real life, where the bigger a loser you are, the bigger a victim you can claim to be, the more sympathy you will get from society and…
Oh, wait…
Vince Lombardi, one of the giants of real “football”, once famously said:
If not to win, why bother to “compete” at all, at anything? I think the antipathy to winning ties into the philosophy that has as its unifying principle that everyone should get only what they need and give everything they have or earn above that baseline to everyone else, according to the gospel of St Karl. I can see why free enterprise and markets would be so hated, based as they are on “competition” and “winners”.
June 13, 2010, 1:17 pmFrank Drackman says:
OK, not a Soccer, I mean FOOTBALL fan, but I’ve been to an Energie Cottbuss game, and you’d have to understand German, but they have some chants that would make Strom Thurmrond roll over in his grave, and I’ve watched most of this years games, but………………….
umm are there any organized “Plays” like in Real Football, Hockey, Basketball, or even like you see in Baseball once in a while? The announcers just seem to say ball goes to so and so, Oh! Close miss!! Well Struck!!
Frank
June 13, 2010, 1:19 pmgeokstr says:
No, it’s that brown stuff the left keeps spewing that is causing the color to change.
June 13, 2010, 1:19 pmMark Field says:
Fair enough.
I think that’s probably part of the explanation. I should have noted that Donovan’s free kicks yesterday were quite good.
Soccer requires the same basic skill, just with the feet. A long pass from, say, David Beckham that lands precisely at the feet of his teammate is just as beautiful as a similar one from Magic Johnson. Field vision is one of the most critical talents in soccer.
Agreed — let’s hope we didn’t jinx it.
I doubt Prof. Post missed that point. Of course it’s true in WC play, but not, generally, the rest of the time. WC play is like the Olympics, where competition is nationalistic. That’s not necessarily good (though it can be emotionally stirring at times). But most of the time soccer is played in leagues which are multi-ethnic. To the extent there are racial or political rivalries associated with soccer (e.g., the Old Firm Derby), I think it’s deplorable.
June 13, 2010, 1:22 pmgladetariba says:
[As for why FIFA, in its infinite wisdom, feels it has to come up with a new ball design for each World Cup, you’ll have to ask someone else — it is entirely inexplicable to me
For the same reason MLB teams change uniforms and cap almost annually , for merchandizing sake
t’s probably because the interests of the free market
there is no sport organization more anti market than FIFA
Barcelona´s FC president is using the team as a nationalistic vehicle , pursuing Cataluña´s independencen fairness,
the 1999 Women’s World Cup final was the most exciting 0–0 game of women’s soccer I have ever seen. (The previous sentence is meant both ironically and literally.)
June 13, 2010, 1:49 pmAgree, JLO or Brandy Chastain celebration
Fedya says:
Free kicks and corner kicks spring immediately to mind.
June 13, 2010, 1:50 pmMartinned says:
You misunderstood (or misstated) my point. Winning is everything when you’re playing. When you’re a neutral spectator, however, the game can be entertaining even when nobody wins.
June 13, 2010, 2:10 pmMartinned says:
(I know the following is potentially annoying, but I can’t help it.)
You’d think that, matters of taste aside, the one thing we might all agree on is that the game that is played almost entirely with one’s feet is the one most logically called “football”.
June 13, 2010, 2:13 pmMartinned says:
Why would you be interested in watching a bunch of grown men perform a dance routine as if they were auditioning for ‘N Sync?
June 13, 2010, 2:14 pmFrank Drackman says:
Try to ask an honest question, and get pummled like when I wore my FC Bayern jersey to an FC Hansa Rostock game, and y’all got me wrong, I love Soccer, same reason as Hockey, for the fights.
Seriously, I’ll eat my Borussia Dortmund hat if any one in here can explain the infield fly rule in 2 sentences.
Frank
June 13, 2010, 3:06 pmRoger the Shrubber says:
True enough, but this sentence should be given a red card.
June 13, 2010, 3:20 pmgeokstr says:
I think I could agree then, based on your logic, to call soccer “feetball”.
:-)
But given that it seems to me that you can also use your head, your derriere, and other parts of your body as well in “feetball” perhaps we should call it “handslessball” or “nothandball” instead, non?
June 13, 2010, 3:24 pmMartinned says:
Well, the singular makes sense because you only ever use one foot to play the ball with, even if it isn’t always the same foot.
All of them would work, although some of them are a little annoying to pronounce. Anyway, all of them make more sense than calling American Football just “football”. In American Football actually using a foot for something other than standing on it is so rare that the one guy who does use his foot has a special name and is only put in for special occasions. (In Rugby Football, the player who does most of the kicking is generally one of the most prominent players on the team, the one who decides when to kick for territory instead of passing for possession.)
June 13, 2010, 3:59 pmFrank Drackman says:
Have you ever seen an American Football game?
June 13, 2010, 4:31 pmActually there’s 2 guys who kick on each team.
Punts, Kickoffs, Field Goals, Extra Points, and what may be the most exciting play in Sports, the on-side kick.
The Kicker and Punter are 2 of the most important players on the team.
Can anyone tell me what defense the USA team plays?? or England? Offensive Strategy?
I know, kick it in the goal, keep the other team from doing the same.
Who even knows a single player on the Slowenian team?
I’ll still be watching.
geokstr says:
IIRC, the last time we had a “real” footballer who did most of the kicking and was still a prominent player was a long long time ago, a guy named Paul Hornung, who held the single season scoring record for many decades because he kicked for points as well as running and catching for them.
I would have no problem with calling “real” football something more accurate and descriptive, like “Reallyviolentball” or “Concussionball” or “Steroidball” or some such thing.
June 13, 2010, 4:39 pmMark Field says:
Heh. Agreed.
June 13, 2010, 4:46 pmBC says:
Because it’s vastly more entertaining than watching a bunch of metrosexuals attired in hideously ugly polyester prancing around a field and pratfalling.
June 13, 2010, 4:49 pmBill Woods says:
From time to time, baseball tweaks the balance between pitcher and hitter, by changing the height of the mound. Couldn’t soccer do the same, say, by slightly increasing the size of the goal?
June 13, 2010, 4:55 pmMartinned says:
Seriously? There’s a player called “The Punter“??? That’s amusing, I didn’t know that. Anyway, you can’t seriously say that the guys who actually kick the ball are the most important/admired/glamorous/etc. guys on the field. Surely that honour most go to the QB, followed by whoever scores the most touchdowns and yards.
June 13, 2010, 5:10 pmChris Brown says:
Messi was great. It’s amazing to me how US sports writers/commentators, who disparage football (soccer) can enjoy the magnificence of a no hitter or perfect game in baseball, but can not see the beauty of what Messi did (despite not scoring on any of the incredible attempts).
June 13, 2010, 5:11 pmFrank Drackman says:
Basketball had the same problem as Soccer until Jimmy Naismith decided to cut the bottoms out of the Peach Baskets…
June 13, 2010, 5:16 pmI’m not sayin they need a 24 second clock, but somethin to put a sense of urgency in the players, an intentional walk in baseball has more excitement than I’ve seen so far, Oh Wow we TIED England!!, if we fought wars the way we play soccer we’d still be drinkin Tea and have Queen Elizabeth on our Money.
and whats with the goalies wearin different uniforms than everyone else? And it takes nearly the whole first half to figure out who’s who, what about some team names on the uniforms?? I’m sorry, I don’t know what Slowenias national color is…
The capitals Llubijuana tho.
Cut the Bottoms out of the Peach Baskets!!!!!!!!!
rpt says:
“MRC’s Dan Gainor: “Soccer is designed as a poor man or poor woman’s sport,” “the left is pushing [soccer] in schools across the country.” Also on the June 10 G. Gordon Liddy Show, Media Research Center’s Dan Gainor said, “the problem here is, soccer is designed as a poor man or poor woman’s sport” and that “the left is pushing it in schools across the country.” He added: “generally football games in this country don’t devolve into riots or wars.” He later added that the sport of soccer “is being sold” as necessary due to the “browning of America.”
Geo, you need to check in with your team, you’re off message.
“MRC’s Dan Gainor: “Soccer is designed as a poor man or poor woman’s sport,” “the left is pushing [soccer] in schools across the country.” Also on the June 10 G. Gordon Liddy Show, Media Research Center’s Dan Gainor said, “the problem here is, soccer is designed as a poor man or poor woman’s sport” and that “the left is pushing it in schools across the country.” He added: “generally football games in this country don’t devolve into riots or wars.” He later added that the sport of soccer “is being sold” as necessary due to the “browning of America.”
Geo: You need to get with the conservative program. Soccer is a conspiracy being pushed by “the left” to cover up illegal immigration by “brown people”.
June 13, 2010, 5:18 pmLitigator London says:
Football is a game for hooligans played by gentlemen, Rugby is a game for gentlemen played by hooligans, American football is a exercise akin to watching paint dry.
June 13, 2010, 5:20 pmMartinned says:
That’s something the President of FIFA, Sepp Blatter has been talking about. However, as he understands and most Americans don’t, this is as much of a no go as any other rule change. The laws of football are written in stone, by the Almighty himself, and cannot be changed unless at least 2 of the 4 home nations agree.
IIRC, the last time the Laws were changed in any significant way was in the mid-90s, when they tweaked the off-side rule by introducing passive off-side (which is not a foul) and by creating a new foul of goal-keeper hand-ball if said goalie receives the ball from a team mate. It is not unthinkable that they would change the dimensions of the goal, but it is unlikely that this would happen any time soon. (Remember, there’s a reason why the goal is 7.32 m. by 2.44 m. It may seem random to the lay reader, but it is actually 8 yards by 8 feet. The fact that the logic of the size of the goal is still based on imperial measures should give you an idea of how immovable the laws of football are.)
June 13, 2010, 5:20 pmMartinned says:
That way you can easily recognise them, which is kinda important given that they’re the only ones who are allowed to use their hands. (And have special protection inside the goal area.)
Yes, and you should be thanking God on your bare knees for it, too. (My favourite headline so far is “one disastrous spill the Yanks won’t complain about“, though “Hand of Clod” is also pretty cool.)
June 13, 2010, 5:26 pmMartinned says:
I appreciate the sentiment, but I think you got the first two backwards. AFAIK the saying goes that Football is a game for gentlemen played by hooligans, while rugby is a game for hooligans played by gentlemen.
June 13, 2010, 5:28 pmFrank Drackman says:
Oh, so Quarterbacks and Pitchers should wear different uniforms?, I mean, they actually do something thats difficult instead of occasionally blocking an off balance kick and then kicking the ball 70 yds down a 70 yard wide field. Kick a pointy ball 50 yards through an 18ft Goal Post in a driving Snow Storm in January with 11 snarling defensive linemen/linebackers bearin down on ya and I might be impressed.
June 13, 2010, 5:35 pmOh yeah, the top 20 point scorers in NFL history?
All kickers.
American Exceptionalism: We’re So Exceptional That We’re The Only Nation That Realizes Soccer Sucks « The View From LL2 says:
[...] — i.e., the rest of the world — need to use soccer as a substitute for the real thing: Most of the rest of the world find almost exclusively in soccer, what we enjoy in great measure in real life: Freedom within [...]
June 13, 2010, 5:40 pmTNeloms says:
Really? If there’s a pop fly in the infield with men on first and second and less than 2 outs, the umpire calls an automatic out and the play is dead.
Yes, there are extensions and exceptions and everything, but that’s true for most rules of any sport.
June 13, 2010, 5:49 pmFrank Drackman says:
You left out “Runners may advance at there own risk”
June 13, 2010, 6:01 pmNow explain the Off-Sides rule in Soccer.
In as many sentences as you please.
Martinned says:
All take this guy‘s version:
(Although the actual rule only requires two opposite players, which is why earlier in the tournament a goal was denied for off-side: the offending player was behind the last defender, but closer to the goal than the goalkeeper, so he was off-side. But in the usual form of the rule, it is assumed that the goalkeeper will be closer to the goal line than anyone else.)
June 13, 2010, 6:15 pmMartinned says:
Yes, it is well known that in the NFL the kickers get all the hot chicks. Clearly theirs is the most highly regarded position on the field, with all the corresponding glamour.
June 13, 2010, 6:17 pmMike says:
As a standard American football/basketball fan, I think the post about incremental levels of advantage hits the nail on the head. Watching as an outsider I have a very hard time seeing what advantage one team has created or is attempted to create with their passing.
In basketball, there are designed plays and and coordinated movement away from the ball – screens, cuts, and dribbles. I can watch the defense collapse on a drive and know that there is a person who is coming around the corner to the spot they vacated to have an open shot, and this is planned. Scoring is high, but the high score itself isn’t what matters – it’s that the high score is a marker to show who has been playing better so far.
In American football, there is a massive coordinated attack with various cuts, misdirections, and decisions on both offense and defense. You obviously gain field position and come closer to a score.
In soccer… I see mostly a lot of guys standing around passing the ball to each other… and very occasionally someone runs a bit faster, gets behind someone, and gets a shot on the goal, which is normally not a score.
The end result is that while I see quite a bit of impressive individual athleticism, I see very little of the impressive team dynamics I see in basketball and football, and since scores are so rare they often feel more a random event than a result of the coordinated effort earlier in the game.
Now… I know many people watching American football do not see the defensive strategies or the various adjustments made, but see a bunch of fat men crash into a pile and then get up and take a break. So I’m asking – aside from seeing which side is spending more time passing the ball around with no real change in the configuration of the offense or the defense on their opponents side of the field instead of their side of the field, how does one track who is playing better in a soccer game? What strategy am I missing that they are employing? Because honestly I’ve been watching specifically away from the ball all day today and beyond “try to spread out” I’m not seeing the patterns that would indicate enough strategy to track whose tactics are succeeding.
June 13, 2010, 6:32 pmFloridan says:
Geokstr: “That’s why we have a movement in the Western world to not even keep score at kids’ sports competitions.”
The “movement” not to keep score has nothing to do with winning or losing. It is a reaction to coaches of 6-year-olds who take shortcuts, teach bad habits and ignore the less athletically developed players on the team in order to produce wins. These “win at all costs” coaches invariably become less effective at producing good [football, baseball, soccer, basketball] players as time goes on. The coaches leave the game when the wins no long come easy; unfortunately, too often their players leave the game as well.
June 13, 2010, 6:54 pmLitigator London says:
You spotted it! But the issue is whether you are talking about the players or as seen by the spectators. Footballers on the field are much more gentlemanly to one another than rugby players are – football is not really a contact sport.
June 13, 2010, 7:38 pmCareless says:
No one praised the hitters who get no-hit. Also, given the history of American football, calling it “real” football doesn’t make much sense. It’s a mutant soccer that wound up having most of it’s rules replaced with modified rugby rules
June 13, 2010, 7:42 pmMartinned says:
Or, put differently, American Football consists of grown men performing (dance) routines, while football consists of almost continuous improvisation. Let’s call it classical music vs. jazz. Like jazz, football involves varying on a theme, with more freedom for some players than others. These variations work because they have an underlying logic that all players understand, not to mention standard themes introduced by the coach.
For example you see wingers taking the ball to the goal line, from where they pass it into the box, a move specifically designed with the off-side rule in mind. It’s impossible to be off-side if the ball is passed from the goal line. (The same goes for many other patterns as well: they are dictated by the off-side rule.) Of course, that is part of some systems of play more than others. The traditional Ajax 4-3-3 system has two wingers whose (almost) sole job it is to give the pass that way. When the coach plays a 4-4-2, the wingers are posted in midfield, meaning they have more ground to cover, but that is compensated for by a stronger axis, with two centre-forwards playing off each other. Long story short, everything you’ve ever wanted to know about formations in football is on this wiki page.
While the patterns are there, if you’re looking for American Football-style plays, you’re looking in the wrong place. The fluidity and lack of commercial breaks in football means that improvisation is the only way to go. Later in the tournament, you can expect the Dutch, who have one of the best offenses in the tournament, to get bogged down against some opponent who are playing very defensively. At that point, they will end up playing too slowly, with too little variation, and they’ll lose the same way Barcelona lost against Inter in the Champions League this year. Once you lose the ability to improvise, you can’t win.
June 13, 2010, 7:47 pmMartinned says:
How do you figure? In my experience, rugby players tend to be as gentlemanly as the sport allows, while footballers elbow each other in the face whenever they think they can get away with it.
June 13, 2010, 7:50 pmChicago says:
Why not just say “When the ball is passed, you must not be nearer to the goal than the penultimate opposing player”? Or “when the ball is passed, there must be two opposing players between you and the goal”? Either one is simple and accounts for the (amazing) offsides call in the South Africa / Mexico match.
June 13, 2010, 8:49 pmMartinned says:
They all work, which illustrates that – in theory – off-side really isn’t that complicated. Stating the rule in terms of “one defender” makes it easier to visualise, especially in a split second. An off-side call like the one against Mexico is extremely rare. (I don’t remember ever seeing one, but then I don’t watch that much live football.)
June 13, 2010, 9:06 pmRoger the Shrubber says:
Assuming we care, you mean.
June 13, 2010, 9:07 pmJustin says:
FYI, the reason that a new ball is introduced every World Cup is because Adidas pays a lot of money for such a right, so they can sell soccer balls at $150 a pop (retail).
June 13, 2010, 9:59 pmJaimeInTexas says:
It seemd to me that the uSA team had “possession” of the ball longer than England and that the game was played longer on England side of the field. England had a better sense of the whole field and England’s attacks on the uSA’s goeal were better orchestrated.
Is there website that gives statistical analysis of a game?
And when did Spanish started using futbol instead of balonpie’.
June 13, 2010, 10:00 pmMartinned says:
Well, according to geokstr,
So all of a sudden you’re saying the US doesn’t care about winning anymore? Or do they only care about winning in sports where they habitually win? (And don’t forget, for the US to get a point against England, that’s a win.)
June 13, 2010, 10:03 pmMartinned says:
Some of that stuff is on FIFA’s website, but I imagine ESPN will have it, too. AFAIK they’re not tracking the distance covered by individual players, like they do in the Champions League, but there must be information on completed passes, fouls committed, etc. per player somewhere.
(OK, they do have this information on completed passes, but it’s only the team average.)
(Edit, there is a feature here where you can compare the stats of individual players.)
Unlike in rugby, that latter statistic is not measured in football. As to the former, the FIFA stats say that possession was 54/46 to England.
June 13, 2010, 10:12 pmgeokstr says:
I’d more compare them to drill teams rather than dance routines, and they have to do their drill maneuvers with perfect timing while another team of lightning quick 300lb steroid enhanced human wrecking machines are attempting to rip their heads and extremities off. Adds a certain degree of difficulty to the “dance routines” to look at it that way, non?
June 13, 2010, 10:15 pmgeokstr says:
Hey, martinned, don’t be putting words in my mouth. Vince Lombardi, the most famous coach of our footballers, said that. Not that I disagree with him of course, but only if the winning is done within the rules.
June 13, 2010, 10:21 pmMartinned says:
I was going to copy/paste it that way, but then I noticed that it ruined the flow of my comment. I figured you wouldn’t mind.
June 13, 2010, 10:49 pmMark Field says:
Soccer is much like basketball in that it’s a game of triangles. Also like basketball, the constant flow of the game means the triangles constantly shift. The key to this is to watch the players who do NOT have the ball — it’s their movement which allows the game to flow.
Free kicks involve some of the strategy you’re talking about, but soccer rules bar some of them. For example, a pick and roll isn’t really possible because obstruction is a violation.
As for tracking the game, the flow of play is a good sign. If one team is maintaining possession, especially with one touch passes, that’s probably the better team.
June 13, 2010, 11:43 pmDebating the Advantages of US Professional Sports Over International Soccer | theConstitutional.org says:
[...] a recent post, I wrote that US pro sports have an important unappreciated advantage over international soccer. [...]
June 14, 2010, 12:20 amJohn Martin says:
Usually when I watch soccer on TV it is a peaceful interlude, akin to watching golf. (Pretty and green on the HD TV.) It is like watching a natural process, a river flowing or, something….Otherwise, like most Americans, it doesn’t make much sense to me.
Tuned in today to the GER v. AUS game — but after a minute or two I turned it off. The vuzu horns ruined it for me. Ack.
June 14, 2010, 1:06 amBill Woods says:
Huh. Well, liberate the game from the crypto-imperialists!
Make the goal 7.5 x 2.5 metres!
Maybe some country league could start an insurgency; Canadian football manages to be different from US football.
I saw several World Cup games the time the event was held in the US. The thing that impressed me most was the ability to play a 90-minute game in less than 2 hours. (By comparison, a US football, 60-minute game takes forever.)
June 14, 2010, 2:26 amYngvar says:
That doesn’t explain why the whole world (-1 country) watches the World Cup. The people in non-participating countries should have no beef or interest in the matches played right now, but they do, and for some at great cost (“Somali Insurgent Group Kills Two People For Watching World Cup Match“).
June 14, 2010, 7:41 amFootball is just a beautiful game.
spot says:
I have to say that I find the complaints about the ball pretty funny- I think this is just a case where the ball isn’t bending as much as it would at sea level and the ball is just the easy scapegoat.
I have to agree that the refs have done a very solid job so far- normally I grossly dislike it when games are “decided” by a ref’s decision because there is very little granularity for punnishment in soccer. Yesterday 2 games were largely decided by a ref’s coinflip decision- Algeria lost largely because of being given a redcard and Serbia lost because of a penalty kick. But in both cases the refs had little choice in the matter- both handballs were obvious and blantant (and stupid). I wish the rules of soccer were different and Algeria wasn’t forced to play mandown an entire game for a handball that in reality gave no advantage but it was the correct call.
June 14, 2010, 9:52 amRandom Wine Geek says:
One of my great concerns about the U.S. team is the frequent failure of players to maintain spacing and move fluidly without the ball, which was a pronounced issue in the second half of the match against England. England was carving up the midfield fairly effectively through much of the second half with good movement and quick, angled passing, though good defensive resistance and great goalkeeping allowed the U.S. to preserve the draw.
I’m particularly frustrated with the U.S. tendency to fail to take advantage of the full width of the pitch, leading to bunching of the play that really benefits the defense. The U.S. started the game with better movement, showing very good control of possession for the first half hour or so (with one major lapse that they paid for). In the second half in particular, however, the U.S. players kept bunching up in the center. And the failure to support an excellent counterattacking opportunity that fizzled out because it was 2 on 7 was disgraceful and makes me question U.S. conditioning. That said, there were a number of bright moments and the game was more evenly played than I’d feared it would be.
For the U.S. viewer who isn’t familiar with soccer, it can help to think about soccer in terms of hockey. Both involve a lot of back and forth flow and the strategies are very similar. Also, in soccer, as in hockey, quality goaltending and an opportunistic goal or two can lead to a victory even when the other team completely dominates possession and scoring opportunities.
June 14, 2010, 11:14 amgab says:
Vince Lombardi didn’t say, “winning isn’t everything …” At least, he wasn’t the first one.
June 14, 2010, 11:31 amgeokstr says:
While it may be true that he wasn’t the first, and I never said he actually coined the term, he is the one most closely associated with it in the public perception. Per Wiki:
Did you make that comment just because you find it utterly incomprehensible to agree with me on anything whatsoever?
:-)
June 14, 2010, 12:17 pmMark Field says:
Yeah, this is one of my biggest complaints about Bradley as a coach. Smaller ones being such things as his strange fascination with Jonathan Bornstein….
June 14, 2010, 1:25 pmgab says:
Correct. I normally don’t agree with someone who is always wrong.
June 14, 2010, 6:48 pmAnthony says:
I am a conservative. I cannot understand the hatred that many of my fellow conservatives seem to have for soccer. Not just dislike or indifference (such as I have for auto racing or curling or what Michele Obama is wearing tonight) but outright hatred. It is attacked as “foreign” yet with the exception of basketball, most US sports are foreign to a lesser (football) or greater (golf, hockey) extent.
In any event, compare football to soccer and I ask which is the more in line with conservative American values:
In soccer you have some basic rules, a few to define the game and but most for safety reasons. The role of the coach is limited. Once play begins, the players can choose to work individually or together to reach the goal.
In football you have strict regimented play with a large number of rules that seem to change in very arbitrary fashion. After consulting with his staff, the coach sends in a play to the quarterback who has only limited control over his destiny. The players have to follow the play. They then run the play for about 15 seconds, then talked about the next play for 30.
I ask you, which game is more like a libertarian conservative’s view of the world and which is more like communism. Football, with its regimented play, large coaching staffs and huddles looks more like totalitarian states, with their politburos (coaching staff), Five Year Plans (the play sent in bythe coach), workers’ soviets (the huddle) and pretending to work (there is much standing around in football).
June 15, 2010, 6:41 amgeokstr says:
Therein lies the reason why the left is so lunatic, and why there will never be any way to compromise with them. They live in their own little fantasy world where even obvious facts must be disputed, disparaged, derided, ignored and/or ridiculed if they support any position held by a non-leftling, even in the most trivial of matters, like soccer vs football.
You can’t seem to admit that a conservative is right about anything, even when it’s obvious you’re wrong.
It’s all going to end in violence, and we will either end up free or in gab’s preferred world of 1984.
June 15, 2010, 9:59 amJaimeInTexas says:
Anthony, I am with you. And why people that rag soccer so much also like baseball?
Martinned, thanks for the link. No statistics on how long the ball was on either side of the field!
How does the ranking in the WC works? Is it based on goals scored and/or wins?
June 15, 2010, 11:06 amJB says:
“Seriously, I’ll eat my Borussia Dortmund hat if any one in here can explain the infield fly rule in 2 sentences.”
If there are runners on 1st and 2nd or the bases are loaded, a batter who hits a popup is automatically out. This is to stop fielders from dropping the ball and getting easy double/triple plays.
I’m an American who loves both kinds of football, baseball, hockey, lacrosse, etc. No sport is devoid of value or interesting things to watch, and no sport’s rules are excessively complex or devoid of common sense.
In that vein, I will permit Frank Drackman to use mustard, but only dijon mustard, to make his hat go down easier.
June 15, 2010, 5:23 pmAbercrombie UK says:
Both tournaments areAbercrombie UK the pinnacle of international competition in the sport.
July 12, 2010, 3:05 am