Rooting Interest Part 2

I was pretty sure I had a post with the title "Rooting Interest," and it was found, so my memory was accurate. That post was about the 2014 Stanley Cup Finals between the LA Kings and the NY Rangers.

This post is about the World Cup.

With the Americans not making the final, who can we root for, if we're interested in rooting for a futbol team?

This is a funny year, with many powerhouses not making the World Cup finals in Russia. The Italians, winners of four cups, and the Netherlands, runners-up a few times and a historically important team, both failed to qualify. The South American power Chile also failed to make the tournament, which is also a little shocking.

So the Americans, the Dutch, the Italians, and the Chileans all failed to make it.

In the past I've stated that I tend to root for South American teams over European teams, but that I do like the Germans and the Italians. And occasionally the French. The Belgians are always fun. And while I don't have a ate on for the Brazilians, I focus my rooting interest in the South American teams on Uruguay first and foremost. I fell for them back in 2010 and haven't given up hope. (They won again today, mostly assuring themselves a trip to the knock-out stages.)

The feeling in America is split, though, on whether or not to root for Mexico. People who do (like me), feel that with the Yanks out, why not root for our southern neighbor? In fact, I root for them each World Cup season, because, it turns out, I'm not as vested emotionally in the international game.

The Americans who are aghast at the call to root for Mexico aren't necessarily Orange Roughy supporters, rather, they are emotionally invested in local international soccer, and Mexico is the biggest rival of ours, and things haven't been pretty over the years. In terms I can wrap my head around, it works like this: back in 2007 when the Red Sox played the Rockies in the World Series was I rooting for the Red Sox? Just because they were from the same division as my team? HELL NO. As a G-Men fan, would I ever root for the Cowboys in the Super Bowl? HELL NO.

The fact that I do root for Mexico shows that my emotional investment is absent.

Anyway...sports!

Let's take a minute to look at some of the kits (uniforms) from this tournament. One of my favorites, and an all-time great kit, are the Brazilian canary-and-blue:

They look so classic that the Swedes have tried to nab a conceptual design idea from them, taking their own blue-and-gold color scheme and "Brazil-izing" their outfits:

And then we get to my favorite, the home Uruguay, the solid (with a design seen here of the Inti, the sun-god on their flag) powder blue top and black shorts:

I'm biased for powder blue, and find this look more pleasing than the white and powder blue stripes of Argentina.

Also, I'm thinking about trying to find all teams that use the golden eagle in some form in their logo or identity. I thought of it during the Mexico-Germany game, since both use the golden eagle somewhere.