Columnist Ron Kantowski: USA picks bad time to play well

Thursday, June 6, 2002 | 10:04 a.m.

Ron Kantowski's insider notes column appears Tuesday and his Page One column appears Thursday. He can be reached at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

It was two o'clock in the morning, and most red-blooded American males were not watching soccer nor even dreaming about it, like they do in Brazil and England and France and every other country that hasn't been exposed to the cool sports we invented, such as football, baseball, basketball and doing 360s on a skateboard in an empty swimming pool.

Maybe they were dreaming about soccer moms. But not soccer.

It's a shame Team USA decided to play the best game in its history at a time when the only guy who could have witnessed it was making donuts.

The 3-2 victory over Portugal Wednesday was shocking, and not just because it featured five goals, which is usually four more than usual in soccer. It was stunning because next to earthquakes, soccer is one of the things Portugal is becoming known for.

Its national team was ranked No. 5 in the world coming into the World Cup. Moreover, their side features a bunch of guys with just one name. Need I say more?

OK, let me give it to you in terms that any Las Vegan can understand. Team USA was plus 550 at the betting window.

It was like beating the Belgians at waffles, the Canadians at bacon, the Spanish at flies. In any other soccer-playing country, the President, Prime Minister, King, Prince, or the Guy With The Biggest Ox would have phoned the coach to congratulate him. School kids and factory workers would have gotten the day off. Husbands might have kissed their wives.

Not here.

A sport that is celebrated around the globe has been relegated to niche status here, probably because we stink at it. But it's not as if our niche sports don't carve their way into the public consciousness from time to time.

Every four years, an American skating pixie winds up on a box of Wheaties after the Winter Olympics. As a nation, we sit transfixed during primetime as guys named Sven and Wolfgang hurtle down, over or through mountains on skis, in a sled, or -- crazy as this sounds -- toting a rifle.

You're gonna tell me that biathlon is more exciting/less dull than soccer?

Nearly twice as many American kids play soccer than baseball these days (according to a Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association study, 7.25 million Americans ages 6-17 play soccer compared to 4.75 million for baseball) but their dads aren't watching the pros play, and therein lies soccer's problem.

You can blame the media for that. And this time, I'm not being facetious.

A sports writer for one of the major Florida dailies this week wrote that if you want him to watch soccer, just put one of his kids on the field and he'll watch all day. This is the same guy who spends six weeks in spring training cranking out hundreds of column inches on groin pulls and exhibition games.

USA Soccer talks about developing young players through nationally funded programs, which is all well and good and probably necessary. But if it really is sincere about taking a number behind the Big 4 American sports (or at least becoming another NASCAR), it should first convince the media that soccer is a game worth watching and writing about.

Otherwise, I'm afraid most Americans will continue to confuse the World Cup with Lloyd Free's athletic supporter.