American Football vs. Soccer

I am sitting here eating a grilled cheese for dinner, thinking about what an amazing view I have from my apartment, and watching the Rose Bowl on ESPN Vivo (and yes, the commentary is dubbed in Spanish).  I didn't plan on watching the Rose Bowl, mostly because I didn't think it would be braodcast on any of the channels I have in my apartment.  I stumbled upon it, and as I watched, I started thinking about how some of my students describe bigger and more important soccer games here.  At some point, they usually tell me, "It's like American football."  I beg to differ.

First of all, even though many people like American football in the US, there is still the division between NFL and college.  I watch college games, but I don't really care about the NFL.  I will watch a game if it is on, but I don't pay any attention to who is playing when and what the scores are.  There is not a game that everybody in the country watches and pays attention to.  And there are tons of people that don't like any football at all.

Soccer here is different.  When the national team plays, everybody watches.  Everybody also watches if Universidad Catolica and Colo-Colo play.  I almost always have my window open, and I know when to check the scores of these games because the city explodes with noise when something really good or really bad happens.  And the next day when I go to class, everybody knows the score. 

Don't get me wrong- I am not saying there aren't big games played in American football.  I am watching one right now.  But there are also tons of people in the US not watching or caring at all about this game.  Even though it seems like everybody and their mother watches the Super Bowl, tons of people only watch for the commercials.  And you wouldn't be able to judge when to check score updates based on when you hear tons of noise coming from your neighbors.

The entire country also gets behind the national team.  I had my interview for my job during the FIFA World Cup, and during the interview, Carlos (my former boss who has since moved on to a new position in Argentina) said that pretty much everything would be shutting down that afternoon because everybody would be watching the World Cup match that Chile was in.  A lot of people in the US didn't even know that the US was in the World Cup, let alone set time aside to watch the matches they were in.  (I will admit that more people were more involved in the World Cup this year than in previous years, but that doesn't change the fact that it was still relatively few people that were involved.) 

There is definite excitement for American football in the States, but it is not the same as the excitement over certain soccer teams/games here.  The difference is hard to explain, but it is there.