In Defense of the WBC

[bucksfan2]

It took me a while, but I finally came to the realization that the WBC is not about competition. It's not meant to be the Olympics or even the World Cup. There is no real presumption of competitiveness underlying it from those who created it. Rather, it's merely a global marketing opportunity for the sport that leverages the power of nationalism. It's about spurring interest in Brazil, in China and in mainland Europe.

Perhaps someday there will be something closer to a world cup feel to the event. But as it stands, there's no need to seek purity and takes steps to make it somehow a higher level of competition with higher standards. Not suspending players doesn't really create some terrible incentive to act poorly and suspending them would simply lower interest in the event.

The WBC isn't about competition rather about growing the game in certain countries. I get that and understand that. For competitions sake I would rather them create geographic teams and allow certain countries to opt out. I would like to see them have all of Europe play under one flag. Let Japan opt out but combine several of the other countries and create an "Asia" team. Same can be said about South America. Let countries like Venezuela, Columbia or whomever opt out, but combine the rest with Brazil.

I get the feeling that most WBC teams want to take out the USA. They are largely considered the best and its always fun to beat the best. But when it becomes, lets beat the best by using some of the bests players. To my knowledge in soccer, once you declare to one country you are bound to play for that county's national team in FIFA events. For example ARod, once he plays in the first one for the USA he is bound to play each subsequent one for the USA.

For competitions sake I think anyone who follows the WBC would like to see a Final 4 of USA, Japan, Dominican Republic then either a Puerto Rico or Venezuela. I would do my best to make the teams match up so you got that level of competition in the later rounds.