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Soccer coverage Expanding -- just not as fast as, say, boatingPosted: Tuesday May 21, 2002 5:26 PM
Well, well, well. Sports Illustrated has put U.S. striker Clint Mathis on the cover of this week's edition, its World Cup preview issue. This is a rare -- some might say historic -- event. Consider: the Mathis piece is only the 10th soccer cover story in SI's history, if we go by the number of times the sport has been the main focus of the cover.
Football ...
894
Sobering data for soccer fans, I know. (New slogan: SOCCER: HALF AS BIG AS SPEED SKATING.) Look, as someone who cares about the professional game, I don't know if it will ever be big in the United States, but I do know that anytime SI features the sport on the cover is a move in the right direction. And who knows? Depending on what happens in Japan and South Korea -- I'll be arriving there on May 24 to cover the U.S. team -- it may not be long before we see another one.
While we're at it, here's a rundown of SI's soccer-only covers: NASL's No. 1 overall draft pick in '73 led league in goals-against average as Philly took the title. "If I'm not the most obscure guy on the cover, I must be in the top 10," Rigby said last year. Wish I could have seen this one in person. Does the chain-smoking Argentine World Cup coach from '98 even realize (or care) he was on SI's cover? Who said there are no second acts in American soccer? Giorgione returns for World Cup 2002 studio duty on ABC. "Whichever team had Diego would have won the World Cup in '86," Bora Milutinovic recently told me. One-man teams in soccer? He was that good. Great story: It wasn't until six years later that the mild-mannered Stewart started to tell people his name is actually spelled E-A-R-N-I-E. At least VIVA BRAZIL! is a more optimistic coverline than WORST WORLD CUP FINAL EVER would have been. How crazy would it be to know that, no matter what you do the rest of your life, one image will forever define you? Then again, how many people have that happen to them in the first place? True story: I actually had the Sportsman of the Year greek amphora in my possession for three days before giving it to the team, and there exists an incriminating photo (taken by my wife) in which I am TOTALLY NUDE save for the strategically placed trophy. Cleatus becomes the third American male soccer player ever to appear on SI's cover. Put it this way: SI has already had more World Cup covers in 2002 (one) than it did four years ago, when we marked the occasion of France's triumph with a cover of ... Mike Ditka . Progress, baby. Progress. That's all for now. I'll check back in once I arrive in Seoul. Sports Illustrated senior writer Grant Wahl covers soccer for the magazine and will contribute frequently to CNNSI.com throughout the World Cup tournament.
Cover photographs by John Iacono, Eric Schweikardt, George Tiedemann (2), Leo Mason, Chris Cavatta, Simon Bruty, Robert Beck, Mark Abrahams/PMI
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