I don't know what folks beyond our borders call what we know and love as football, but mention "football" to most people outside the USA and you'd be talking about "soccer." Once in a great while, soccer takes center stage among this country's sports fans. With Team USA's 2-1 loss to Ghana today at the World Cup in South Africa, that prominent position will now revert to another sport. Whenever soccer grabs our attention the way it did over the last few weeks, the question always arises as to whether the USA will soon join the rest of the world in making soccer a major spectator sport. Well, Pele has been the only international soccer star Americans have ever heard of for decades. During that time David Beckham has been the only addition to that short list. Bottom line: it's not happening anytime soon. There are signs of slow change. "Soccer moms" were nonexistent when I was a kid, but now they're everywhere. The added influence of Latin American and other soccer-friendly cultures point to the likelihood of the "other football" gaining more attention here in the USA. Let's just hope that those South African Vuvuzela horns that sound like thousands of angry bees don't become a staple here as well.
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