Musings

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– The Women’s World Cup pulled in some decent TV ratings, specifically the final, which garnered the highest viewing audience for a soccer match ever in the USA. With this news, the accompanying articles came flying in this week, talking about the growth of the game and how it is becoming mainstream. These stories come out after EVERY World Cup and the approximate number of eyeballs watching (and most of the public does not realize how much insane guesswork goes into these so-called Ratings) does not equate to the “growth” of the game. The majority of these people that watch US soccer get caught up in the patriotism as we Americans love getting behind the U-S-A, no matter the event. Take an informal poll of people that you know watched the women’s game and see how many genuinely have or will become fans of domestic or international soccer? A better question would be to those people that did watch the women, how many knew about Copa America going on around the same time, arguably the 3rd biggest soccer tournament in the world. While I do absolutely love our patriotism, comradery, passion and youthful energy for these events, let’s hold on the seemingly annual discussion of how the game is exploding in popularity because people watch a World Cup. We can safely say that the soccer momentum is gradually building (see the American Outlaws and the MLS Supporter Groups) and it’s been a thrill to both be a part of it and watch it over the last decade, but it will be awhile until the overall game is “mainstream”.
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– What’s the deal with tennis players touching each other now at there post-match handshake at the net. Does anyone else notice that instead of just shaking hands, male tennis players have a relatively new tendency to gently touch the opponent’s stomach, chest, or my new favorite, the cheek (see Jo-Wilfried Tsonga during the early Wimbledon rounds). I’m not opposed, but it’s a little weird and why is this now the hip thing?
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– Does anyone else get annoyed with the sports ticker at the bottom of the screen during events on ESPN, Fox, etc. NBC Sports Network at least does it right by not using it during events. I find the use of a ticker incredibly distracting when watching event and wish we would get away from this during games. I feel like in this day and age with smartphones, fans can get the info they want pretty quickly instead of seeing the gibberish at the bottom that has 75% useless “news” or scores. Good news are decent trends as the 24 hour sports networks have stopped using the bottom ticker during bigger sporting events.
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– Less than 60 days until Football is back….Yes! Yes! Yes! 

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