United States Getting Its Kicks From World Cup, Not Soccer

Your latest World Cup update: If the USA beats Ghana on Saturday, every man, woman, child and pet in America is going to get a Landon Donovan tattoo.

If they refuse, they will be deported to Guantanamo Bay, where they will be chained to a wall and forced to watch MLS reruns with Glenn Beck.

Just so I'm not rounded up, let me state that like 300 million other Americans, I'm now a huge World Cup fan. I was in a restaurant during the USA-Algeria showdown on Wednesday. The place erupted when Donovan scored.

Business people in suits were high-fiving. Meals got cold. The scene was common throughout our great soccer-playing land. It was quite a moment, but since then I've been nagged by one thing.

Algeria?

Al-freakin-geria?

What does it say when the most powerful nation in world history beats Algeria in anything, then reacts like it's V-J Day?

It says that we've never been any good at soccer. It says that we don't hold soccer to the same standards as sports we really care about. If we did we wouldn't be so strenuously exercising our Constitutional right to excess.

Only in America can you drink a 64-ounce Big Gulp while driving a 10-mile-per-gallon SUV and listen to ESPN gush over the Great Algerian Conquest.

I heard an analyst say the TV announcer's call of Donovan's goal would go down as an all-time great broadcasting moment. Sorry, but I didn't get any 1980 Al Michaels flashbacks.

Do You Believe In Miracles?

A bunch of our college kids beating the mighty Soviet Union in Olympic hockey in 1980 was miraculous. A bunch of our soccer pros beating Algeria did not send the same chills up my leg.

It's great we made the Sweet 16, but shouldn't we be decades past this euphoria? This is like Duke cutting down the nets after the first round on the NCAA basketball tournament.

But we're not the Duke of soccer, you say. Well why not?

Our best athletes are in the NBA and NFL, not the MLS. That will change when it starts paying $20 million a year. But even if soccer never gets the little Kobes, America has long had enough talent and resources to produce a competitive international team if the public demanded it.

It hasn't. We've cut soccer slack, and soccer has suffered for it. The U.S. is ranked No. 14 in the world. Instead of expecting to be in the second round, we're just happy to be there.

Make that euphoric. And right on cue we have the Soccer Has Arrived Chorus.

I hate to see soccer fans again get all worked up that the sport has finally arrived, only to be left behind when Donovan removes his USA jersey and puts back on his, umm, whoever-he-plays-for jersey.

Actually, I don't hate to see it. I enjoy saying "I told you so." But for now, soccer nuts get to bask in that feeling. Are you listening, Mr. Beck?

"We don't like the World Cup. We don't like soccer. We want nothing to do with it," the multi-media heavyweight proclaimed. "You can package it any way. You can spend all kinds of money. You can force it on our television sets. We will not enjoy the World Cup."

That makes one of him. TV ratings have been stupendous. Barack Obama is phoning in congratulations to the team. Bill Clinton hung out and drank beer with our boys after the Algeria game.

It's all so predictable. There's been a slew of stories using phrases like "tipping point" and "paradigm shift." The Wall Street Journal stopped ripping Obama long enough to weigh in with this:

"Remember June 23, 2010, the day the lame old "Soccer is Boring" argument finally died in the U.S.

"If you weren't completely, utterly thrilled, exhausted and satisfied by Wednesday's 1-0 World Cup thriller over Algeria, you're a lifeless sports corpse."

Please pass the formaldehyde.

The last minute or so of Wednesday's match was thrilling. The preceding 90 minutes were soccer. In their euphoria, the soccer-philes are making their quadrennial mistake.

There is soccer. And there is the World Cup.

Sure, there will be some residual bump in popularity. But it will be measured in kids who play, not adults who watch. Just as it's always been.

In that sense, Beck is half-right. You can package it any way, spend all kinds of money and force it on our TV sets. You can't make us enjoy soccer. The minute Brett Favre shows up at some Mississippi high school and starts testing his arm, America's attention will return to more pressing sports matters.

Until then, I'm game to go along for the joy ride. Today Algeria, tomorrow Ghana!

The Ghanaians, by the way, are currently ranked No. 32 in the world.

So the good news is the U.S. should keep on marching. The sad news is we still believe that's a miracle.