![](\"http:\/\/cyber.law.harvard.edu\/blogs\/static\/dowbrigade\/tweller.jpg\")
Watching
\n the undefeated and league leading New England Revolution play
\n their arch-enemy New York Metro Stars. The scene on the field in New
\n York is brilliant sunshine and the fans are all in T-shirts and shorts,
\n whereas when we look out the window here in Boston it is dark and dreary,
\n cold and nearly night-time.
\n Supposedly the game is live, but it is hard to believe, and incongruities
\n like this are what make us doubt the reality of a lot of what they are
\n showing us on
\n TV
\n these days.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, as part of the plot to popularize the world’s number one
\n sport among the athletic barbarians here in the homeland, the network
\n announcers keep presenting, with attractive animated graphics, newly invented
\n statistical categories like "passes for possession" and "passes behind
\n the defense".<\/p>\n
They are obviously trying to pander to a perceived American predilection
\n for numbers, statistics, objective measurement of performance. It won’t
\n work. Soccer is too fluid, too subjective, too creative to be reduced
\n to statistics. In Europe and South America sports writers and pundits give
\n grades to each player after every game, B+ or C- for this guy or that,
\n but this is a subjective analysis as well.<\/p>\n
American networks who want to help soccer catch on would be better advised
\n to use their technological wizardry to better capture the magic on the
\n field; more camera angles, super-slo-mo so we can actually see the footwork
\n and body control necessary for those incredible moves, movable cameras
\n suspended over the field like FOX NFL broadcasts to capture the dynamic
\n sweep of
\n a wave
\n of attackers racing downfield or a perfectly timed offside trap.<\/p>\n
Forget the numbers and graphics. Show us the game, just better.<\/p>\n
postscript: Revs Watching the undefeated and league leading New England Revolution play their arch-enemy New York Metro Stars. The scene on the field in New York is brilliant sunshine and the fans are all in T-shirts and shorts, whereas when we look … Continue reading
\n 2 – Metro Stars 2<\/a>; Revs still undefeated.<\/p>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"