In the past week through last year, we've seen Americans come up short of expectations in international team competition of baseball, basketball, golf, hockey, soccer, and tennis. Except for soccer and hockey, these are sports that Americans have dominated in the 70s and 80s. Enough has been written and said by the media on the reasons for this decline. I'll try to give five alternative causes of the slide in American team sports:
1. Football (The American variety). Talented athletes in the U.S. with strong teamwork skills tend to steer towards football at a young age. Football is probably the ultimate teamwork sport. Though high-school stars tend to play more than one sport, the ones who have good teamwork skills tend to stick with football while individual stars may go on to college basketball, for instance. The pool of these talented teamwork-oriented players for other sports is therefore smaller in America on a percentage basis. Imagine if Shaun Alexander and Clinton Portis were playing soccer instead...
2. Corporate image. Endorsements and corporate responsibilities prevent star athletes from being candid and loose with each other. Off-field activities are dictated by these corporations, to the detriment of socializing outside the game. For instance, the Europeans boozed it up with each other after winning the Ryder cup. That's something you'd never see Tiger and Phil do if they had won, because Nike and Callaway would never allow a photo of them sloshed.
3. Lack of a villain. In the 70s and 80s you had the evil Commies. It's difficult to get worked up facing a bunch of metrosexual Euros or dirt-poor Latin Americans. Chanting "U-S-A U-S-A!" loses some meaning when it's not the evil Red Army team on the ice. Too bad Al Qeda doesn't have a country that sends athletes...
4. American sports leagues are filled with international players already. So foreign players already have scouted them pretty well. Even if a country doesn't have representation in an American league (see Greece), there is enough tape and broadcasts of games available so foreign players are exposed constantly to American sports. I don't think Comcast broadcasts games of the Greek pro basketball league.
5. Americans' pursuit of "a well-rounded life" in high school. It's considered child abuse here to throw a bunch of teens into a single-track institution focused on developing their sports skills. No sports academies here, except for tennis (which is primarily attended by foreign students). Oh no, the poor children will lose out on "life experiences". So the U.S. players don't get to develop fundamentals and cohesion with fellow stars, since the pool is widely dispersed until one gets to the college level. Overseas, most promising youths are sent to these academies to develop their skills year-long, not just in summer leagues and such. So these athletes will be one-trick ponies, but ponies who become thoroughbreds in their sport.
1. Football (The American variety). Talented athletes in the U.S. with strong teamwork skills tend to steer towards football at a young age. Football is probably the ultimate teamwork sport. Though high-school stars tend to play more than one sport, the ones who have good teamwork skills tend to stick with football while individual stars may go on to college basketball, for instance. The pool of these talented teamwork-oriented players for other sports is therefore smaller in America on a percentage basis. Imagine if Shaun Alexander and Clinton Portis were playing soccer instead...
2. Corporate image. Endorsements and corporate responsibilities prevent star athletes from being candid and loose with each other. Off-field activities are dictated by these corporations, to the detriment of socializing outside the game. For instance, the Europeans boozed it up with each other after winning the Ryder cup. That's something you'd never see Tiger and Phil do if they had won, because Nike and Callaway would never allow a photo of them sloshed.
3. Lack of a villain. In the 70s and 80s you had the evil Commies. It's difficult to get worked up facing a bunch of metrosexual Euros or dirt-poor Latin Americans. Chanting "U-S-A U-S-A!" loses some meaning when it's not the evil Red Army team on the ice. Too bad Al Qeda doesn't have a country that sends athletes...
4. American sports leagues are filled with international players already. So foreign players already have scouted them pretty well. Even if a country doesn't have representation in an American league (see Greece), there is enough tape and broadcasts of games available so foreign players are exposed constantly to American sports. I don't think Comcast broadcasts games of the Greek pro basketball league.
5. Americans' pursuit of "a well-rounded life" in high school. It's considered child abuse here to throw a bunch of teens into a single-track institution focused on developing their sports skills. No sports academies here, except for tennis (which is primarily attended by foreign students). Oh no, the poor children will lose out on "life experiences". So the U.S. players don't get to develop fundamentals and cohesion with fellow stars, since the pool is widely dispersed until one gets to the college level. Overseas, most promising youths are sent to these academies to develop their skills year-long, not just in summer leagues and such. So these athletes will be one-trick ponies, but ponies who become thoroughbreds in their sport.
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