Where Mute Memories Start Talking

By now, everyone who owns a TV or reads a newspaper is well aware that David Beckham will be playing for the L.A. Galaxy in the MLS. In addition to this, everyone is also well aware that Beckham will do nothing to make soccer more popular here in the States. My question is this: Who decided that this is the case?

Most of our wonderful sportswriters here in America will try to make the claim that the American sports fans have made this decision. After all, every one of us would much rather watch tall, overpaid males throw a basketball through a hoop 80 times, none of which are meaningful until the last two minutes of the game. Slam dunks never get old, either, and we’re all perfectly content to see dunks constitute 8 of the 10 top plays on Sportscenter.

Sure, anyone could use numbers alone to make the case that there aren’t very many soccer fans in the United States. It’s still behind basketball, baseball, and American football. For some reason, sportswriters believe that a sport cannot survive in the United States if it operates in a niche market. While this may be true (or may not be), sportswriters have been reluctant to even give soccer a chance.

There are plenty of Americans out there who have a genuine interest in soccer. Many more have a genuine interest in David Beckham, for a number of different reasons : ). Sportswriters just lovvvve to downplay this fact and make the claim that nobody cares, nobody understands. Have the writers ever once considered that they themselves may be the reason that Beckham won’t have any impact?

Every single article I’ve read so far on Beckham is just another diatribe on the million reasons why he won’t do anything to increase American soccer’s popularity. Countless numbers of Americans read these articles and are immediately subjected to an extremely negative perception of soccer. These readers are then forever ingrained with a subliminal message: that as Americans, they must be uninterested in soccer, since “everyone else” is. If an American is repeatedly exposed to the idea that American sports fans hate soccer, he or she may instinctively decide that soccer isn’t a sport worth having any interest in. Automatically claiming disinterest in a sport without exploring it or giving it a chance is no way to make a decision. Unfortunately, sportswriters around the nation are causing countless numbers of individuals to do just that.

Yesterday, watching Chelsea win 1-0 was far more exciting than watching Tigres win 3-0, so forget about the whole lack-of-scoring argument. What the MLS needs is talent, and a lot of it. Buying 50-60 mediocre European players would help a lot more than snagging Beckham alone, but maybe Becks could be the start of something new if we all just give him a chance.

The point is this: if sportswriters and anchors continue to approach soccer with such a negative attitude, the sport has no chance at all of growing into something larger. The problem is not disinterest within the American public. There is a growing interest in the youth community, and a sizable contingent of my generation seems to be more interested in soccer than all the baby-boomers who control the media. The base is there, the talent is growing, and the interest is bobbing at the surface.

So to all the sportswriters out there: congratulations. You’re the biggest threat to soccer’s chances of gaining popularity in the United States. Keep demonizing the sport and everything it stands for, and it’ll be gone from here in no time- just like you all want it to be.