At least according to Globe columnist Bob Ryan, whose column today revolves around the theme "If you're not fired up for the World Cup, you're not a sports fan." This is so typical of the Globe Sports section, this attitude of "I have decreed this so, and if you disagree you're slime." Shaughnessy does it to a T. I was actually on the verge of getting interested in the US run for the championship. (Though not to the point of getting up before dawn. It's taxing enough to make it to the end of the Sox-Padres games on the West Coast.) But the sanctimonious "I believe this so it must be" attitude puts me off.
Look, it's great that the US has gotten as far as it has. This is a lot more impressive than the Winter Olympics (which Ryan also says is mandatory for sports fans to care about), where the Americans slip in "sports" that only Americans would have the leisure time and the inclination to become good at. I mean, a gold medal in snowboarding? Please. To get involved now puts me somewhere in a zone that is overlapped by the This Is The Time For Blind Patriotism Zone and the They're Doing Well, So I Care Zone. And neither of those is a place I feel particularly comfortable in.
So I can't muster the enthusiam to throw myself fully into World Cup Fever. And if that means Bob Ryan doesn't think I'm a worthy sports fan, I guess I'll have to live with that.
Posted by michaelf at June 19, 2002 08:02 PM