John Miller, who is playing and coaching for the Brussels Kangaroos in the Belgian 2nd Division and is a reporter for a big American newspaper, is now also the Little League Commissioner for Belgium. He is also back chronicling the 2010 season in his “Old World Pastime” column on Mister-Baseball.com for a third straight year.
I’ve just returned from a two-week baptism into the world of international soccer. I didn’t write the column last week because I was in South Africa. My newspaper needed an extra hand on deck for the World Cup. Luckily, I got the call.
Courtesy of my friend Manu, who gets regular tickets through his job, I’ve attended a dozen Anderlecht games over the years. Anderlecht is the Brussels team in the Belgian soccer first division.
I like it. Anderlecht might only be the Belgian first division but this is still Europe: the quality of play is world-class. The players are fast and athletic, and the crowds are fun. Best of all, I’m always home by 11 p.m.
The World Cup, of course, is a different beast. There’s infinitely more at stake, a billion people are watching, and these are best players of a sport every nation plays. I saw eight games, including the U.S.’s thrilling buzzer-beater win over Algeria.
I never thought I’d say this, but there’s a lot we baseball people can learn from soccer.
Baseball tasks are precisely defined. Pitcher: throw strikes on the corner. Hitter: hard up the middle. Runner: Steal the base. These precise definitions are why we can keep score. We’ve defined the right fielder, code number 9, as a guy who stays in one particular corner of the field. When a hitter doubles to right then gets thrown out at 3rd base, even my grandmother can describe that with one line of code.
If you love baseball, you love the hundreds of confrontations created by players trying to accomplish their tasks. Can Jimenez strike out Pujols? Can Matt Wieters throw out Brett Gardner? Can Ichiro get his 6th hit tonight?
Soccer, on the other hand, is the most undefined sport. It has a few tasks, like the penalty or the corner kick. But at its core, it’s about two groups of 10 individuals driving a ball forward in a million different possible ways. As they try to score, they have total freedom.
Soccer’s rules are the lowest common denominator of complexity. It is the simplest game. That’s why every country and culture plays it.
Spending a couple weeks watching World Cup games from the sidelines has made me appreciate what a difficult task this presents for the players. Without defined tasks, ability is not enough. Players have to find the energy and will power to make something happen.
It’s as if A-Rod had to choose a different size bat every time he hit, and the pitcher were allowed to stand wherever he wanted on the infield. There’d be days when A-Rod would have trouble figuring out exactly how to go about his job.
It’s an imperfect analogy but the truth behind it, I think, is the magic of soccer. It explains the Azzurri and the French (The French!) choking in South Africa. Those guys can play; they can accomplish tasks. But in June of 2010, they just didn’t have the creative drive to figure how to make stuff happen.
The lesson for baseball players and coaches, I think, is that we shouldn’t let our game’s well-defined tasks impose rigidity. We should develop the drive, spark and creativity that soccer players are forced to have every time they take the field. We should take groundballs far and wide. We should not take BP for two hours in a row. We should invent new plays. We should not stick to one style of coaching or playing.
Of course, there is much soccer can learn from baseball, too. U.S. goalkeeper Tim Howard’s long pass down the right sideline led to the winning U.S. goal against Algeria in that final game of the group stage. As my friend Marc McLean pointed out, “there is a reason that American goalkeepers have good arms.”
Any comments on the World Cup? Please share at oldworldpastime@gmail.com
As I`m just aware of the Czech, Dutch – and now the sole one player from Belgium – could you (or any other informed reader) disclose the full list if players selected by MLB Europe for the Summer Camp @Tirrenia in Augusr 201 ?
Thanks for the infos in advance !!