One of my friends has a phrase that is powerful: 'its the number'.
He was a 'trader' in steel, chips and a few other products. Traders are rare people who can win and lose everyday and still keep on trading. What my friend is saying is that a trader will be hired by any company to sell anything if he/she can deliver the net profit. 'The number'. If the goal is a $100 million a month net revenue in bond trading, anyone who can deliver that number will be hired as a trader, regardless of charm, skin color or previous condition of servitude.
The reality of modern commerce is that we use numbers to evalute most workers from the top CEO to the bottom maintenence man.
Which brings me to soccer. A national sport is based on a metaphor for national life. Most of the world loves soccer. Americans really don't care.
The metaphor for American sports is 'the number'. Commerce is based on numbers. If you watch any American sport on TV you will see an endless stream of numbers. 'This quarterback has thrown 102 times in 5 games with 63 completions'; 'four successful rebounds in this game at home compared to an average of 6.2 in the previous 6 games at home'; ' 33.6% of his hits are to right field so far this season, with 7% fly balls'.
American sports is about 'the number' because America is the commercial leader of the world. Our sports are a metaphor for commerce. Maybe the only real commercial nation on the planet. Certainly the engine of global commerce... a point I make regularly.
I might add that Japan loves baseball and the numbers there are of the same importance as in America.
Soccer has no yard lines on the field, the scores are usually one digit, virtually no numbers during the TV game and it is fine for a world that generally hates America and commerce.