Improving the world's game

The World Cup started last week. Around the world, soccer fans are on edge as they follow their team’s fortunes. Countries are declaring national holidays so their citizens can stay home and watch their team’s games.
Meanwhile, in the United States, people are wondering why it’s taking so long this month to the golf highlights on SportsCenter.
It’s no secret soccer’s in the United States has a popularity that ranks it somewhere in the vicinity of lawn bowling and dwarf tossing. Every time the subject comes up — essentially every four years during the World Cup — Twin Cities newspaper columnists renew an argument against the game that has been going on at least since I played soccer in high school. This time around, one actually suggested liking soccer was just a few steps removed from burning the flag. “We’re Americans,” the message seemed to be. “We know better than to like that silly no-hands game.”
Ask them and Americans will give several reason for their dislike of soccer. A nation raised on the thrill-a-minute pacing of baseball does not believe the game is exciting enough. A country where fans frequently celebrate sports championships by turning over cars and starting fires tut-tut over the soccer hooligans who celebrate their team by fighting with the hooligan fans of rival teams.
Admittedly, there have been reports of Polish fans trying to schedule fights against rival fans. I don’t condone the violence, but it’s nice to know it’s so well scheduled. Although presumably the Poles would be wary of an planned brawl German fans, though.
Granted, soccer is not the easiest game to watch on TV. It’s hard to appreciate the individual work players do without seeing them up close, but it’s hard to appreciate the tactical aspect of the game — the reasons a team would pass the ball all the way back to its own goalkeeper when the goal is to get the ball in the net at the other end of the field — without a wide view.
Our sports do not lend themselves to moving backward, and it’s not a notion we accept readily. A runner would never voluntarily move back a base in baseball and a football team would never give up a sack just because it gave them more plays to choose from. About the closest we come in this country is a center in basketball passing the ball out for a three-pointer. But in Minnesota, home of the Timberwolves, even that must seem like a foreign concept.
I could argue the merits of soccer as a game, but that has been done before. Americans have their arguments and there isn’t much soccer fans will ever be able to do to convince them the game the rest of the world adores might be at least as entertaining as a rerun of According to Jim. Maybe what we need to do is find ways to make the world’s most popular game more appealing to the American public. With that in mind, I propose the following:
• At halftime, the team that is behind has to eat a tub of cow intestines.
• Two words: alligator pits.
• Every 15 minutes, someone gets voted off the team.
• Replace referees with women in striped bikinis.
• Speaking of scantily-clad women: where are the cheerleaders? How are we supposed to take a sport seriously when there are no dance squads? Come on, Sweden. Bring out the bikini team!
• Miss a shot, do a shot.
• Come on, you can use your hands just a little bit, can’t you?
• Is it too much to ask to have an occasional fight? And how about some kind of car crash?
• Two more words: exploding ball.
• No more letting goals decide the results of games. From now on, America votes. Think South Korea played the better game? Text your vote to 3845. Think Togo deserves the win? Text 3846.
I’m not sure any of this would actually be enough to make soccer appealing to the average American fan, but I’m pretty sure it’s a step in the right direction. If you disagree and would like to fight about it, please call to schedule a time.