Soccer

Or, why I hate the "Beautiful Game" 

Apart from the fact that I wasn't brought up in a place or a time where soccer was the "it" game, I have several reasons why I just don't like it. I get that I'm an American, and to me, soccer is something kids play for a while before discovering their love of football or baseball or whatever. 

The Rules

Specifically the offside rule. It's complicated and depends far too much of human perception. It seems as if it's too many games could be decided/ruined by errant calls. Which then leads to...

Overtime

Just keep playing. Like in baseball, you should just keep going until the first team to score wins. Penalty kicks are never a satisfactory ending to any game. Getting to this point in a game brings up...

Playing Not To Win, but To Not Lose

It was evident in the last World Cup and in this years Eurocup that a lot of the teams were playing for a tie. In the words of Herm Edwards ,"Hello! You play to win the game!" You don't play for a tie; you don't play for fun; you don't play because it's something to do on an afternoon. You play to win. Anything less than that is unacceptable. 

Flopping

This. 

Nuff said.

Odds and Ends

This long standing history among each club and inane rivalries that everyone is just supposed to inherently  know about. The fact that players play on several different teams and often teammates play against each other. The idea of players being on loan to other clubs, which seems akin to being a man without country. ESPN and ABC force-feeding it to us every time there's some big tournament going on. Being told that soccer is the next big thing in America for the past 40 years. The disdain other countries have for Americans not referring to it as football. How every match between every country in Europe has to tie into or have some callback to the second World War. Being told these are the greatest athletes in the world. If they were the best surely they'd score more and flop less. 

To me, Soccer is one big inside joke that everyone gets except for me. And I'm OK with that. Once the NFL season starts up again, it'll all be gravy.