MartyMoffatt wrote:Hmmm... some slightly parochial views here methinks.
If 'American' football is so good, why is it that NOBODY outside the US cares about it or watches it?
First off, Canada loves the NFL, and they're outside the US. Secondly, The Super Bowl is the most watched event on television, worldwide.
If 'real' football (yes, that game where you use your feet) is so bad, why is it played and watched by BILLIONS of people worldwide, and not just the poor that Deano alludes to.
Perhaps the rest of the world are too fuckin poor and too fuckin stupid. People in Egypt, Cameroon, and Sri Lanka could never be good enough to play real football(the one with the oval shaped brown ball), Real football requires hand-eye coordination, speed, strength and some smarts.
Footballers, or soccer players, have probably better overall conditioning, and RUN on average 6-10 miles during a typical match.
Put a soccer player next to a hockey player, and you have a huge difference in body fitness. The hockey player will have superior strength and toughness as well as being in as good or if not better shape than a soccer player.
As to excitement, I'm not saying all football is exciting (some matches are excrutiatingly boring), but many games are edge of the seat exciting from start to finish - that's 90 minutes of continuous entertainment.
Sorry, not slipping this by me. Soccer is slow motion bullshit crap. Soccer only exists for their hooligan fans to drink and riot. Pathetic.
Hockey is an exciting sport, I'll give you that. However there doesn't seem to be much subtlety or artistry in it. And unfortunately, it will never become a major world sport because there aren't enough suitable venues worldwide for it to be played at grassroots level.
You're joking right Marty? No artistry? They play their game on ice for shit's sake. A guy hauling ass on ice, gently juggling the puck on his stick, all the while being checked and bumped, does not take talent? A goaltender facing 100mph shots is a lot different than a soccer goalie facing a huge white ball at 40 mph. I have always wonder why soccer spends money on nets? They are never needed anyway.
Also, hockey IS worldwide, more so than football, baseball and basketball. Hockey is prevalent in Sweden, Finland, Norway, Germany, Switzerland, Russia, Czech Republic and of course Canada. The NHL has more international flavour than any other sport.
Basketball is a great game to play but is, IMHO, mind-numbingly boring to watch. How can a game decided 140-130 be considered exciting, where it is a bigger deal if you don't score when you have the ball than if you do score?
I agree with you on the NBA game. Boring as fuck. I try to tell Soto it sucks and he won't listen. To see these huge guys play a timid pussy sport is comical. Fouls? Free throws? yuck. The college game is more exciting, tenfold.
I quite like baseball but it suffers, much the same as our own cricket, from having too many rules and being too statistics driven. It is almost more interesting to study the stats than it is to watch the game, and the moments of actual excitement are sporadic and few.
With the exception of hockey, baseball is the toughest to play. A sport where you are considered goodl when you are successful 30% of the time (batting .300) is pretty tough to do.
It is a mystery why, of all the countries in the world, it seems it is only the US (and maybe Canada) that doesn't have football as one of its most popular sports. I'm sure that if you were able to play it to a level where you had a chance of actually winning a major competition its popularity would suddenly soar. That time will come as, despite your best efforts, Dean, to prove otherwise, the sport is slowly growing in the US, and your players are getting better. Beckham's presence will only help that, as he is a world class player, even though he's at the end of his career.
Marty
No fucking way will soccer ever take off here. Beckham will increase interest, and a few kids will watch, then say, "what the fuck is this? Let's go watch the Cowboys- Packers."