Re: [nas] John Feinstein Column on AOL Sports

[HRSRCJIM@aol.com]

U.S. Team Victories Can Help
Increase Soccer Popularity

By JOHN FEINSTEIN
AOL Exclusive

Years of experience tell me that the one column not to write this week is a soccer column. There is so much else going on that can be discussed right now. But every morning these days Americans are waking up to soccer. Tommy Smyth seems to have replaced Katie Couric as America's sweetheart. At least for another couple of weeks.

So, at the risk of unleashing the wrath of soccer lovers and soccer haters, today's column is about the World Cup.

When it comes to the subject of soccer, I play the Billy Martin role: I feel strongly both ways. On one hand, I know how electrifying the atmosphere can be at a soccer match, particularly during the World Cup. I also know that to argue with the popularity of the World Cup is foolish. A great soccer match can provide super drama.

On the other hand, I also understand that a LOT of soccer matches are far less than great, that 90 minutes can go by with almost nothing happening. It isn't anything as simple as the lack of scoring -- hockey doesn't provide that much more scoring these days than soccer -- it is a lack of action, players seeming to do little more than run back and forth on the field.

Those who make fun of soccer because the field is called a pitch; because zero is called nil; because players are called lads and because players who often go into a complete frenzy when they score are foolish. Just because something is different or outside the range of your understanding or comprehension, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with it. Putting it down because you can't quite figure it out or have never experienced it is ignorant.

But it isn't any better to insist that your game is the best game or the only game simply because you see it that way. That seems to be the constant debate in this country. Those who like soccer are always putting down those who don't and vice-versa. Both sides are wrong. If you like soccer, if you've been waking up before dawn to watch every single match from Korea or Japan, that's great. If you aren't interested, if you've barely noticed the scores, that's fine too. Let's just try not to fight about it.

Soccer is fun. It is a great kids sport because one doesn't have to be a special size to play and it takes minimal equipment. It teaches kids teamwork and sportsmanship and is less likely to produce injuries than most sports. It will also get you into extraordinary shape if you keep at it for a while.   

Because it is a great sport for kids and because youth programs have boomed in the last 30 years, a lot of the sport's supporters have expected soccer to boom as a spectator sport in this country.

It hasn't happened.

In the late 1970s, when the North American Soccer League was able to recruit foreign stars like Pele and Johan Cruyff and Giorgio Chinaglia, it had a boomlet of popularity -- especially in New York where the Pele-Chinaglia led Cosmos became a truly hot ticket for several years.

The people running the league got carried away with themselves. They called soccer, "the sport of the '80s;" over-expanded and even split into a National and American Conference to mimic that fading sport -- professional football. The sport was fun to cover because the players were accessible and easy to talk to. They seemed to understand that their game was new and foreign to most Americans and they had to work to promote it. 

But just when it seemed inevitable that soccer would become a big-time sport, it all but disappeared. The league had stretched itself too thin. Twelve teams was a good number. Twenty-four was not. The weak teams outnumbered the strong teams. Franchises folded left and right until the NASL itself disappeared. Then came 1994 and the World Cup in this country. 

Aha! said the soccer people, now Americans will see the sport at its very best and then there will be no stopping us. Well, they did -- sort of. In many ways World Cup '94 could not have gone better. The U.S. made it to the second round and played well in a July 4th loss to Brazil. The crowds around the country were excellent. But the final was one of those brutal 0-0 debacles with very few legitimate scoring chances.

It took Major League Soccer too long to get up and running, but it did finally launch two years later. Then came the U.S. debacle in France in '98. That should have been balanced by the electricity caused by the American women winning in '99 in the U.S. -- even if the final was ANOTHER 0-0 snooze. No one cared when Brandi Chastain scored her famous shirt-ripping final goal to clinch the shootout.

NOW soccer would really take off. There would be a men's league and a women's league and no one could make the argument that soccer wasn't popular in America because there were no American stars or heroes.

And still, it hasn't happened. Or has it? Both soccer leagues have a core of loyal, devoted fans who show up at every home game. The leagues have not overreached the way the NASL did. They have TV contracts that don't provide much income but provide them with steady exposure.

And maybe, just maybe, if the American team can continue to play well in this World Cup, the sport will get a bump in popularity. If the U.S. team reaches the second round -- an accomplishment after what happened in France four years ago -- that will help. But if the U.S. could somehow advance to the quarterfinals and place itself among the best eight teams in the world, it will get a huge media bounce and there should be publicity for soccer at the national level that extends beyond the end of the World Cup.

That's not to say that soccer is going to replace football as our most popular sport or baseball as the national pastime. It isn't going to move past basketball or even hockey in popularity. But it can continue to grow -- slowly, steadily. Maybe the kids playing the game now -- unlike those who learned the game 20 years ago -- will grow up to be soccer fans, not just former soccer players.

In the meantime, those who are reveling in all these pre-dawn games should continue to revel. Those who don't care about any of those games should continue not to care. But there's no reason to fight about it, regardless of which side you come down on.

John Feinstein's column appears every Tuesday, exclusively on AOL Sports.