Milton Kent

This just in: The United States is awash in soccer fever. The arrival of the men’s World Cup on U.S. shores at one of the few times on the calendar when there isn’t actual football of the NFL variety has made for a boomlet in interest in the game the rest of the world knows as football. While it remains to be seen whether soccer, once and for all, takes root in the U.S. zeitgeist, as its devotees have long dreamed for, it may leave its mark on the American brand after all.

Whatever problems or difficulties you may be experiencing these days, be grateful that you are not Cathy Engelbert. For the uninitiated, Engelbert is the commissioner of the WNBA, and, right about now, in the words of comedy legend David Letterman, you wouldn’t give Engelbert’s troubles to a monkey on a rock. Her league, the longest surviving women’s professional sports organization, is in the midst of its 30th season.

Gerry Sandusky during a pregame broadcast before an NFL football game between the Baltimore Ravens and the Indianapolis Colts on Monday, Oct. 11, 2021, in Baltimore. How local TV sportscasting has reached the end of an era. Sports at Large WBALSportsjournalismBaltimore City