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beating Ghana (finally)
extending No. 2 Germany
Last touch away from beating No. 4 Portugal
Overtime with No. 11 Belgium

On paper that looks fantastic but I agree the fundamentals and ball skills were disappointing. Clint Dempsey was so close to really putting an exclamation on this World Cup.

Really more like the Olympics than growing soccer momentum. When you are not horrible people watch you. When you are garbage people don't watch. Very few of the soccer "experts" running around talking world cup actually watch pro soccer

You're talking soccer, couch 'em. Ten years ago you would not have. At least publicly.

There is an interesting NPR article out there somewhere about soccer. Raises some interesting points.

18-36 has soccer tied for the second most popular sport, tied with basketball/nba and behind football.

12-18 has soccer tied with baseball for the top spot.

12-18 has been there for a while, but the big advance is in 18-36. They essentially boil it down to three things: lots of people have played the sport, non-stop action, and a two hour time limit. The younger generation actually plans to do stuff on their weekend and don't want to spend 3.5 hours watching a sporting event.

I realize that it is a little apples to oranges, but the fact that the three US games all outdrew the audience of the NBA finals and world series is very telling, especially the Belgium game in the middle of the day. And they absolutely blew olympic hockey away.

The new TV contract will allow MLS to significantly increase the salary caps of the teams in 2015, when their CBA is up. Enough to not only increase the number of designated players, but also increase the average salary of the league, so that the league can compete with Mexico for regional dominance. At that time, MLS will bypass the NHL as the 4th major sports league in the US.

The only thing keeping the US from being elite is the lack of one or two elite attacking players. If Donovan had been in his prime right now, and combined with a healthy altidore, this team is really something else this year.

All we need is for a couple of the kids to develop into world class studs. And the potential is there for that to happen by 2018.

ponyboy wrote:You're talking soccer, couch 'em. Ten years ago you would not have. At least publicly.

I chalk that up to improved performance. If USA never medaled in figure skating it wouldn't be so popular.

That said I do think soccer is on the way up just not at the level world cup people want to promote.

couch 'em wrote:

ponyboy wrote:You're talking soccer, couch 'em. Ten years ago you would not have. At least publicly.

I chalk that up to improved performance. If USA never medaled in figure skating it wouldn't be so popular.

That said I do think soccer is on the way up just not at the level world cup people want to promote.

Except that the USA was a WC quarterfinalist in 2002 (12 years ago), which is a better performance than 2014

I don't remember it having the hype of this year. Do you think the proliferation of sports channels in need of content contributes?

couch 'em wrote:I don't remember it having the hype of this year. Do you think the proliferation of sports channels in need of content contributes?

Given that the WC was an ABC/ESPN property back then, I think social media contributes far more than that.

Here's what you don't seem to get, couch. The continued Europeanization is seen in wine, cycling, general cuisine, and the fact that you can get a panini for lunch or a macchiato for breakfast at the corner shop in Athens, Texas.


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We Have Been europeanizing for our whole history

Not really.

Anyway, it's not a bad thing. Just describing.


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ponyboy wrote:Here's what you don't seem to get, couch. The continued Europeanization is seen in wine, cycling, general cuisine, and the fact that you can get a panini for lunch or a macchiato for breakfast at the corner shop in Athens, Texas.


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Is the fact that I can get sushi or pad thai pretty much everywhere evidence of the Asianization of America?

Certainly globalization.


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ponyboy wrote:Certainly globalization.


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That makes more sense than simply Europeanization or Asianization.

FWIW globalization is occurring nearly everywhere (North Korea a clear exception)

We returned from Brazil a couple of days ago. I'm watching some of it on TV now.
So far it's been easy to pick the knockout round winners.