The Dogg Pound - 4/10/06 - Why Americans Hate Soccer

Invictus

The problem is the difference in what we look for in sports. One of the characters in the West Wing mentioned why the US on the whole isn't interested in hockey is because its a sport where anything can happen at any moment in time, very much like Rugby and soccer where one minute the goalkeeper has the ball the next minutes its in the back of the net.

On the otherhand US sports fans seem to savour the moment, 3rd and long, 1 down, bottom of the ninth, runner on third etc.

Maybe you wrote that in your column, I didn't read it all, but I think that it does make sense a little.

Dr. Giganto

Yeah, that also makes sense, and it's another point that I didnt touch upon.

It's like, when we're growing up, we always picture ourselves in these scenarios. Like, if we're playing baseball with our friends, we're like "It's Game 7 of the World Series, bottom of the ninth, bases loaded two out, can I do it???"

Or we imagine ourselves taking a game-winning basketball at the last second and stuff like that.

I guess I kinda sorta touched upon it when I was talking about how one of the things we like about baseball is that there are all those breaks that build up the action and suspense. Like, you have the time to sit back and consider the situation, like the inning, the batter, the score, the pitcher, runners on base, etc.

It's difficult to explain, but if you have a rooting interest in a big baseball game, the 10 seconds or so between every pitch feels like an eternity. You're anxious, you're nervous, you're holding your breath...it's so different from a game like hockey or soccer, it's like comparing apples and oranges, really