[Vision2020] Hostility to soccer

[Sunil Ramalingam]

Deacon,

You see the nuances and strategy in baseball, but you don't see them in 
soccer.  Your inability to see them doesn't cancel them out, just makes you 
unaware of them.  I'd bet there's as much going on in soccer as in baseball; 
you don't know the first sport, so you don't see it.  I'm sure I miss at 
least half of what's going on in baseball, never having played the game.  I 
understand enough to think I know what's going on.

I like baseball well enough, but not like the sports I mentioned.  But I 
don't need to diminish it in order to appreciate the sports I care about 
more, which was my original point.

Sunil

>From: <deaconjames at verizon.net>
>To: Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>, vision2020 at moscow.com
>Subject: Re: [Vision2020] Hostility to soccer
>Date: Sun, 11 Jun 2006 18:06:37 -0500 (CDT)
>
>Sunil,
>
>My biggest complaint with kickball is that is doesn't involve much. There's 
>running, and there's kicking, and there's... um... a clock? I'm not sure. 
>Now I readily admit that kickball players are really, really good at their 
>little game, but I'm not so sure that is a good in itself.
>
>Beisbol is so much more multi-faceted. Every at-bat is a head-to-head 
>battle between the teams' representatives, there is intrigue built with 
>every pitch, and it truly is America's sport. There is batting, pitching, 
>stealing bases, sign stealing, pick-off moves, homeruns, double plays, and 
>strike outs. How could you truly love anything else?
>
>Admittedly mocking what I don't understand,
>
>Deacon
>
>From: Sunil Ramalingam <sunilramalingam at hotmail.com>
>Date: Sun Jun 11 10:07:19 CDT 2006
>To: vision2020 at moscow.com
>Subject: [Vision2020] Hostility to soccer
>
>What I don't get is the hostility to soccer by some American sports writers
>and radio talk show hosts.  It's as if love of sports is a zero-sum game,
>and somehow to admire soccer is to take something away from football,
>baseball, or basketball.
>
>I grew up with soccer, and love watching it.  If my knee felt better I'd 
>try
>to play.  When I returned to the U.S. at seventeen, I started watching
>football and love watching it or playing sandlot football.  I started
>playing rugby in college, and would watch it more often if I could justify
>the cost of adding the expensive cable box.  (If someone will let me come 
>to
>their house to watch, I'll bring the beer and try to leave behind my kids.)
>
>Last week I heard the idiot sitting in for Tony Bruno claim that if he were
>on the field for a World Cup game, no one would be able to tell he was a
>useless athlete.  I had to change the station, because I was screaming at
>him that we'd all watch him drop with a heart attack after five minutes of
>every attack by the other team being funnelled through the space he was
>occupying. (Also, long, run-on sentences make me light-headed.)  The other
>side of his argument was that his ineptitude would be obvious in any of the
>'American sports.'
>
>I see that some people don't appreciate 'strange' games because they don't
>understand them.  My dad thinks gridiron football is dumb, because he
>doesn't understand it; my explanations to explain it to him fall on deaf
>ears, because he's not interested in learning about it either.  He's happy
>to tell me it's dumb.  But the repetition doesn't make him any more correct
>than the idiots on the radio when it comes to soccer.
>
>Sunil
>
>
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