So I've been watching a lot of World Cup. Last night I saw two bad games, France vs. Denmark and Germany vs. Cameroon. France got destroyed. They totally sucked. There's no getting around that. They got thoroughly shut down, as effectively as they themselves shut Brazil down in the 1998 Finals. The Danes were content to remain in their half of the field for most of the game, and were even content to let the French maintain possession most of the time. It became rapidly clear that was the correct strategy, as the French didn't know what to do with the ball. They knew they had to do something, as their midfield defenders and fullbacks pressed upfield to provide attacking support. This pressure might have been a good strategy had the strikers and forward midfielders been able to convert, but they repeatedly tried the same slow, short passing strategy up the middle. With ten of eleven Danish players back on their own side playing defense, the French got stripped of the ball over and over without being able to convert. Even worse, with so many defensive French players pushing forward, the Danes mounted strong counter-attacks, two of which resulted in goals. The legendary Zinedine Zidane, hero of the 1998 World Cup and the 2000 World Cup, was clearly still suffering from the injury that had kept him out of play so far. When the ball came to him, he generally quickly passed it on to a teammate, only rarely showing the flashes of talent that made him twice the World Player of the Year. The French were waiting for him to lift them up, but he was unable to sustain the whole team by himself. He was inexplicably named "Man of the Match" by the FIFA Technical Study Group (TSG). The Danes had strong defensive play, especially from their goalie Thomas Sorenson, who saved over a half dozen shots with potential. He would have been a far better choice.
The German game was no more enjoyable, though for different reasons. The game was a physical one from the start, and rapidly degenerated in spite of a referee who handed out yellow cards like a Vegas dealer (so eloquently stated by the ESPN commentators). Indeed, at least a third of the 16 yellow cards handed out in that game were undeserved. Four of those yellows were to two players, one on each team, with the result that the game was completed with only 10 players per side. In spite of the flurry of yellow cards, the referee still managed to miss an incident when, in the air, German striker Miroslav Klose knocked down Cameroonian defender Rigobert Song and then landed with his cleat on the Cameroonian's face, causing a bloody nose. The incident was replayed in slow motion, and it was obvious Klose (later named Man of the Match) could have easily avoided stepping on Song. Later in the match, Song threw an elbow Klose and then stepped on his head, but again the referee missed it. Even more incredibly, the commentators didn't pick up the connection to the previous incident. Germany won 2-0, incidentally, but I'm not going to be rooting for them anymore. There was no "beautiful game" at work in their play. They were, well, jerks.
With France out of the running, and Italy soon to join them, my personal picks will be (in order): Brazil, Spain, and Portugal (they redeemed themselves very well against Poland, and hopefully they will defeat Korea). Of course the United States is a sentimental favorite, but for them to survive the second round would be nearly impossible, though getting there now looks likely. I would also like to see Turkey advance, which they will do if they defeat China by two and Brazil holds Costa Rica scoreless, as well as in other possible scenarios. Sweden is a good team, but they don't really grab me. England and Mexico similarly uninspirational for me. I would like to see Japan and Belgium advance from Group H; I just don't like the Russians. Nor do I like Croatia, but I expect them to defeat Ecuador to advance. Finally, I am hoping against hope that Italy defeats Mexico, which would be enough for them to advance.
After watching a good 15 or so games so far, I'm pretty certain that I would want to be a professional soccer player over all other sports. Given choice of countries (excepting the US, of course), I'd pick Italy, Spain, or France. And, while I'm wishing, I think I'd want to be a midfielder or a goalie. Maybe in my next life.
And the villagers rejoiced. My teams have won so far. Brazil (of course), Turkey, Italy, Belgium, and Japan all advance. Of course, Belgium is going to run smack into the Brazilian juggernaut, but you never know... Those Brazilians aren't too defensively focused, which we saw in the 2 goals scored by Costa Rica in the final Group C match. Italy struggled into the second round where they could meet any of Korea, the US, or Portugal (to be determined in about 5 hours, but I won't know for another 10). Japan's got an excellent team, so it's good to see them advance. I just plain didn't like Russia, so I was happy to see Belgium win in a suprisingly exciting game to close out Group H.
On the subject of the World Cup, visit the homepage of the most terrifying referee on Earth. I've seen this guy in games; they picked flattering pictures on the website. I especially like the "action pose" of him handing out a yellow card to (it looks like) a French player. Why does a referee even have a home page? Never mind, I have an even more important question: why does this guy have fans?!?! Incidentally, more action poses in that site's galleries, including a red card. Then there are really scary pictures of him looking angry and even scarier ones of him smiling. Yeesh. I'm not going to be able to sleep now.
So my teams didn't all win. Portugal got knocked out by Korea in the last game of Group D, giving the US the edge even though they lost to Poland 3-1. The Korean teams is excellent, though. They were relentless; they never let the Portuguese team just hang on to the ball without getting pressured. I feel sorry for the Italian team that is going to face them next. The US will face Mexico, which will probably end their run.
I just watched the US beat Mexico. That was a surprise. I'm starting to think there's something about the US team that I just can't read; they can't have gotten lucky in three games (Portugal, Korea, and Mexico) to get this far. Obviously there is some skill factor at work that I'm not reading. But I stand by my assessment that the US national team has the dorkiest coach of any team in the World Cup.
Alas, the dream is over. South Korea lost to Germany in the semi-final. I wanted Germany to lose. I still want Germany to lose. After the Germans scored, the noise level in the stadium (in Seoul) went up even higher, and the commentator noted: "the fans crank the volume to 10." The first thing that popped into my head (given how enthusiastic Korean fans have been) was: "this one goes to 11."
I think they need to throw sailing, shooting, and equestrian events out of the Olympics. Those aren't sports. Equestrian especially offends me. I don't think we need Olympic events for soccer and tennis, since they already have mature international competitions, but at least they're real sports. Rhythmic gymnastics and synchronized diving are silly, but at least they require skill and athletic ability.
I didn't realize that the Japanese were such strong gymnasts and swimmers.
I hate that mainstream news sources aren't obeying the time delay. I basically cannot look at news sites during the day because they will give me the results of the events that I have to wait until evening to see. Accidents have already sucked the suspense out of several finals.
The neat thing about gymnastics is that the lay person can tell what is good and what is bad. You don't need any specialized knowledge to be able to tell when someone screws up or when they nail a routine. Hmm... screw and nail... fasteners used as opposing metaphors...
China is really coming on strong in just about every event; no doubt they are using Athens as a warmup to blowing out the world in Beijing in 2008.
So, I called out equestrian, shooting, and sailing events as being unworthy, but I gave no reason. It's simple. Those things are not human-powered. In each of those, the energy comes from a horse, gunpowder, or the wind. That's different from all of the other events and makes those events impure as expressions of the human spirit. Incidentally, "kudos" is a Greek word for "glory."
I am an unrepentant swimming snob. As I see it, there are 4 kinds of swimmers in the world:
People who don't know how to swim - Doggy paddle.
Self-taught swimmers - you can generally tell that they've seen good swimming but were never directly instructed. Their form is graceless and thrashing; they expend a lot of energy in what looks vaguely like a stroke but don't move very far. They don't like putting their faces in the water.
Lesson swimmers - they've had some swimming lessons. They know the forms, but they don't understand them. Their strokes are often marked by excessive precision. Sometimes they very precisely swim inefficiently, like in the breaststroke; in lessons, you are taught the arm motion and the leg motion, but you aren't taught how to make them flow together. Often you call tell by the arm motion in their "crawl" stroke; some put their arms into the water right next to their head, others slam their arms into the water as hard as they can, and others move their arms like they are petting the water. Sometimes they like to show off their flip turns, which are invariably slow and awkward.
Competitive swimmers - They learned the same strokes the lesson swimmers did, but then had years of swimming coaches stripping their strokes down to the bare essentials. The key here is economy of movement. The various parts of the strokes flow together rather than being independent parts. They roll their shoulders in the backstroke. Their breaststroke is a fluid, whole-body motion. Their butterfly ripples and skips across the water. Their freestyle is fast but smooth. Former competitive swimmers never start standing; they either dive in or push off the wall. They never stop swimming and put their feet down before reaching the edge; competitive swimmers always, always, always finish to the wall.
As comes as no surprise, I put myself in the last category. There's just a qualitative difference that you can see. I'm terribly judgmental when go to pools, even though I am 10 years and 45 pounds beyond my peak, which was only average. But you never forget the training, the years of 7am practices in 64 degree water with coaches yelling at you to go faster and faster and faster.
I had the benefit of trying many sports in my life. I think it's important to learn how to play sports. You learn a certain degree of comfort and ease in moving your body that you don't get through ordinary, day to day activity. You learn to manipulate objects finely. Not all sports are equal, though, and not all sports teach the same thing. To get the maximum effect, you have to try several different kinds of sports. I've broken them up into various categories:
Race sports: Track, cross country, swimming, cycling, rowing. You learn that you don't just go and run/swim/bike. There are technique and strategy even if they aren't obvious.
Throwing sports: Baseball, basketball, football, water polo. Everybody needs to learn how to throw a ball well. I'm a little hesitant to put basketball in this category, as the throwing motion is different.
Stick sports: Golf, baseball, lacrosse, hockey, tennis, billiards. You learn to manage an object indirectly, by applying controlled leverage to an intermediate tool.
Kicking sports: Soccer, kickball, football. Soccer really stands above and beyond the others, as their use of kicking is minimal.
Body sports: Dance, martial arts, yoga, gymnastics, wrestling. You learn to coordinate and balance and stretch your body in ways you wouldn't otherwise.
I have played baseball, basketball, tennis, billiards, soccer, run track, swum competitively, and learned two martial arts. It's also important to split along the axis of competitive/non-competitive and team/individual and make sure you get one of each kind (martial arts are both competitive and non-competitive). If you didn't learn a sport from each of the categories above, you missed out on something. There are omissions from the list above, like volleyball, skating, skiing, and so forth. That's not because I believe them to be worthless, but rather that I don't believe they make as valuable a contribution to your normal life as those listed above.
The more you splash, the more energy you waste. Slapping the water doesn't make you go faster.
If you won't put your face in the water, you are wasting your time.
All of your energy should go into propelling yourself forward. If you are pushing water down, sideways, or (heaven forbid) forward, you are wasting your energy.
You should always be level in the water; your whole body should ride partly above and partly below the surface.
Your stroke should be smooth; you should not be swimming like "left, right, breathe, left, right, breathe, etc." It should all be one fluid motion. Your upper body and lower body should move together, not independently.
To swim faster, push harder; don't stroke faster.
Raise your head only enough to get your mouth out of the water.
Exhale underwater so you minimize the time your head is up.
Breathe out through your nose so water doesn't get in it.
Breathing slows you down. Don't overdo it. Seriously.
Do you know how to run? Really? Apparently there are different ways. I had no idea. One that I heard about today is the Pose method. I don't know how to react; it's just weird. It doesn't help that the site looks like a self-help guru's site or that they trademarked the name, but a woman at work says it helps.
I figure there are two types of people when it comes to sports commentary. Some people listen to it, maybe just because it's there, or because they want to. Others don't listen to it because it is stupid. I take the middle ground: I listen to it precisely because it is stupid. They called the US vs. Sweden curling match "a game of cat and mouse." Figure skater Evan Lysacek learned an "important life lesson" when he bounced back from a poor short program performance. Then there's how they pick exactly one biographical datum about each individual or team and repeat it endlessly, whether it be Jamie Silverstein's overcoming an eating disorder or Tanith Belbin's "ordeal" in becoming an American citizen
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. It's hilariously stupid.
It's also amusing how many of the commentators have accents. This isn't a knock by any means on the commentators, but rather that it makes obvious how Americans only care about many of these sports once every four years, if that. For sports like curling, biathlon, bobsled, etc., the commentators are often Canadian, English, Scottish, or even fluent non-native speakers. We just don't have the interest to support homegrown American "talent" when they're only needed once every four years. The same thing happens with the World Cup, though 10 years of MLS should change that.
Less fun is how thoroughly white the Winter Olympics are. South Korea, Japan, and China provide a steady shot of color, but that's about it. Part of that is justifiable: there aren't a lot of places (where people actually live) that have real winters, and those are mainly Europe, Russia, and North America. However, there are significant non-white populations in those areas that aren't represented. I ascribe that in part to cultural factors, but also to how expensive these sports can be. Skiing and snowboarding require a substantial capital investment, as well as the lift ticket fees. Ice skating requires expensive lessons. I have no clue how anyone gets started with bobsledding and curling, but I'm sure that's not cheap, either. Those costs will naturally favor white people. I don't know what, if anything, should be done about it, but it sure is a shame.
Speaking of bobsledding, I don't think it belongs in the Olympics. I'm sure it requires skill, but that is the skill of piloting. I'm not too keen on the rifle shooting events, either. I figure that any event included in the Olympics should require at least a few of the following
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:
Precision
Strength
Stamina
Speed
Agility
Elegance/Artistry
Bobsledding requires precision, but none of the others. Shooting requires precision, too, but only archery requires strength. Most importantly, they should be human-powered, which singles out the worse of them, the equestrian events. The Olympics are about celebrating the human body. Horseback riding requires skill, certainly, but it belongs in the Olympics no more than car racing. I assume it's only there as a vestige of the more aristocratic era in which the modern Olympics were born.
In general, I'm also against some of the team-oriented sports. The Olympics should celebrate individual excellence. I distinguish between sports like hockey and the 4x100 relay. Victory in the former relies on the success of the group
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, whereas in the latter, it is the sum of individual performances. Furthermore, games like soccer have a significant strategic element that muddies the waters. A mediocre team with superior strategy can defeat an excellent team with poor strategy. That is certainly a good thing in many cases, it will diminish the importance of the attributes I list above. The Olympic motto is "Swifter, Higher, Stronger,"
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but nowhere does it say "smarter."
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Can you tell someone in our house likes the ice skating?
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More interesting to me is that ice skating embodies all of the attributes of an Olympic sport.
I've reviewed the 2006 World Cup groups and picked the teams I favor most in each. These are not the teams I expect to win necessarily, but the ones that I want to win (for various silly and not-so-silly reasons).
Costa Rica over Germany, Poland, and Ecuador. I want to go to Costa Rica one day. It seems like a very interesting country. Plus I've inherited from my dad an attraction to the underdog. I know nothing of Poland and Ecuador, while Germany has a brutal, aggressive style of play lacking in style or finesse. They win, but they're not fun to watch.
Sweden over England, Paraguay, and Trinidad. I liked how the Swedes played last time around.
Netherlands over Argentina, Côte d'Ivoire, and Serbia-Montenegro. I like the Netherlands, both the country and the soccer-playing style. Argentina's a powerhouse in soccer, but I don't have much of a feel for them. Nor do I know much about Côte d'Ivoire. Serbia-Montenegro I am explicitly rooting against; Serbian fans are apparently some of the most racist in Europe. I would very much like to see the Latins of Argentina and the Africans of Côte d'Ivoire kick Serbia's ass.
Mexico and Portugal over Angola and Iran. Mexico's our pal, this silly political controversy over immigration notwithstanding. Portugal gave us vinho verde. I don't have a feel for Angola. Iran? Pshaw. I might have been positively disposed towards them under Khatami, but not under this Ahmadinejad lunatic.
USA over Italy, Ghana, and the Czech Republic. C'mon, is there any question about this one? U! S! A! U! S! A! U! S! A!
Oof. Tough bracket. I pick Japan and Brazil over Croatia and Australia. I liked Croatia in the last World Cup, but they can't compete with Japan and Brazil for my affections. Japan's our pal and entertainingly bizarre. On top of it, their team in the last World Cup was excellent. I was really impressed. As for Brazil, how can you not root for Brazil? They make soccer into the beautiful game.
South Korea over France, Togo, and Switzerland. No question at all. Korea had an amazing run in 2002, getting into the semi-finals before running out of gas and losing the third-place match to Croatia. The team was just fantastic, and I hope they return with the same skill and vigor they showed then.
I have no strong preference between Ukraine and Tunisia. I think I'll go with Tunisia, since I'm guessing they're an underdog. I have nothing positive to say about Saudi Arabia (big surprise). Spain, which will likely win this bracket, has some of the more racist fans in the sport. I would be pretty pleased to see the Berbers and Arabs of Tunisia thump them.
So there you have it, for whatever it's worth. Only one month to go.
The first World Cup 2006 matches are a week from tomorrow, but the first ones I care about won't be until the 12th. Somehow I don't think I'll have the time to watch anywhere close to 2/3 of the 6364 matches like I did last time.
Driving along, this other driver cut me off. The first thing that popped into my head was, "Ref, yellow card!" Maybe I should have thrown myself to the ground, clutching my knee and grimacing in agony.
I've managed to watch about a half dozen of the games thus far. None have been great, but a few were pretty decent. The Brazil vs. Croatia game was all right. Brazil looked sluggish, but Croatia impressed, even as they lost. They got numerous good chances, but just couldn't go all the way.
Yesterday's Spain vs. Ukraine game was good, but was marred by a terrible call by the referee. A Spanish player with the ball in the box stumbled either on his own or due to incidental contact with a Ukrainian defender. It wasn't worth a penalty, especially since the Spaniard got a clean shot off, but the Ukrainian was sent off with a red card. Since it happened in the box, Spain got a penalty kick as well. The goal off that pushed them up to a 3-0 lead, which was out of reach of a 10-man Ukrainian squad.
The fourth Spanish goal was a beautiful one, but I can't help but think the game would have gone a lot differently had Ukraine not lost their 11th man, a goal, and their morale in the 46th minute with that bad call. Hopefully, they can pull out victories against Tunisia and Saudi Arabia, because they proved they belong in their tenacious and skillful play. It wasn't a 4-0 game; I think without that bad call, it could have been a 2-1 game. Still a Spanish victory, but not the blowout 4-0 implies. Incidentally, I found the 4th Spanish goal on YouTube. The video quality doesn't do it justice, but the official site is broken.
I've been thinking about why soccer isn't popular in the United States. I figure it comes down to three interlocking and reinforcing reasons, none of which have anything to do with the game itself. First off, there's inertia. It sounds like a non-answer, but soccer isn't popular because soccer wasn't popular a while ago. People enjoy sports that people around them enjoy, starting with their parents. Adults today don't watch soccer because their family and friends didn't watch soccer during their formative years. They're less likely to pick up an interest now.
Another killer for soccer is that the US loses. Americans don't watch the Olympics, they watch Americans in the Olympics. They watch events with Americans in them, especially events where the Americans are the favorites. Most of the Americans watching the World Cup are that way as well; they only care about the US team.
Consider the other major sports. Football is barely played outside the US, so we never see an American team lose. Basketball is the same way, though to a lesser degree. Baseball is played well in numerous countries, but we just pretend they don't exist and call a championship of American and Canadian teams "The World Series." Americans don't like watching soccer because the US team isn't very good. MLS helps in that respect because it's American teams playing other American teams, but MLS just doesn't compare to the Premier League or the Bundesliga, and Americans know it. Americans want to be the best, and when they're not, they lose interest.
The other kind of competition is for attention. In the United States, we have well-developed baseball, basketball, football, and hockey play, all at professional and college levels both, American sports fans already have plenty of sports to watch. There's little room for soccer because the space it might occupy in people's interest is already occupied.
That has a corollary in how promising athletes get pulled away from soccer. Someone who's good at one sport tends to be good at others. Michael Jordan was a better Chicago Bull than baseball player, but he still was good enough to play minor leagues. Tim Duncan of the San Antonio Spurs was a top swimmer until an accident of fate switched him to basketball. The money and the attention are on sports other than soccer, so good athletes tend to choose those sports. That's not to say that American soccer players are the leftovers from other sports, merely that they have to really like soccer to stick with it.
Sure, people will say soccer is boring, but c'mon, have you seen a baseball game? Basketball and football seem kind of repetitive, too. Once you achieve a certain minimum level of interest, it becomes entirely subjective, a reason after the fact. People think soccer is boring because they don't watch it, not the other way around.
Of course, in spite of those reasons, I'm a big fan. I readily admit that part of it is elitist snobbery; I'd be far less interested in soccer if everyone else around here was also. Mainly, I like the fluidity, individual skills, and the tension. The first two are easy to understand. The tension is less so. In soccer, anyone could score at any time. It just takes a few seconds. That's true in football and basketball as well. With football (as with baseball), the game is too structured. There's little fluidity because of the start/stop nature of play. As a result, you don't have the same sorts of ebbs and flows. Basketball has that, but each point means so little in the grand scheme that there's little celebration or disappointment for most of the game.
Soccer also has uncertainty that magnifies the tension in soccer. In basketball, football, and baseball, scoring is easy enough that you can just tell how the game went by the score. That's not true of soccer. Since scoring is harder, measuring how well a team is doing is slippery. The American games are about scoring, while soccer is about getting chances to score. The former is easier to measure, while the latter is more suspenseful. Just because someone could score at any time doesn't mean they will; usually, they'll fail. But they'll make you hold your breat even so.
Even those reasons don't go very far. I'm only interested in soccer for one month out of every four years. There's something special about the World Cup
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. I like that it seems less commercial (in spite of the blizzard of logos) and more pure than professional play, akin to how many Americans prefer college sports. I like the exoticism of teams from all over the world. It's also how I got started watching soccer, so watching MLS or even the Premier League ($$$) would feel like a step down. Finally, there's the time commitment. I can manage to watch a few dozen games every four years, but I couldn't imagine watching a sport regularly. At least Uma will be 5 next time I make Jessica a World Cup widow.
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And it's not that there are 32 teams (2^5) and 64 games (2^6), though that doesn't hurt.
I've been disappointed in Brazil. They've won their games, but not in the way I expect Brazil to play. Don't get me wrong, both Croatia and Australia have solid teams (even if the latter think they're playing rugby). But this is Brazil. They should have crushed them. They had little flair.
Ronaldo was of marginal importance against Australia, and nearly useless against Australia. Ronaldinho wasn't particular helpful either, though part of the credit for that goes to Australia's excellent work in cutting off his options. Brazil scored goals, but had little of the Brazilian style or dominance I expected. That level of play might work against Australia, Croatia, and Japan, but Brazil needs to pick up their game if they expect to defeat teams like Spain, Argentina, the Netherlands, etc. Not only would they be unable to win, I wouldn't want them to win.
The teams I've enjoyed most so far are Argentina and Spain. Argentina had a monster game against Serbia-Montenegro, putting 6 balls in the net. Their second goal was beautiful, even better than the fourth Spanish goal against Ukraine that I mentioned before. Sadly, I haven't found any good enough video of it. YouTube's quality is abysmal. The official site, while no longer broken, doesn't show enough of the buildup and wastes time on crowd reactions. You can give it a try (sorry, no direct link). The Argentines were powerful and dominant; I'd say they're now my number one pick, given Brazil's weak play.
Spain was also impressive. Their game against Ukraine was solid, as I mentioned before. Yesterday's match against Tunisia turned into a surprising nail-biter. Tunisia scored very early, before the 10th minute, and then clamped down. They had all 11 men in their half most of the time; since Spain couldn't risk sending so many forward, Tunisia was often able to put 2 men on each Spaniard. They shut down the offense, with Spain getting increasingly desperate and the fans looking despondent. In the 71st minute, though, they managed to sneak in a goal, releasing a wave of relief that was almost palpable. This put Tunisia in a bind. They already had one tie against Saudi Arabia, so they needed a win. They had to loosen up their backfield to put men forward, but this created openings that the Spanish were able to exploit to score a second time 5 minutes after the first. There was a third goal late in the game on a penalty kick. The commentators judged it a harsh call by the referee, which I disagreed with; perhaps I am biased because I dislike the game getting physical, and Tunisia's style definitely was that.
I don't have any loyalty to Spain the team, but I do enjoy watching them play. It's not just a question of skill, but their constant attack. If you've seen the Netherlands playing with a lead, you've seen how the Orange do possession plays, passing the ball back and forth in safe territory to eat up time. The Spanish do something that is superficially similar, in that they hang back moving the ball around the backfield, but it's fundamentally different. The Dutch are trying to run down the clock. The Spanish are trying the set up a play, moving the ball to make the opposition move, to find holes and place their men, like a predator stalking their play. It seems like they're being lame, but they're really finding their opportunity. These pauses are part of their attack, which, in the two games I've seen, is unrelenting. Spain keeps probing for weaknesses and trying to score, and that makes for a fun game to watch.
The most fun game I've seen, though, would be the France v. S. Korea game. The game ended in a 1-1 tie, which should have been a 2-1 France win, but the referee didn't see that the ball was past the line when the Korean goalie bobbled it out. 1-1 sounds like a dull game, but it was anything but. The French came onto the field fired up. They were strong, but they didn't dominate the Koreans, who gave almost as good as they got. The game was a back-and-forth pitched (haha) battle for the whole 90 minutes. It might not have been as superficially spectacular as Argentina's 6-0 victory over Serbia-Montenegro, or Germany's 4-2 against Costa Rica, but it was a higher quality game.
The winner of that group will come down to the final game, as there have been 2 ties already. In spite of their excellent play, France may not advance. They must defeat Togo and either have no tie in the Switzerland/Togo game, or score numerous goals to win on goal differential. We shall see.
Finally, the boys in red, white, and blue. I thought the United States made a hash of their Italy game. The commentators went on and on about how the US was gritty and brilliant in holding Italy to a tie, but they laid it on so thick it seemed they'd forgotten that the sole goal against Italy was scored by an Italian. I just have not been impressed with the US team. I thought they were better in 2002. Regardless of how they do, they're just not interesting to watch.
I have little team loyalty (as evinced by my dropping Brazil and adopting Argentina) because it's the game that matters to me rather than the team. I've felt vaguely and irrationally guilty about my lack of interest in the United States team, I think because I've been conditioned to think that there is something unpatriotic about it. That's ridiculous of course, as mentioning piloting airplanes into skyscrapers and kicking a ball in the same breath makes obvious. The word patriot has been hijacked, but that's an issue for another day. The point is, the US team isn't particularly good, and that fact doesn't really bother me.
Incidentally, I thought of another reason that soccer isn't popular in the United States. This one actually has to do with the game itself. Soccer is a sport where judging individual ability is hard. You can easily tell whether someone is a good player in football, basketball, and baseball. Even hockey, while sharing many similarities with soccer, is easier, as there are only 4 players (other than the goalie), so it's easy to tell who is pulling how much weight. It's a lot harder with soccer. Rarely is there a solo goal. Soccer stars don't exist in isolation, as the performance of Côte d'Ivoire and star Didier Drogba demonstrate. Strikers need the midfield to serve up viable shots, and even the best mid-fielders usually fail. Most goals don't seem spectacular in and of themselves; the actual ball-going-in-the-goal part isn't nearly as spectacular as Michael Jordan driving to the hoop or Vince Young running for a touchdown.
The skill of being a striker comes in deft touches, with the difference between good and bad measured in mere inches of foot or head position, or just being in the right place at the right time. The skill of a midfielder is in controlling the pace of the game and building a play. That's not something that's readily apparent from watching a game. Even goalie skill is can be hard to judge, as there are often so many players in front of the goal that random factors make things problematic. Goalies are heavily reliant on defenders to stop the opposing offense. The defenders are reliant on the midfielders to prevent the ball from even getting that far back, and they are often called upon to serve in a support role. The number of so-called defenders who score or assist goals is comically high.
The point is that soccer is very much a team sport, and since it has so many team members in relatively fluid roles, assessing the contribution of any single player can be difficult. America is a country that loves the diamond in the rough, the standout star. They exist in soccer, of course, but their performance is more obscured and affected by the performance of the rest of their team. Other nations are less fiercely individualistic, so they don't have to adapt as Americans must.
Of the remaining first round matches, I'm looking forward to today's already-happened-but-unknown-to-me Ecuador-Germany and Sweden-England matchups. Tomorrow features Portugal-Mexico and Netherlands-Argentina, both of which promise top action. Thursday's games are uninspiring, but I'll watch USA-Ghana out of a misplaced sense of duty, and Brazil-Japan hoping the Seleção can live up to their past glories. Friday closes out the first round with France-Togo and Korea-Switzerland figuring how who joins Togo in taking an early flight home. It also features Spain against Saudi Arabia, which I'll likely watch as well, as I haven't seen Saudi Arabia play yet. I had been hoping to see every team play at least once, but it looks like Poland, Iran, Angola, and Trinidad & Tobago will leave the tournament sight unseen (by me).
Brazil showed a little bit of why they're the top pick against Japan yesterday. Japan did well in the first half, but crumbled in the second. Ronaldo scored 2 of Brazil's 4 goals, but I still think he should be on the bench. I'm sure having Adriano or another Brazilian striker in his stead would have resulted in a similar or greater victory. When he wasn't hanging out in front of the goal to put the cherry on top of the rest of his team's plays, he was muddling around trying to avoid the ball. The goals he scored were good ones, but he wasted several more good chances, and his possession aside from taking shots generally involved giving the ball right back to whoever gave it to him. I won't speculate as to the reason for his limp play, but he's been that way for three games now, so it's time to bench him.
Sadly, our new entertainment center doesn't seem to give Tivo quite the ventilation it needs, as it has been locking up frequently. As a result, I didn't record any of today's games. I was pleased to see France managed to push through to the second round; it was pretty dicey for them. I was glad Ukraine beat Tunisia, as they are a strong team; their 4-0 loss to Spain should really have been a 2-0 or 2-1 loss but for a bad call by the referee. Spain didn't need to do anything except show up, but got a win anyway over Saudi Arabia. Finally, I was sad to see South Korea fail to progress, but at least I'll be able to see Switzerland play.
I copied the brackets for the remaining rounds of the tournament from the FIFA web site and filled in my (initial) predictions for the remainder of the tournament:
I know I've ragged on Brazil's performance, but I think they'll be able to manage Ghana. Though I like Spain, I think Brazil will have picked up their game enough to beat them. I don't see France winning against Spain; they made it out of the first round, but only barely. I picked the Netherlands over Portugal almost arbitrarily, as I haven't seen Portugal play. I think the Netherlands will be able to squeak by England, but it will be close. Their semifinal against Brazil will also be close, but I see Brazil winning out there, as well.
In the other bracket, Germany will be able to power past Sweden, though I wouldn't mind of the Swedes beat them. I both want and expect Argentina to beat them after cruising past Mexico, even with Germany's home field advantage, but that will also be a close match. Italy should get by Australia without much trouble. I haven't seen Switzerland, so my pick of Ukraine is a little arbitrary. Regardless, whoever wins that will lose to Italy, who will then lose to Argentina in the semi-finals. I figure this as the "bracket of life," with either the Argentina/Germany/Mexico/Sweden bracket or Ecuador/England/Netherlands/Portugal serving as the "bracket of death."
This puts Germany and Italy in the third-place match, where I give Germany the slight edge. The final will feature the two titans of South American futbol, Argentina and Brazil. I hope and expect this to be a fantastic game, with the final victory going to Argentina. Since I'm already this far out on a limb, I predict a score of 3-2 (and let's say 1-0 in Italy/Germany).
So there you have it, a precise prediction of what will not happen over the next two weeks. I'll be back Tuesday with revised predictions.
I ended up getting 6 of the 8 World Cup matches right, which sounds like a better result than it is. Just blindly picking the teams that won their group to win their round-of-16 matches would have gotten 6 of 8 as well. My weakest call was Netherlands over Portugal, which was of course wrong. My other weak call was Ukraine over Switzerland, which happened to be right. Then there was France vs. Spain, which I knew would be close. France was the better team yesterday and justifiably won, though I was bummed about it. I don't think their rematch of the 1998 World Cup final against Brazil will go quite as well, though. My revised predictions are below, with my erroneous calls in red.
I am increasingly convinced that Germany will beat Argentina, but I still want Argentina to win, so I'm sticking with that call. I feel like the remainder are no brainers. England is just a weak team. The Germany/Argentina match really ought to be a semi-final, but this is the sort of thing that happens. After seeing Mexico against Argentina, I certainly think they deserve to be in the quarter-finals more than Ukraine, Italy, or even England. Again, that's just what happens.
Thus far, I think this year's tournament isn't up to the quality of 2002. Maybe it's because I'm not getting as immersive an experience; I haven't seen all 90 (or more) minutes of any game yet. Beyond that, though, there's a degree of predictability to the results. 6 of the 8 quarter-finalists are traditional heavyweights, having won World Cups in the past (only Ukraine and Portugal have not). Further, only Uruguay of the 7 nations that have ever won a World Cup is not in these quarter-finals, and their last win was 56 years ago. England has the next longest drought, at 40 years, but the remaining 5 have all won a World Cup since 1982.
Compare that to 2002, which had the USA and Senegal making it to the quarter-finals, and Turkey and South Korea making it all the way to the semis. I wanted the underdogs to have a good shot at it, as I think the sport is too dominated by Europe. Then there's the controversy over the referees. I can easily name 4 games that were corrupted by bad officiating. I don't remember this in 2002 when we had Pier Luigi Collina's iron fist (in the France/Spain game, a commentator wished out loud for Collina's presence). There are still 8 games remaining, so I'll try not to be too down on this tournament.
Nevertheless, I'm already looking forward to 2010 in South Africa. They're an additional 2 hours ahead of Germany, which will make the games even more inconvenient, but it'll also likely be easier for me to find the time then (*fingers crossed*). I predict that Russia will qualify and make the second round in South Africa, as Guus Hiddink has signed on to be their coach (assuming he stays through until 2010). The man seems to know how to get teams good, being credited with South Korea's amazing run to the semi-finals in 2002 and Australia's reaching the round-of-16 this time around, losing out to Italy through no fault of their own. That may also give some of the younger teams, like Spain, a chance to more fully develop their talents. If nothing else, it'll be four years of anticipation.
Bummer bummer bummer bummer. My teams lost. I don't much care that Brazil lost. It wasn't about the score so much as Brazil not being the Brazil of old. They didn't play to their potential. I said earlier that if Brazil didn't pick up their game compared to the first round, they wouldn't get very far. Well, they didn't pick up their game, and they paid the price. It wasn't just Ronaldo, though his slowness and random falling over didn't help anything.
The whole team was limp. They didn't win because they didn't deserve to.
That's not to say that France was unworthy. Far from it. They played an excellent game. I'd gotten sick of hearing the commentators praise Zinedine Zidane, endlessly lamenting his imminent retirement. After the Brazil game, though, I can understand. The man was brilliant. The game's only goal was credited to Thierry Henry, but it was Zizou who made it happen. He ran the game like a general, constantly aware of the whole field, dropping passes with pinpoint precision, and using his magnificent footwork to dance out of tricky situations. Ribery and Vieira both had strong presences as well, but this was Zidane's game.
Portugal v. England was pretty close, as I expected, but Figo et al. sent the English packing. They were missing a couple of key players with yellow cards, so I expect they'll provide better competition against France. That will be a close game; I expect it will hinge on how much the French expended themselves in defeating Brazil.
The result of Italy v. Ukraine was no surprise, but the game itself was surprisingly exciting. I kind of wish I watched the whole thing, but I had more important priorities.
Which brings us to Argentina. That game was a heart-breaker. I knew it was going to be a tough one from the beginning, but it was even more tense than I had imagined. That it finished with penalty kicks left a real sour taste. Brazil didn't deserve to win, but Argentina did. Whether they deserved to win more than Germany is up for debate, but I do know why Argentina lost. It came down to one mistake by the Argentine goalkeeper. No, he didn't let the ball go by. Instead, he went out into a cluster of players when he should have stayed behind, getting a knee in the chest for his efforts (neither foul nor intentional, unless it was really subtle). Apparently, that hurts. A few minutes later, he left the game to be replaced by Argentina's #2 keeper. Germany's equalizing goal happened after that, and it's likely the first goalkeeper would have missed it as well. However, the game ended on penalty kicks, and that's where a better goalkeeper would have made a diffeerence. Furthermore, after replacing the goalkeeper, Argentina only had two subs remaining. This was important enough in regular time, but even more so during the two overtimes and the penalty kicks. I am firmly convinced that the knee to the goalie's chest is what tipped the game to Germany.
The final four are far less interesting than in 2002. Three of the four have already won World Cups, and all four are European. Compare that to 2002, when only Germany and Brazil were previous winners, and only Germany was from Europe proper (the other two were South Korea and Turkey). My order of preference is a perfect inverse to what I expect will actually happen. I most want Portugal to win, as they've never won before. My next choice is France, as I've enjoyed watching them play. Italy would be my third preference, with Germany coming in last. At this point, it looks like Germany will triumph, however. If Italy defeats them in their semi-final today, then I think Italy will win overall. France I expect to squeak out over Italy and then lose in the final, with the same result for Portugal if they win.
Overall, I'm a little disappointed in this World Cup. The Argentine loss and the lackluster Brazilian play sealed it. I'm looking forward to South Africa 2010, but four years is a long time to wait. Both the aforementioned teams will be able to bring back key players, but not all of them, and some of them will be into their thirties by then. Zinedine Zidane is proof that you can still play world-class soccer at 34, but he is the exception. That might be of benefit to Brazil, but I worry that Argentina may have lost their best chance for a time. Still, one can hope.
Maybe it's the symmetry, or the odd expressions, or that the staff apparently thought those were the best pictures of Zidane and Figo were the best available.
I'm hoping that technology advances to the point of providing the ideal, immersive World Cup experience by 2018 (Mexico?). There are a bunch of moving parts to it.
First off, I want a giant HDTV display, but I don't want to pay a lot. 2018 ought to be plenty of time for HD circuitry to get super-cheap. For the display, I figure it's either OLED or DLP, but either way, I expect 52" to be way cheaper and way better than it is today with standard projection, plasma, or LCD TVs.
I want to be able to pick and choose what is added to the feed. ESPN did a terrible job of choosing how and when to display screen overlays. They were too big, too opaque, and badly timed, often obscuring the action. Often, they showed me things I didn't care about or already knew. I want to be able to choose how that stuff is displayed, or if it's displayed at all. I also want little icons floating over the players' heads that tell me who they are, and give me some way of accessing their info on the side.
Then there were the commentators. I was fine when they said things like, "Kaka to Ronaldo, Ronaldo back to Ze Roberto. Nice move to get around Thuram, but the pass to Adriano got picked off." I was less fine when they were going on and on about how much they wanted to marry Bruce Arena and have like ten thousand of his babies, or repeated for the millionth time that Côte d'Ivoire was in the middle of a civil war. So I want to be able to pick and choose live commentary from any source I want, or turn it off entirely without muting the rest of the game.
One more big thing is the camera angles. I want a lot more of them. I want clusters at each corner, over each goal, on either side of the half line, and directly over the center of the field. Each cluster should have 26 independent cameras to ensure that every player on the field, the ball, the referee, and the referee's assistants each have a camera fixed on them at all times (that's 234 total). Obviously, each of these cameras will have to track automatically rather than having a camera operator. I'd certainly have no problem with augmenting these with field-level steadicams, other positions, or whatever; this is just the minimum. The cameras should record at a greater resolution than HD. That way, optical zooming is unnecessary, with digital zooming being the norm. Finally, I should have direct access to all of these raw feeds, or be able to tune into someone else's "mixing" of them into a broadcast in the same way that I can do with commentary.
The first couple are pretty easy, but the last will require a huge amount of bandwidth. I figure that it's relatively possible if the raw feeds are only available to broadcasters, with them "flattening" the feeds into a single stream like the current state of the art. What's more important is having a number of cameras on any and all potential actors, so it's easy to see Zidane or Figo head-butting another player. Of course, these would also be very handy for improving the refereeing, but that's a topic for another day.
I have decided that I will enthusiastically watch the Women's World Cup next year. I have a daughter now, and I don't want her to think that women's sports are worth less than the men's. Besides, this way I can see a US soccer team that doesn't suck.
I'm not much of a sports fan. That's no surprise. However, I do enjoyreadingabout sports. That applies 110% when it comes to Michael Lewis. The writer of "Moneyball," Lewis's latest is "The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game." Like "Moneyball" before it, "The Blind Side" has two interlocking threads. One is a broader narrative about a particular trend, while the other is about an individual embodying that trend. In "Moneyball," Lewis told us about the increasingly sophisticated ways of valuing baseball players, as exemplified by Billy Bean's management of the Oakland Athletics.
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"The Blind Side" switches to football, discussing the increasing importance of passing and the quarterback, and thus the importance of the left tackle, who protects the quarterback1. The personal side is the story of one Michael Oher, a poor black kid in Memphis who was everything that a left tackle should be, and the his efforts and the efforts of those around him to overcome the many deficits in his background to help him achieve his potential. That description may not reflect as positively on the book as it should. It really is interesting, and Michael Lewis writes in such a lucid and easy way that it makes the subject accessible and engaging. The man has a gift. If you're interested in sports or sports writing, you should definitely put this one on your to-read list. Even if you don't think you are interested, maybe you should give it a try anyway2.
1 Specifically, his blind side, the side he turns away from to throw.
2 Maybe read the article by Malcolm Gladwell (your friend and mine, right?) I also linked above to get an idea; if you like that, you'll probably like the book. If you don't, it's less than 2000 words, so you haven't lost anything.
Back when I was swimming regularly, I considered a mile to a mile and a half a good workout. That comes out to about 70 to 100 laps in a standard 25-yard pool. In a non-standard pool, though, like these fantastic ones, the whole workout would be just one round-trip.
What does it mean that only 5 of the top 45 teams in college football (Division I)1
are private schools? My bias tells me that it's because public schools are less accountable to their financiers, and so can justify blowing the money. Contrary to popular belief, college sports contribute very little to academics. Notre Dame contributes the most, at $21 million per year, or a respectable $1800 for each of the approximately 11,000 students. However, other programs contribute much less. The University of Texas Longhorns football team contributes $4.7 million per year to academics, or a paltry $94 for each of the approximately 50,000 students. The majority of profits get funneled back into sports programs. And these are among the most profitable programs in the most profitable college sports.
To me, this just supports my opinion that college sports are no different from professional sports. That is, for everyone who isn't a student. The networks make money, the coaches make money, the athletic programs make money, but the students rarely benefit. Few of the athletes benefit beyond the value of their scholarships; even the most successful programs rarely see more than a handful of their athletes enter the professional leagues. The big sports live in their own separate worlds from the rest of the university; they're de facto independent. UT's football team is nearly a professional football team, just with burnt orange branding.
There's nothing wrong with making money. I endorse that vigorously. In fact, I want to go further. Let the players get paid. Get rid of the academic requirements. Let the programs keep all of their money instead of letting the schools siphon some off. Forget the pretense of the student athlete 2 and call Division I football what it is: a development league for the NFL.
1
#8 University of Southern California,
#11 Boston College,
#19 Brigham Young University,
#34 Wake Forest University,
and
#40 the University of Tulsa
2 Which only exists in less visible sports or lower divisions
Am I the only one who thinks that the 40 members of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee have better things to do than to find out if Roger Clemens is a juicer? Maybe they can switch to something involving oversight and reform of, you know, the government. I tell you, next time any one of those Representatives claims that we need to make sacrifices because "we're at war" or anything like that...
I've been wondering about UT's choice of mascot. Texas culture about boldness. Aggression. I realize the longhorn is significant in Texas history, but why would they name themselves after a prey animal? And not just a prey animal, but a domesticated, ranch-raised one, not even a wild one. It doesn't fit.
