While the NFL is unquestionably the most popular sport in America by a long distance, soccer is by far the most popular sport globally. If NFL analyst Ross Tucker had his way, that wouldn’t be the case.
During Thursday night’s Eagles-Browns preseason game, Tucker was amazed by the global audience for the game with the hashtag #EaglesEverywhere. That led him into one of the most frequented debates that sports fans seemingly love to have: Soccer vs Football. And Tucker clearly knew the deep international waters he was wading into by offering his take.
Ross Tucker: "I love that the game is growing internationally. I mean, Scott, think of the kids. There are kids out there that think soccer is the best sport. We gotta grow this thing internationally so they know." pic.twitter.com/vKw220GG5i
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) August 18, 2023
“I love that the game is growing internationally. I mean, Scott, think of the kids, there are kids out there that think soccer is the best sport. We got to grow this thing internationally so they know.”
“How many soccer tweets do you think I’ll get now?”
“Listen, I just want young people all across the globe to at least know about American football, to at least know that it exists. I played soccer till I was 11, it was great!”
The kicker that Tucker admitted to playing soccer and loving it was just fantastic. In spite of that, he’s committed to the idea that the gospel of the NFL should be shared around the world. After all, it’s for the kids. Won’t somebody please think of the children!
To his credit, Tucker knew what was coming and he did get his fair share of soccer tweets from folks on Twitter who heard his commentary.
@RossTuckerNFL didn’t sign up for the 1960s soccer bashing broadcast. American football will never overtake soccer.
— ConorD (@CONOR_____) August 18, 2023
hey @RossTuckerNFL really? bashing the most popular beautiful sport that gave us Pele, Maradona, messi… while commenting on a sport that stole the name of the 1st one? that was stupid by you. what is the meaning of soccer btw sucker!
— 🇲🇦 tha Rockin' Moroccan (@ArbaouiJaouad) August 18, 2023
Love your passion for Football. I’ve made my living in Coaching Soccer. Plus I’m a huge NFL fan. Respect for the greatest game in the world, Soccer. The World Cannot be Wrong!
— John Amorim (@JohnAmorim4) August 18, 2023
Of course, the NFL has taken steps to grow internationally with regular season games taking place around the world including England, Germany, and Mexico. While there’s always been rumors of the NFL wanting to put a team in London and take the world by storm, it hasn’t happened yet. Unless you want to count NFL Europe, that is. Long live the Rhein Fire.
The NFL has also, somewhat ridiculously in the spirit of old-world colonialism, has also assigned countries around the world to each NFL franchise to claim marketing territory.
But just one look at the numbers show that the gap between the NFL and soccer around the globe might as well be the distance to the nearest inhabited planet. This past year, an estimated 1.5 billion people around the world watched the epic World Cup final between Argentina and France. Only 200 million people watched the Super Bowl, and more than half of those were watching domestically. That’s only a gap of just over 1 billion new fans that the NFL would have to make globally to catch up with the world’s game. Good luck with that, Ross Tucker.
