In the wake of last night’s entirely unexpected but nonetheless horrific elimination from Copa América at the hands of the Uruguayans, U.S. Soccer has never felt further from its goals. Has it been further from those goals? Probably. But it’s never felt like it. Anyway, I’m glad U.S. Soccer is trying to figure out what happened, but I hope they’re taking the right lessons from it. Specifically, I hope they use what they learn to make the U.S. Men’s National Team even worse.
Here’s the deal with sports, guys: We don’t like the same ones the rest of the world likes. This puts us at a disadvantage everywhere but the Olympics, where Stanford University and the existence of the Rocky Mountains keep us afloat. It is hard to be good at soccer when you don’t give a shit about soccer. Why should we keep trying?
The message our futility in soccer sends to the world is that we are futile. The message we need it to send is that we are apathetic about this silly game where the players wear silly shoes and the officials may or may not always be corrupt. We need to divert all men’s soccer funding away from men’s soccer, redirecting it into either crypto or the women’s game. We need to start accidentally missing matches and explaining we forgot. When the World Cup arrives in 2026, we need to say, “Oh, that was this month?” and then let Brazil play France only after the Cowboys get done practicing.
We aren’t going to be good at soccer, and all you nerds who spend too much time online (unlike me, a nerd who spends too much time online) need to stop hoping for it. Have a little pride. Give up.
Etc.
- Kemba Walker announced his retirement today, and while Walker’s NBA impact was real, he’ll always be a bigger figure in college basketball lore. Few will forget what he did in the postseason. 18 points in the NIT’s second round? In Blacksburg?? While overmatched??? Noble, heroic stuff.
- Sergio Garcia claims he came up short in qualifying for the British Open because fans were in his way. He was put on the clock for slow play, and he says this was unfair. “Unless we wanted to start hitting people, we couldn’t hit.” Uhh, Sergio? Sounds like there was an easy solution here.
