I watched the upstart USA sprint out to a 2-0 lead yesterday against mighty Brazil. For a moment I let myself think,  "What if.." Then the second half began, and I quickly remembered why we are the USA and why Brazil is Brazil.

Maybe the analysts will be telling us that it was poor strategy, that the US went into a protect the lead mode, when they should have looked to play the same way that led them to a 2-0 halftime score. Maybe the goalie will be blamed, who knows. There is another point though, one that always seems to go ignored...the USA just does not get enough elite athletes into the soccer program, plain and simple.

Why? Maybe because our football, is well, football to us. Our elite athletes have some choices to make when they are young. Basketball, baseball, football, and to some extent, hockey, all muddy the waters for a young kid. In junior high, fall meant football, so even if I liked soccer, I had to choose. Since I grew up in Pittsburgh, my boyhood dreams were to be Lynn Swann leaping into the air to make a spectacular catch in a future Super Bowl, or Jack Lambert blowing up Wendell Tyler and just intimidate the hell out of him.

When I realized I was not big enough for football, I turned to the other sports, hockey and baseball, winter and spring school sports where I grew up. My summers were spent playing all three of these sports, and for me, soccer was just not my thing. As a country, more kids that show signs early on of being athletic, choose one of the major sports in the US, not soccer. Now with golf & tennis gaining some popularity, the talent pool weakens even a little more.

For the rest of the world, football is the end all be all of sports. Everyone plays it, needing only a ball and a make shift goal to participate. Economics do not enter the sport, one does not need to have wealthy parents to participate. Most of the football powers do not have other major sports leagues to draw the attention of their youth. Brazilian children dream about being Pele or Ronaldo or any other of the hundreds of fantastic stars the country has produced. Sure, a few may look at basketball, the other major sport, but bar none, football is the only sport for most of the nation. 

Take a listen to sports radio, and the upset of Spain barely got a mention. Driving today I hear this:

"Soccer is so boring." - Host
"Yeah, thank god for all those horns, it's the only thing that kept me awake." -Guest

Um, yesterday's game was very exciting. Yet these two probably watch golf and are on the edge of their seats. The perception is though that the game is lacking excitement, and that seed has stayed put and rooted in the collective US sports' consciousness. Still, the crux is that the US has 4 major sports leagues, while most have football and now basketball is making major headway on the international scene.

Europe is dominated mainly by football, as its major football leagues attract the elite players from all over the world to come play there for vast sums of money. Ask Eto' o, a native of Cameroon if  I am correct, if his dream was to throw a touchdown pass to Santonio Holmes or score a World Cup goal, and well, he'd probably know little about the NFL. In fact, most impoverished nations play football in the streets or fields wearing Arizona Cardinal Super Bowl Champ t-shirts, so their history may be all askew.

Would a victory yesterday have inspired a 8 year-old promising athlete to kick araound the ball instead of practicing free throws? Maybe. The loss though just puts the improbable Spain victory out of our minds. The only silver lining is that as more South Americans immigrate to the US, soccer will continue to gain popularity to some degree, as our demographics continue to change. Until the US can seize the moment on the world stage, football will only be a sport to us with a helmet, pads and the Lombardi Trophy.