Do You Believe In Miracles: USA Takes Down Pakistan At The Cricket World Cup
Matt Roberts-ICC. Getty Images.The thing about America is that we could be the greatest country at any sport in the world if we ever actually wanted to be. The issue is that we are so addicted to football that that's where we focus the majority of our athletes and resources. You could take a somewhat decent division II football team and stick them in almost any other country in the world, and they'd be the best football team in that country by a mile. No country in the world could ever send a football team over here to win an SEC title.
So we're not exactly a huge cricket country. Probably not even a medium cricket country, to be honest. It's not our first sport. It's not our 2nd or 3rd or 4th or 9th. Heck, we care more about lacrosse in America than we do about cricket, and you rabble rousers in the comment section have been telling me for years that nobody cares about lacrosse.
Don't tell that to the United States of America Men's T20 Cricket Team, though. Because those sick puppies just went out there and pulled off a miracle.
Cricket is all that Pakistan has. They live for that shit. Most people in America just found out that USA has a cricket team this week. So if USA is already knocking down powerhouses like Pakistan before the country is even fully bought into the sport? I'm shitting my pants right now if I'm New Zealand or South Africa or England or India. It's only a matter of time now before theirs is up.
I wrote this blog a few years ago after seeing a cricket match draw in 200 million viewers.
200 MILLION. For a season opener. Not a championship match or anything like that, but just opening week.
You don't think ESPN wants those numbers every week? NBC or Fox or TNT or any of the streaming platforms? You don't think North American advertisers want to get in front of that many eyeballs?
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All I'm saying is that there is a ton of potential money to be made in cricket. Right now we are beating Pakistan, and one of our best players spends his 9-5 every day working at Oracle.
Imagine what would happen if we showed up with a team full of guys making $50 million a year to just play cricket. It would be wraps for every other country out there.
Rock. Flag. Eagle.