Random Soccer Thoughts

• If you had told me 20 years ago that I'd care more about the World Cup than about the NBA Finals, I'd have thought you were crazy.  And maybe asked you what the World Cup was.
• Most of the sports I really like I played, even if casually, and that's why I like them.  I think I like soccer from having been forced to sit through 10,000 games of it as a parent.  It's sort of like Stockholm Syndrome.
• There's an article in the National Post (Canada) about a soccer league in Ottowa that has put in a new rule: if you win by more than five goals, you lose.  Previously there was a mercy rule that dictated any goals scored creating more than a five goal lead simply weren't counted.  Not only is this new rule stupid, at least by my thinking, but it also creates some interestingly perverse incentives.  If you're down 6-1 with time running out, why not score an own goal and "win"?  Or why not score an own goal every time you score a goal that puts you up by five, just to have a cushion.  I've got to believe that the only thing worse than losing 15-0 is losing 15-11 and all 11 goals were own goals intentionally scored by the other team.  (Thanks to Mike Taylor for making me aware of this madness.)