World Cup News: America loses (in other news, Scarlett Johansson is attractive)

News flash from Brazil: the United States was eliminated from the World Cup, raising the number of World Cup lost by the US to, well, all of them.  At least our streak is intact.

Of course since we are the United States of Egotism, many have interpreted this loss as a win. This is understandable.  We lost to Germany, but since we made it to the next round we considered it a win.  We tied Portugal, but since they scored at the last minute we considered that a win.  At this point we sound like Jerry Jones calling losses “moral victories” and imaging the Cowboys in the Moral Victory Super Bowl.

How good was the US Men’s soccer team?  We played four matches and won once.  What other team had the same ratio of wins to games?  The 1962 Mets, the worst baseball team of all time.  If you want to toss out the tie (because in the most important sporting event in the world they can’t be bothered to always have winners and losers) then we won one game and lost two, which is such a low winning percentage you wouldn't have even reached the NBA Playoffs from the Eastern Conference last season (wait a minute, I’d better double check that; okay, that’s right).  In no other sport is winning 1/3 of your games considered to be a sign of competence.

The problem is that nearly every soccer match ends with a score of 1-0. Or maybe 2-1.  So when we beat Ghana by a single goal, and we say we crushed them; when Germany beats us by a single goal (possibly because they didn't need to beat us by more), then we just barely got nosed out.  When we tie with Portugal, it’s actually a win because we had the lead for most of the match.  It’s as if soccer is scored like Olympic diving or gymnastics; it’s all a subjective view of who played better, not an objective score like baseball or football.

What’s pathetic about soccer is that it has been threatening to become a “major” sport in America since Pele joined the New York Cosmos in 1975, and after forty years soccer is barely starting to threaten hockey for 4^th place in the American pantheon of sports.  Waiting for soccer to catch baseball in popularity is like waiting for Godot.

There’s been a lot of speculation about why American Men’s soccer can’t compete on the international stage. One factor is fairly obvious; good athletes follow the money.  The median pro soccer player in America makes $90,000 a year; the median pro baseball player makes over $90,000 a MONTH.  Star soccer players are paid like excellent accountants, while average baseball players are paid like rock stars.  Maybe young soccer players in America could make more overseas, but they don’t grow up hearing on ESPN how much a star in the Premiere League can earn.  They do hear about light hitting shortstops signing contracts for millions of dollars per year.  The same goes for mediocre football players and basketball players.

This also helps explain why the US Women’s team has had international success.  Female athletes are encouraged by Title IX, but when it comes to pro opportunities there is soccer, basketball and maybe tennis.  The WNBA pays less than men’s pro soccer, with Britney Griner earning less than $50,000, so choosing soccer makes sense.

In the next forty years, the median salary for pro soccer players in the US will not come close to the median in the other major sports.  Attendance at MLS soccer games will not threaten attendance at baseball games.  The United States will not serious challenge for a World Cup.  Soccer fans, accept it.

I am in total agreement with the character of Dan Rydel on Sports Night, modeled on ESPN personality Keith Olbermann.  Dan Rydel once said, “I'll tell you what else. I'm starting to get a little cheesed at people telling me the reason I don't like soccer is that I don't understand it. I think I do understand it. I think I understand it just fine. I just happen to think it's a mind-numbing bore, and that any reasonable person would rather be playing it than watching it.”

So all you soccer fans out there, enjoy yourselves.  Plan on having World Cup parties in 2018 when the games are in Russia and airing at 2 AM.  Talk about how soon soccer will render Major League Baseball irrelevant.  Dream of your children signing contracts with the MLS that would make A-Rod blush.  Go on.

I’ll be sitting here smug in the knowledge that soccer will be the most popular sport in America when everyone is wearing jet packs.