As regular as elections, and to most Americans as exciting, soccer’s World Cup begins today.

The U.S. Men’s National Team has at least three games — Ghana Monday at 5 p.m., Portugal June 22 at 5 p.m., and Germany June 26 at 11 a.m.

You can set your watch (if you had a watch you had to manually set) to two things by the time the World Cup begins — (1) opinions wondering if Americans will ever like soccer, and (2) opinions exhorting Americans to care about the World Cup.

The former is covered by World Soccer Talk:

Any time the prestigious tournament rolls around, the sport catches the attention of the United States for a brief amount of time. Numerous television networks fight for the broadcasting rights, as the ratings for soccer seem to soar during the period despite never recreating those strong numbers any other time of the year. It begs the question of, “does the U.S. have a passionate enough of a following to warrant any success the team may garner in the tournament?”

Soccer still lags far behind the major sports in this country in terms of viewership and attendance, despite the recent trends of growth that suggest a shift could occur in the near future. It’s safe to say there are more than enough eyeballs on the one month that consists of the World Cup, but how about the other times of the year when Major League Soccer is in session?

It’s tough to pinpoint the exact reason why the average American will tune into the World Cup and cheer on their team but insists on ignoring the existence of a league within the country’s borders. It may be a lack of awareness and perhaps some teams have yet to reach out and publicize themselves enough in their area to get more fans in the stadium.

Maybe there isn’t a team nearby for them to cheer for. MLS consists of 19 teams at the moment, with two more to join for the 2015 season, and another arriving two years later.  Some of these teams are filling holes in the map where the lack of a professional soccer team is very apparent. It seems Commissioner Don Garber has made it his mission at the moment to focus on expanding to the Southeast, where previous teams folded at the start of the millennium, and also gain teams in bigger markets to feed more money into the league.

MLS isn’t the richest league in the world by any means, which might be a reason why it hasn’t caught on yet because it doesn’t have the same amount of reach as the Premier League or La Liga. That by no means negates MLS’s development, which has been incredible since its inception in 1996, as the number of teams has nearly doubled and the level of play has vastly improved. The fact remains, though, that the sport can’t acquire the TV deals it desires to extend to broader audiences. Networks that broadcast MLS games seem to only acquire a dozen from the entire slate of games and, of the teams chosen, there doesn’t appear to be much diversity.

There is no doubt that the average MLS follower most likely is a fan of the U.S. national team and will watch every single match it participates in this summer. A typical MLS fan seems to be well-versed in the sport, watching the games of other teams in the league, following the play of various leagues around the world, as well as observing the progress of several different national teams. Perhaps this is no different than any other soccer fan from another part of the world, but the point is that there seems to be a certain type of passion that only exists within a soccer fan, as opposed to a fan of another sport.

Soccer fans seem to be the ones most willing to jump up and down, scream, wear the colors of their team, and stay proud regardless of a win or tie. They never give up, and this attitude continues to be reflected when it comes to the national team as well. The connection of the love of your soccer team and the love of your country is tied together because every four years the players you follow take part in the most important games of their lives.

This type of fanaticism and passion seems limited in the U.S. as the majority of the population hardly pays attention to the sport anyway. So the question remains if the future of soccer within the United States is a bright one or not. Does it have a tough road to complete in order to garner more fans, to create a tough, competitive league that can win over the casual viewers and make admirers out of them?

The World Cup is the battleground, not only for the U.S. national team in Brazil, but also for the popularity of the sport amongst Americans. Will this be the year that more people take an interest and wonder who are these faces representing them down in South America, what teams they play for, what their histories are, or why they’ve been chosen as opposed to others?

As for the latter, Sports Illustrated says:

Why should I watch this if I’m not a soccer fan?

1. Everyone is good looking.
2. Referees are part of the game: they make important calls with little to no technological help, and they can make the decision not to call a foul if they think doing so would give an advantage to the team that fouled. We can argue about whether this freedom for the refs makes soccer better or worse than other sports, but it’s certainly different (and with all the complaints about MLB’s new replay system, hopefully it’s refreshing, too).
3. Everyone gets REALLY emotional because everything (well, not everything, but you know what I mean) is at stake:
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VNpRVW7w0I
4. Watching a World Cup held in Brazil will be a spectacle like none other. This will be the party of a lifetime (assuming strikes, riots and a bevy of other issues that the country has faced leading up to the event don’t interfere)
5. Flopping is a genuine part of the game, and everyone likes to watch good acting. Dwyane Wade would fit right in.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ioyt2zzm530

SI didn’t mention, but should have …

… Landon Donovan’s stoppage-time goal that got Team USA into the round of 16 by defeating Algeria 1–0 in 2010. Donovan won’t duplicate his feat this summer because he’s not on the 2014 team. You will, however, probably find out soon enough who the 2014 American players are.

To answer the questions posed by World Soccer Talk and SI: Americans sports fans pay attention to world-class events when the U.S. is involved and the U.S. does well, basically, since 1994, when the U.S. gets out of group play. Given that the U.S. group is called the “Group of Death,” the U.S. may make an early exit this year.

Soccer is also a big and growing participatory sport. Soccer’s problem is that participation hasn’t led to more fan interest. Yes, there now is Major League Soccer, but interest in the teams is limited to the teams’  markets. There is no MLS team with a following beyond its own market, like the Yankees or Packers.

The other problem is that soccer as a sport lacks something casual American fans like — scoring. Passionate soccer fans, like hockey fans (and, in different senses, baseball fans with pitching and defense), can appreciate defense and passing to set up shots. Less-passionate fans want end-to-end action  and scoring. There is not a lot of scoring at the highest levels of soccer. Casual fans are bored by “nil-nil” matches where, they think, no action is taking place. (Several years ago I saw the end of a match on ESPN where the announcers apologized for the game’s lack  of scoring.) The key to growing soccer is getting more interest from the casual fan, and that’s going to be difficult until the casual fan has more action to see. The National Football League has emphasized offense over all, and that’s worked out rather well for the NFL in expanding fan interest.