I gained about fifty pounds my freshman year in college (from ~190 lbs in high school to ~240 labs by the end of the year), owing to taking up rugby and a beer-heavy diet. Since then, people who meet me generally assume that I played football in high school– in fact, that was probably the biggest indicator of the weight gain (other than, you know, clothes fitting differently)– people stopped asking me whether I played basketball, and started asking what position I played in football.<\/p>\n
In fact, I never played organized football– basically because the coach when I was in Jr. High was a jerk, and I wanted no part of that program. Instead, I played soccer. That experience has left me with enough appreciation of the game to feel some anticipation for the World Cup starting in a couple of weeks.<\/p>\n
I was channel-suurfing last night, and caught the second half of the US’s final tune-up game before leaving for Germany, a 1-0 victory over mighty Latvia. Some observations on the game below the fold, so only people who, you know, care about soccer need to read them:<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
1) It might just have been the specific people in this game, but it always seems to me that international-level soccer coaches are about the most detached coaches in all of sports. They had dozens of shots of US coach Bruce Arena last night, and he mostly just looked bored.<\/p>\n
Of course, I suppose it’s only to be expected– there’s not much for them to do, after all. I mean, it’s hard to work the refs when they’re usually fifty yards away, and it’s hard to really fire up a team on that basis, too. The play never stops, so it’s not like you can signal in set plays for different situations. And you’re only allowed something like six substitutions a game, so there’s no personnel management to do. You might as well bring a magazine and buy some popcorn.<\/p>\n
2) On the flip side, is there a more theatrical group of world-class athletes than soccer players? Every single tackle seems to be accompanied by an Oscar bid for “most agonizing performance of a leg injury.” Guys flop around like landed trout, and clutch at their shins and ankles as if trying to hold the crushed bones together. And then, as soon as the ref bows the whistle (or it becomes clear that he’s not going to blow the whistle), they spring back off and sprint down the field like nothing was ever wrong.<\/p>\n
In most other sports, guys are expected to act tough, and pretend that injuries are no big deal. In soccer, the rule seems to be to ham it up as much as humanly possible. I’m not sure why that is (Mediterranean influence?), but it probably contributes to the American idea that it’s a game for wusses.<\/p>\n
3) Damn, but American soccer announcers are bad. ESPN’s coverage was barely competent, and the announcers just sort of blathered over the top of it, as they cut from one camera to another for no clear reason. I really need to check out when and where the Spanish-language broadcasts will be playing, because they’re so much better.<\/p>\n
ESPN really needs to either decide to go with the Spanish-language approach, and find someone who can treat it as if the slightest tap of the ball is the most exciting event in the history of sports, or opt for the British model, and hire a couple of really snide announcers to just harsh on the players constantly. The middle-of-the-road approach is just dull.<\/p>\n
Anyway, the World Cup starts June 9th, and the ritual slaughter of the US team begins on the 12th. Should be fun, in Spanish, at least…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
I gained about fifty pounds my freshman year in college (from ~190 lbs in high school to ~240 labs by the end of the year), owing to taking up rugby and a beer-heavy diet. Since then, people who meet me generally assume that I played football in high school– in fact, that was probably the… Continue reading Soccer Observations<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"1","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[43],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-soccer","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/chadorzel.com\/principles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}