Americans are losing their competitive edge in sports. Are we becoming lazy bums?
 

Justine Henin recently knocked Serena Williams out of the French Open. There are no Americans left in the competition.

The current heavyweight boxing champion list looks like this: Shannon Briggs WBO (USA), Ruslan Chagaev WBA (Uzbek), Sultan Ibragimov WBO (Russian).
Who in the hell are these guys?

I know who these guys are: Mike Tyson, Evander Holyfield, Ray Mercer, Michael Moorer, Riddick Bowe and Tim Witherspoon.

MLB is experiencing a decline in AA players and a dramatic increase of players of Latin descent.

The NBA is experiencing an ever increasing influx of foreign born players that really know how to play good ball. The USA mens Olympic basketball team discacefully took home the bronze medal in 2004.

The list goes on and on.

I dont know much about hockey but I suspect the same trends.

Football? Well...we are the only ones who know to play it.

If this keeps up we are in serious trouble.

it's a big world - America doesn't have a monopoly on athletes. In some sports like baseball, basketball and hockey, which are all indiginous North American sports, it's just a case of the rest of the world catching up. Americans still produce the majority of the best in those sports. Boxing - that's socio-economics, boxing was always an escape for the ethnic groups at the bottom of the totem pole. It was Italians, Irish, Jews and of course blacks - as those ethnic groups became middle class less of them went into boxing - blacks continued to dominate the heavier divisions. The rise of the NFL and NBA in only the past 25 years or so has led to the talented young black athletes pursuing those sports rather than boxing. Blacks are no longer playing baseball much either, it's not the sexy sport for black kids, and you can see it in the major leagues, their numbers are dropping and will continue to. America still has the best basketball players, but on the international level playing international rules, European teams can and are beating the best America has - that's all about teamwork something American superstars don't know much about. Blame NIKE, ESPN for that.

In Olympic sports, a ton of the world's best from all over the world trained in the United States on athletic scholarships at top NCAA schools.

I'll answer you later when I feel like it.

Just watch the chinese athletes at 2008 Olympics.

Yes.

:2 cents:

I'm sure Americans dominate one sport at least...golf :)

Ok...cant wait!