Soccer American Style

I’ll miss watching US compete on the national stage and while I’ll likely watch another game or two I just don’t have the same level of interest I did when we were in it.  That doesn’t make me a bad soccer fan more likely it means I am a typical American.  The game as it is played really isn’t geared to our collective tastes as sports watchers.  To that end I give you a short list of things I think could improve the game by making it a little more “American” if you will.  I don’t mean to disparage the beautiful game but no one on the planet could argue that without good ol’ American ingenuity the world wouldn’t be half of what it is today.

1. Soccer needs more commercials. I know I posted two very cool commercials (here and here) but 45 minutes is a little much without a break to go get a beer or use the facilities.  The problem is simple – you could leave for 30 minutes and not miss anything or leave for 30 seconds and miss the one goal of the game.  So why not add more breaks and more cool commercials?  Perhaps moving away from to halves to four quarters with TV time outs once per quarter would work better.  It would intensify the action and give us time to hit the fridge without missing anything.
2. Time should countdown and not up. It’s the final count up!  That doesn’t sound right and while you are at it quit adding time.  So someone got hurt – stop the clock.  That’s what we do here if someone is really hurt we make time stop to get them help.  If they are faking it like I think a lot of them are I have a solution for that as well…
3. Issue a PINK card for being a wuss. I know the card thing is already complicated enough with a yellow card and a red card and what they mean and all that nonsense but I am all for ending the cry baby on the ground game stopping nonsense.  If you fall down and no one touched you we’re giving you a pink card – two pink cards and you are out the rest of this game and the next game or however long the referee feels you need to recover from being a wuss.
4. Enough with the damn horns already. I know it is a vuvuzela and I don’t care.  It is like any other kid with a noisemaker.  We heard you the first time now shut the hell up.  We get it – you have a plastic horn.  You can play one note.  Congratulations.  Now learn a song or stop. A band marching or otherwise at halftime would be kinda cool.
5. Cheerleaders. All I’m saying is it worked for the Hurricanes and they said hockey would never make it in the south.  If redneck hockey can work for us – American soccer might work for the rest of the world.

FIFA feel free to use my suggestions any way you see fit.  See you in 2014.