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 Why do we care about Ryder?
Posted: Thursday September 23, 1999 02:57 PM
Our interest in the Ryder Cup is really quite contrary. Usually, in the United States, we couldn't give a hoot about international competition -- even though, in most countries, national teams playing against other nations is the absolute epitome of sporting interest. Of course, it's always a curiosity about us that, in so many respects, we, the nation of immigrants, can be so isolationist. And surely, too, nothing marks our America-first-and-only attitude than does sports. Much of this has to do with simple geography. We're not only so distant from our natural foreign rivals, but, likewise, so much larger than our neighbors. It's been kind of hard for us to get worked up about playing Canada in baseball or Mexico in basketball. Besides, early on we not only invented our own sports, but we established professional leagues, where the rivalries developed city-to-city. Moreover, we became the only country in the world where academia accepted games between colleges -- and high schools -- as vital to the educational experience. With our city teams and the old-school spirit, there was simply never a chance to develop a tradition of caring much about playing outside this country.
Although Formula One racing is probably the most popular individual sport in the world, we've never taken to it -- even though we adore cars and speed. Rather, we rejected all those fancy foreign cars and those drivers with the funny names, and developed our own indigenous NASCAR circuit, which is good ole Amurrcan to the core. Oh, occasionally some international event catches our passing fancy. All of America was enthralled by our 1980 Olympic ice hockey team. For once, you see, big, huge, rich America was the cute underdog. We felt like Belgium or Bolivia when they play us, as our sweet li'l toe-headed amateurs whipped the older, villainous Commie Red rats. We also adored the 1992 basketball Dream Team -- but for the completely opposite reason. There, we were the bullies. Dream Team? Ironically, the hockey boys represented the American Dream, while the so-called Dream Team was the American Statement -- the athletic declaration to the world that we're the only superpower left, and here's the slam dunk we're capable of, so, in your face, you insignificant turkey, you. Our most recent celebration of international sport, in the Women's World Cup of soccer, had more to do with the gender than the competition. It's revealing that, as soon as we beat the faceless foreigns, all everybody said was: Okay, now when can our women have their own league, so we can watch what really matters: Americans playing Americans? The popularity of the Ryder Cup can be attributed to the revived interest in golf, which, of course, dropped off a few years ago when Faldo and Ballesteros and Price and all those other silly foreigners ruled. But now we have an American star again in Tiger Woods -- plus, now that the Ryder Cup has become not just the U.S. clobbering Britain, but the U.S. struggling against Europe, it's a real competition. Don't think for a moment that it's a trend, though. There's a good reason our baseball teams play in the World Series and our football teams and basketball teams declare themselves "world" champions. In sports, to us, we are the world, and every place else is bush. These commentaries, which appear each Wednesday on National Public Radio's Morning Edition, are posted weekly by CNN/SI.
The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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