Soccer...Really?

Maybe it’s the lull in the sports world from the middle of June to the beginning of September. Maybe I’m just that sick of hearing about Brett Favre. Maybe I’ve been drinking too much. Whatever the reason, I’m about to make a statement that goes against every logical brain cell I have left: I’ve been thinking a lot about soccer recently.

Like the majority of American sports fans, the World Cup piques my interest in soccer every four years. An interest that previously had fizzled out as quickly as it came. However, this time is different. This time the beautiful game will remain in my conscious from the end of South Africa through the next World Cup in Brazil four years from now. Why? Because I’m going to force feed myself until it equals American football and basketball in my mind. (Right now, it’s already ahead of baseball and non-playoff hockey.)

My partner in this endeavor, as well as about 75% of the other endeavors in my 24 years of life, is ESPN. In order to force feed myself I’m going to need a feeding tube and ESPN’s new found love affair with the English Premier League is halfway down my esophagus and destined for my stomach.

However, the most intriguing aspect of a new sport is also it’s biggest adversary. Who do I root for? If I seriously expect for this fad to stick, I need to genuinely like one team over everyone else. But which team? For the first time since I was 11, I get the chance to arbitrarily pick one team to throw my heart and soul behind. Not since the Knicks acquired Larry Johnson and Latrell Spreeeeeewell and subsequently my undying love, have I had the opportunity to start a sport with a blank slate. (Just for the record, the Steelers and Pens had me at hello because of my birth place. As for baseball... who cares?)

I saw this problem quickly coming on as the World Cup approached. I mean, obviously I was going to root for the USA, but I also needed a horse that had an actual chance to win. After doing far less than $100 worth of research, I decided to throw $100 on the Netherlands to take the Cup. I compounded my random choice, by ordering a ridiculously orange Dutch Soccer shirt. (A shirt that, judging by the picture on WorldSoccerShop.com, I thought I could wear on a regular basis after the World Cup. That is, until I was nearly blinded as I opened the package on my doorstep 5-7 business days later. Now I can’t think of any occasion that I could comfortably wear that shirt on an off day for the Dutch National Team.) Those 120 dollars bought me a rooting interest for a month and the fact that they made it to the finals, made it a worthwhile investment. (Plus, the $200 profit I made after I hedged it with a Spain bet.)

Do not stare directly at this shirt.

But this is different. This will hopefully be my team for the remainder of my life. Sadly, this is possibly the most important decision I’ve faced since I chose where to go to college. (And really, that wasn’t exactly a decision. Once I got accepted to Penn State, I didn’t really apply anywhere else. With that Penn State education, you would think I would know that if you only have one choice, it can’t exactly be called a decision.) If I choose poorly, I may regurgitate soccer within the first season I digest it. I have to think this one through. We need some sort of criteria.

My favorite soccer team:

Must be on American TV at least twice in the next calendar year.

This narrows the field substantially. Major League Soccer, surprisingly, has seen a steady rise in popularity over the past few years. Five years ago, I would have been the first person to say this league will never make it to the mainstream in this country. It would always rank as a third rate league, somewhere along the lines of the WNBA. Clever marketing and the fact that Major League Soccer isn’t women trying to play basketball, has catapulted the league to respectability and a regular national TV schedule. That said, despite the name, it is basically minor league soccer. Picking an MLS team as my favorite would be like saying the Toronto Argonauts are my favorite football team. Why would I follow a league that doesn’t have the best players in the world? In football, basketball (except for Stephon Marbury), hockey, and baseball, the best in the world come to play in the USA. In soccer, the best in the world go to Europe. If there was any doubt about the gap between MLS and European Soccer, it was erased last week, when the MLS All-Stars faced off against Manchester United’s B team, and were drubbed 5-2.

Luckily, as I previously stated, my surrogate parent ESPN has started showing the English Premier League over the past year. So without much say from me, the European league of my favorite team has been selected. Sorry, Bundesliuge. Maybe Fox Sports Southwest will strike a deal with you some day, but in the meantime, I’m picking a Brit. The other chance to get my required biannual dose of soccer is in the Champions League, which gets some airplay here in the US. The Champions League will come into play later in my decision process.

One caveat to this criteria: When I say American TV, I mean the commentators must be speaking English. While watching 30 Mexican men huddled around a TV in the lunch room while an announcer speaks incomprehensibly fast in a Spanish blur is amusing to watch, I can say for certain that it is a fad, with an entertainment value that will pass over time.

Must have at least one bona fide superstar, who will instantly ascend to favorite player status.

I don’t know much about soccer. In four weeks of watching the World Cup, I roughly quadrupled my knowledge about the sport in it’s current form. Even knowing 4 times as much as I knew at the beginning of June, I still know more about women’s basketball than I do about soccer. And, I proudly have never watched a women’s basketball game in my life. So if there is a soccer player that I know, I can confidently classify him as a superstar.

Going down the rosters

Arsenal: Fabregas, Robin Van Persie
Aston Villa: Emile Heskey
Chelsea: Petr Cech, John Terry, Frank Lampard, Anelka, Drogba, Michael Ballack, Joe Cole and his sister, Ashley
Everton: Tim Howard, an attempt to buy Landon Donovan
Fulham: Clint Dempsey
Liverpool: Dirk Kuyt, Steven Gerrard, Fernando Torres
Man City: Carlos Tevez, Nigel DeJong (I watched a lot of Netherlands games during the World Cup)
Man United: Edwin van der Sar, Wayne Rooney, Rio Ferdinand, Michael Owen
Stoke City: I don’t actually know anyone on their team, but I’m going to put them on the list of finalists based solely on their name
Sunderland: Michael Turner, but only if it’s the running back from the Falcons
Tottenham: Peter Crouch
West Ham: Robert Green, aka the English guy who let in the easy goal against the USA in the World Cup. West Ham is not going to be my favorite team.

We’re down to the final twelve.

One thing I noticed while looking through the rosters was that if a player only has one name, I feel like I should know him. I found myself researching every single-named player from Nani to Rafael, just to make sure I don’t know them. I really wish I was a world class soccer player and I could go by just “Tom”. That is my new dream.

Can’t be the best team but must be close.

I would never root for the Yankees, but “rooting” for the Pirates has turned a medium level of interest in baseball into a complete indifference toward everything about the sport. Right now, I have a medium interest in soccer. I don’t want to spend the next 18 years wearing that interest down to nothing. Remember, I’m a Knicks fan. I have my lovable (I guess?) loser. I want a team that has a chance. As far as I know, Isiah Thomas has no interest in running any of the twelve teams I listed above, so at least I don’t have that to worry about.

This goes hand in hand with the Champions League that I mentioned above. The top four teams in the Premier League qualify for the Champions League the following year. The Champions League means the potential for a few more televised games each year. In the infancy of my soccer love, television appearances is like breast milk: necessary for growth. The four teams to qualify in 2010-2011 are Chelsea, Man U, Arsenal, and Tottenham Hotspur. All four teams were in my final twelve.

Tottenham Hotspur is the first team eliminated. The only player I know on that team is Peter Crouch. Peter Crouch is not going to be my favorite player. That would be like saying Shawn Bradley was the reason I rooted for the New Jersey Nets in 1996. I’m not going to base my soccer eternity on a giraffe whose novelty act is to expand his neck to head in goals.

This will not be my favorite player

That leaves arguably the three most successful Premier League teams, at least recently: Man U, Chelsea, and Arsenal.

Manchester United are the Yankees of the Premier League. Although Chelsea won the league last year, Man U is historically the most loved/hated/successful team. They’ve won 18 Premier Leagues, 11 FA Cups, 3 Champions Leagues and are the only team to have won all three titles in the same season (1998-99). They are the most valuable soccer club in the World, valued at $1.2 billion pounds and have sold more merchandise worldwide than any other club, by far. I just can’t bring myself to root for the Yankees.

Chelsea are the defending champs. They are the Red Sox. They went 50 years without winning the Premier League until they broke the curse in 2005. They have won twice more since then and currently have the most loaded roster, at least by my rankings. But what fun would it be to come in rooting for the champs? I want to root for a team to make their way to the top, not sit on their perch and swat away the challengers. Plus, I know eight players on their roster. How could I choose my single favorite player? That’s just not a decision I want to deal with.

That leaves, by default, my new favorite team for the rest of my life: Arsenal. I have no idea whether Arsenal is their nickname or an actual city in England, but screw it, I love them. My Fabregas jersey is already in the mail. I just hope it isn’t neon orange.