The americans don't care much about soccer. There are very few dedicated soccer fields here in LA for example, and each time we want to play soccer we find it very hard to find a place and the people. More women play soccer here than men.
Despite that, all 64 games of the world cup were broadcasted live and in High Definition here by big networks: ABC, ESPN and ESPN2. ABC is completely free. It was a beauty to watch.
Americans care much more about basketball. The NBA is big, the stadiums are (still) mostly full, and franchise is huge. Then what about the FIBA World Championship that starts today in Japan? You would expect the matches to be everywhere so that all people that care can watch.
Nope! Not only they broadcast only 24 out of the 80 games, but none of them is on free tv. None of them is in high def. Why?
Is FIFA so much stronger than FIBA that they paid enough to have the networks broadcast soccer? Do they want to promote it better? If that's the case, they succeeded. This is how you show that you care about your sport. You make sure everything is broadcasted live, in high def, in free networks.
We watched the soccer world cup in 92" crystal clear picture. We will have to PAY to watch the basketball world championship in a 320x240 mpeg stream in a 17" computer monitor.
And then people ask why soccer is so much bigger than any other sport.
