But it's churlish to complain about World Cup enthusiasm. What the sports-radio guys misunderstand is that situational enthusiasm, born of ignorance, is the heart of American sports culture.
Most normal sports-watching people are too smart to tune in for boring or irrelevant action. There is a whole hype industry waiting to bring the general public up to speed when it's time to care. Who watched any of Butler's regular-season college basketball games? And why should anyone have? Only basketball nerds would bother.
March Madness, not the Super Bowl, is the real reference point for the World Cup. Or the Olympics by way of March Madness. Once every four years, soccer stops being confusing and dull and organizes itself into a straightforward tournament, populated by easily identified teams. Who cares if Americans can't name any of the players or their professional clubs? We know what Haiti, Greece, and North Korea are. We can root for that.
-Tom Scocca
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