One Shot

That's all we got at the World Cup Monday. Literally. And that's a problem.

(AP)

This game was why soccer will never go mainstream as a professional sport in this country.

One shot.

In 90 minutes of action — more than100 minutes if you count extra time — the US team took one shot Monday, in its World Cup opener against Wales. As good fortune would have it, that one try resulted in a goal. It doesn’t change things. Wales tried three shots. A hundred minutes, four shots between two teams. The rest was men running up and down the pitch and writhing on the ground with mortal wounds from which they miraculously recovered.

I can appreciate the skill involved. I can respect the endurance needed for 100 minutes of sprinting in one two-hour chunk of time. I even found myself becoming borderline excited about what I was watching, if only because the USA-USA-USA was involved. It is with some sadness I admit I will not be watching the Tunisia-Croatia tilt on Wednesday morning at 5.

I realize, too, that it’s crazy-ironic to appreciate the drama of a 1-0 baseball game and not the tension of a 1-1 futbol match. I’m not denigrating the Beautiful Game or those who love it. Billions of people around the world can’t be all wrong.

I’m saying. . . one shot. In an hour and a half.

Cricket matches last for days and a hunk of the world loves cricket. Maybe so. But not this hunk.

Been to a movie lately? More to the point, streamed one at home? What are the most popular movies? I believe they are movies where unreal men and women fly like jets and blow up stuff. MMA rocks, the NFL rules.

It’s the action, Sportsfan.

We don’t relate well to sports where guys look to be dying from being kicked in the shin. As a whole, we don’t have a national grasp on a game that doesn’t tell us how much time is left before it ends. Can you imagine?

The Bengals are in the Super Bowl. They’re down six and driving, late in the 4th quarter. How late, you ask?

Good question. No idea.

And we haven’t even mentioned that alcoholic beer is not being sold inside the seven stadia where the Cup is being held. See how far that gets you at PayJoe Stadium.

(The hosts don’t mind abusing migrant workers and jailing homosexuals, but they draw the line at having a beer at a soccer game.)

This isn’t always a popular opinion. It is, in fact, becoming less popular all the time. Soccer is mainstream with kids and their families. It doesn’t cost a fortune for a kid to play soccer. He’s less likely to suffer serious head trauma. Soccer is 3rd-generation legit in our country now. The way baseball used to be.

MLS just signed a 10-year, $2.5 billion deal with Apple TV, to broadcast every game. That’s $250 million a year. In March ‘21, the NFL agreed with several networks to an 11-year $100 billion deal. That’s $9 billion a year. Even MLB is getting $5 billion for its national TV deal, which started in 2018 and runs through 2028.

TV money and exposure validates things, for better or worse. The rest of the world declares a holiday during the World Cup. In the U.S., we call in sick.