It's an awkward time to be an American sports fan. The NBA Finals are wrapping up, the NBA Draft is right around the corner and NFL mini-camps are poised to give us the short-term football fix before we can welcome the real deal in late August.

Most avid sports fans have tried to give NASCAR a shot by now. I compare it to when Diet Coke became real popular in the 1980's (for those of you who can remember that) and more than dieting housewives began to drink it. For years, NASCAR was that "redneck" sport that had its limited following but really only targeted one audience. Hell, most of racing was considered either too "European" or too southern for the common sports fan from 1975-1995. The truth is that the sport, besides the diehards (every sport has them, even gymnastics), was followed more on a casual basis by the habitual NBA, NFL and MLB fans. Now everyone seems to have a favorite driver and catch part of the race. It's my theory that this is more of a fix for the common sports fan because of the lack of appeal to other games during the summer.

Baseball has a few weeks before the All-Star break. So, as much as ESPN would like to make us think every game is crucial, we won't really have an idea of what kind of memories this season will provide for more than a month. Most of the country is willing to assume Barry Bonds is juiced like there's no tomorrow, regardless of the evidence, and the really cynical fans have written off half of the game's participants as users of HGH. This fact overshadows most of the regular season interest that baseball draws, save for following your favorite team. If the league didn't have to make every Red Sox-Yankees series seem like Game 7 in the 2004 ALCS, I probably wouldn't be so appalled by the idea of watching those games in May.

So where does the sports fan turn right now? There is no weekly ritual to enjoy the games with your friends like we have from August to January with college football or the NFL. There is no action-packed NBA playoff series like we had over the last few month and half or so.

(By the way, is it just me, or were these playoffs the most exciting since Jordan was in his prime? It seemed as if every series was significant and every series was close. No one team rolled over the others as we had been seeing from the Spurs, Pistons and Lakers over the past five years. We witnessed the birth of LeBron as a bona fide NBA Superstar and the ability of Kobe to almost single-handedly unseat the MVP of the league and the Suns' style of play. The Clippers, who have been the most laughed-at franchise in sports, almost did the same thing thanks to Elton Brand. Ironically, it's my opinion that the Finals between Dallas and Miami may be the least anticipated series played yet in these playoffs. The only real reason to keep watching? Just to see and hear Mark Cuban's reaction when he finally gets his hands on that big gold basketball with David Stern standing next to him.)

We have an event here or there that can capture our limited attention like the Indy 500 (The Andrettis don't settle for one coming close anymore, now it has to be two that miss out) or the U.S. Open (Can Tiger create the fairy tale of winning the major on Father's Day?), but generally, there is no one sport that can keep us craving it over and over again like football.

Hardcore baseball fans, myself included, have been wondering aloud for years as to why football seems to have ousted baseball as America's pastime. We've blamed it on the strike of 1981. We've blamed it on the strike of 1994. We blamed it on missing the 1994 World Series. The most popular reason now is because of the steroid scandal. The truth is that football would have supplanted baseball if none of this stuff ever happened in Major League Baseball. There is a simple reason - It's a more interesting game.

During baseball's heyday (1920-75), football was a sport that was more organized locally than professionally, as evidenced by its longtime popularity in places like West Texas for high school games. It was baseball that allowed athletes a long-term spotlight though. Players like Ted Williams, Yogi Berra, Willie Mays and Mickey Mantle received fame and fortune for their age that lasted, unlike football stars who sometimes passed on in relative anonymity. Someone like Deacon Jones, a man most football fans know of today, actually worked as an administrator for some health care supplier after he retired from the game.

After Pete Rozelle, the David Stern of the NFL era, actually uncovered what should have been obvious to everyone, things began to turn. He marketed the fact that football is the most fast-paced yet organized and energetic sport in our society. To most Americans, soccer and hockey, despite being fast-paced and violent at times, is too continuous and unorganized to maintain our interest. Tennis and golf (save for individuals as charismatic as Tiger Woods or Andre Agassi) are too slow-paced and at times, boring. Baseball fits more of the mold of what we as fans are looking for, but it was football that idealized that label.

Besides that, the schedule that accompanies a football season is ideal for a professional sport. Baseball games are played every single day for months and months, and the truth is that most fans have lost interest in watching the Royals host Seattle in May, even in Kansas City - especially in a three-game series. In football, there are only 16 games, so no matter how bad your team is, you want to watch every second of every game because you know that there are not that many chances to do so. During the regular season for football, fans chomp at the bit for the next game on the Cleveland Browns' schedule, while Cleveland Indians' fans barely have to wait 24 hours between games most times, and when they miss one, it's no big deal because they can catch one of the 161 other contests on the calendar.

What does it say that in 2006, most sports fans look just as forward to seeing the first game of the Fall Classic as they do to seeing the first game of the football regular season? We do have a new pastime, and it's not up for debate. Baseball may very well be America's most historic sport, but it is no longer America's pastime. Whether you think it is good that we don't have the attention spans as a society to find tennis or golf or even baseball as entertaining as football, the point is moot.

The U.S. has become a culture of violence, and I for one am probably one of the leaders of the pack. Professional wrestling like the WWE is as popular as ever, and that's only fake violence. The Ultimate Fighting Championship is growing day-by-day. It's only natural that a sport with players hitting each other as hard as possible with pads on would begin to distance itself from the figurative professional sporting field.


Published 06/15/06