The Empire Never Ended

The U.S. Men's National Team lost in the knockout round. You may have heard. In the aftermath of the loss came talk. Instead of an avalanche of "this is the tipping point for American soccer" thinkpieces, we got a stream of "it doesn't matter if this is the tipping point for American soccer" thinkpieces. With a few exceptions in the Coulter/Olbermann vein, we were spared pundrity-spews on What Soccer Needs to Do to Get Popular or Why It's Unamerican (and no, I am not linking that horseshit). (Quick notes for Keith and Ann: 16.5 million Americans watched the last game, making it nearly half as American as America's Got Talent, almost twice as American as 60 Fucking Minutes, just about three times as American as July Fourth Fireworks. How much more American success are you looking for?)

Aside from the media, I got a few text messages from people who don't and didn't watch any games, earnestly urging me to consider whether soccer is an "honest" sport, excitedly demanding changes to the game's complications like the offside rule, angrily requesting that the importance of the referee be reduced. I tried for a while to figure out what "honesty" means, and did allow myself to be baited into comparing, say, the human error levels in soccer officiating to, say, the human error levels in ball/strike calling, but that's just sad human shittiness on my part, and more appropriate for a discussion with my priest than for a gimlet-eyed consideration of The Way People Are Talking About Stuff. What's really striking, though, is that the tenor of the talk has changed, and in a not-that-heartening way.

There were near-constant exhortations to manage expectations, from the coach before the tournament to the po-faced recaps after the loss to Belgium, redolent with words like "death" and "valiant": "this was not yet a team that could attack Belgium and Germany with much success" or "Belgium were the better team with the better players. The United States were overmatched, but they tried anyway. More than anything, the Americans fought, out of pride and out of fear and out of hope."

After being told the team had no chance, once they lost, we were urged to deploy a rich mix of disappointment and pride, which would have been a deeply curious trajectory, were it not based closely on an existing school of sports-watching: that of the English. Early in the tournament, when England was actually playing half-assed well, commentator Ian Darke said something like "This is a newer, fresher English side, without many of the familiar faces from the so-called 'Golden Generation,' which was of course nothing of the sort." Listening to the frequently delightful BBC 5 Live podcasts yielded a similar "these players suck, they're just not good enough" vibe, tempered only slightly by the complete impossibility of rooting for anybody else under any circumstance. John Lanchester and Simon Critchley ring similar changes about England's side.

Our faded empire, then, seems to be following theirs into a gnashing fatalism alongside a sour circle-the-wagons nationalist hunker. Probably not a surprise. But even Germany and Brazil can find joy and keep things light. One suspects even English and American fans could, with some effort, one day manage to watch the games without stumbling under the weight of their own contradictions: the craving for domination, the pre-emptive quashing of hope to fend off disappointment, and the inevitable desire to predict doom in order to be able to say "See? I told you those guys had no chance." The third-place game might be a good place to start: when there's nothing at stake, for viewers and players alike, maybe the enjoyment of pure play can take over.

Probably not, though.