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Bum Chillups aka Spencer Hall on the World Cup hitting the American mainstream like never before
447 Plays1 hour ago
Spencer Hall, aka Bum Chillups joins Jeremiah to talk about how the World Cup seems to be hitting the American mainstream in a way that it never has before, his delight at seeing Alexi Lalas embarrassed on national TV and why he loves the communal aspects of soccer fandom.
Follow Bum Chillups aka Spencer Hall on Channel 6 and on BlueSky.
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Transcript
Introduction of Will Bruin
00:00:01
Speaker
Hi, I'm Will Bruin, and I was just recognized as a Seattle Sounders legend. Now I get to do voice reads for the Sounder at Heart podcast network. Here we go.
00:00:11
Speaker
Come
Seattle Sounders' MLS Cup Victory
00:00:12
Speaker
on. Hey, O'Shaughness. Let's The Seattle Sounders have done it. MLS Cup winners. The Sounders rule the region.
00:00:43
Speaker
Ooch of a gooch! All creatures, great and small! Rothrock gonna collect it, he does about, runs into the advertising order. Low to our left, ball goes in! Oh, what a Where's my copy? got bunch of them How many do you cost them? 50 bucks.
00:01:08
Speaker
I'll deadline you.
Sponsorship by Full Pull Wines
00:01:18
Speaker
This episode of Nos Arietes is sponsored by Full Pull Wines, a Seattle-based wine retailer and proud sponsor of Nos Arietes since 2011. Full Pull was founded in 2009, is based in Seattle, and is owned and operated by longtime Sounder supporters.
00:01:32
Speaker
They offer the best boutique wines of the world to members of their mailing list, with special focus on their home, Pacific Northwest.
Interview with Spencer Hall
00:01:44
Speaker
Welcome back to another episode of Nos Adietes on the Sounder at Heart Podcast Network. Joining me today is someone who, I will be completely honest, I wasn't entirely sure if they had any idea who I was when I reached out to them, and I was very relieved to find out that they at least...
00:01:59
Speaker
knew enough to pretend to know who I was. So I, I really want to say thank you for that Spencer Hall, who you probably know as bum chillups or EDSBS. ah He is currently running channel six, a former SB nation colleague of mine and someone who is usually knee deep in college football, but right now appears to have gotten, ah be very interested in the world cup. And I found that very fascinating and I wanted to talk to him. Welcome to the show, Spencer.
00:02:27
Speaker
Yeah, thank you. Yeah, I'm ah i'm a 94 guy. Like if you want to know when okay my first World Cup of note of memory was, it's 94. Everything else is retrograde. Like I, my first World Cup memory is the hand of God goal. But that was divorced from that was divorced from any actual understanding of what was happening. That was just something cool on a TV that was happening. ah The first one where I knew, okay, that's what's happening. We're doing the Animal Olympics, but with soccer, that's, ah that's 94.
00:02:57
Speaker
Yeah, so i I will admit that I am about the same age as you. And so I should have the same sort of sporting reference. And I was a I was, you know, a high schooler in 1994.
00:03:10
Speaker
And the World Cup to me was something I knew existed. But I don't know, I had any frame of reference for it.
Personal World Cup Journeys
00:03:18
Speaker
at all. Like, other than i have family, you know, I know soccer to some degree. i played soccer, but I was not a, ah so I was certainly not, I don't think I could name any players going into the World Cup. I don't think i could name a single player in the tournament going into 94.
00:03:32
Speaker
And so my connection to the World Cup was almost exclusively that the Brazil national team was playing, was, uh, headquartered in Los Gatos, California, which was near where I lived and they were playing games at Stanford.
00:03:46
Speaker
And that was relevant to me. I, I but i did not get to a game. Uh, I started dating my wife in 1996. She was much more of a soccer fan than I was at that time. So I was a little bit and she was into the 98 world cup. So I was started getting into that, but I really didn't get into the world cup. until really 2006 when she and I am and and a couple of other friends went to Europe to experience what it was like to be around the World Cup. We didn't actually get to a game, but we did go to a lot of watch parties. We went to a fan fest in Germany after we failed to get tickets for the U.S. opener.
00:04:20
Speaker
And I was not really into soccer, but even then, i was not really even into soccer until 2010. So the fact that you seem to have been remotely intrigued by 94, or more intrigued by 94 than me, I think says a lot about the ah the the credibility you you should have in this space. Yeah.
00:04:40
Speaker
I'd hope so. Although yeah cred i'm less concerned about credibility and more about disclosure and's and being very forthright about things. For instance, I've always looked out when I came to the World Cup because there's always something that is a a turn for me. There's always some pivot point in either life or the world that it always hinges on. 98, I moved out of the country.
00:05:03
Speaker
um i moved to taiwan so i was watching them in the middle like i want to say that what is the time difference there even i forget france to taiwan probably like eight ish hours i would guess boy yeah there's like i was trying to think like i remember watching them at very very inappropriate times right and watching like dennis bergkamp score when i probably should have been working And then in 02, it's the middle of the night because it's the Korea-Japan World Cup.
00:05:32
Speaker
I did have some insomniac memories of that of that tournament as well. Get up, go to the bar at 3 in the morning, go to work at 9. That was basically...
00:05:44
Speaker
how you negotiated that, right? um Just, there's always something that sort of hangs on it for me, you know? And I suppose that that this time that is, ah I've got a summer where I kind of have to be home, like everything, like I can't get out too much because there's a bunch of places falling around our falling down around our ears and, you know, we need, I have to be around to make sure that, you know, there's not a hole in the roof.
00:06:08
Speaker
And that actually ends up being mad convenient. Yeah, like it's it's extremely convenient where you go, ah, cool. I just I have an excuse. I could sit here and watch soccer all day.
00:06:19
Speaker
Well, you know, that actually dovetails nicely into into this. ah This World Cup is obviously the first one in the modern American soccer
Evolution of Soccer Culture in the US
00:06:29
Speaker
history. Like I think we can put like obviously 1990 was when the U.S. made its return to the the World Cup after year.
00:06:37
Speaker
60 50 year absence and 94 was sort of when a lot of fans were first
00:06:48
Speaker
in uh first kind of introduced to the u.s to the to the world cup in ah in a real way but i don't think there were not soccer there were not a lot of soccer fans uh who were going into like 94 was ah a curiosity, I think is fair to say. yeah And this is the first world cup that we've had where we have a robust, like there's a real soccer culture. I think you can say in the United States, there is a, you know, it's, you can find virtually any game in any league, a relatively easy on a streaming service or even over broadcast TV. And this is the first world cup that we've had where it's made for our viewing our our time. It's on our time zones, right? Right.
00:07:27
Speaker
And so we have almost every day for the last few weeks had four games a day. And it goes from, you know, on the West Coast, it it goes from either nine or 10 until or noon, I guess, in some cases, until sometimes we have games going until 11 p.m. at night. ah How do you think that that has changed? Just the fact that we are there is soccer on the TV basically every day, all day. How do you think that is that is sort of breaking through to the average sports fan?
00:07:55
Speaker
The average sports fan is is usually somebody who, um I don't know what our language parameters are, ain't got shit to do. It's very important that you're willing to just put something on in the background.
00:08:06
Speaker
And I think this is ideal for that because the notion of paying attention to four games diligently within a game, I will tell you somebody who covers college football for half the year, it's not real possible.
00:08:17
Speaker
You know, eventually you will zone out and soccer is built for that. You know, watching on Telemundo, I just kind of follow the the pitch and the tilt of somebody's voice until something gets quicker.
00:08:28
Speaker
And, you know, you want to watch know why I watch on Telemundo. There's like 35 reasons why I watch on Telemundo, despite not being a native Spanish speaker and not really a Spanish speaker at all. Yeah. I think I'm at like 70% upkeep, on this. Like, I think I get 70% of what they're saying, but mostly I'm just there for the ah stage direction. They're very good at it. Yes. And they let you know when something is about to happen or might happen or something cool is going to happen.
00:08:55
Speaker
um You know, That's, I think that matters a lot. I think for the diehards, they're going to be watching no matter what. And I think for the casuals, who I think we worry too much about sometimes, if you put it on, people come, like they'll watch a spectacle. And this is a spectacle.
00:09:16
Speaker
But more importantly, I think at the ground level, it's fun. And I think despite this, that's why, you know, like this, this goddamn tournament, because as a concept, it always works.
00:09:26
Speaker
it It always works. Like it's, it's too fun. It's too ridiculous. Like it's a big, ridiculous idea, right? That we're going take these essentially temporary squads, you know, summer squads.
00:09:37
Speaker
And we're going to determine who has the best soccer team in the world. it with Like the best soccer team in the world plays for either the Bundesliga or plays for the EPL or in league one, right? Like they're not, that's the best soccer team.
00:09:53
Speaker
It's the one can buy. Yeah. it It is funny sometimes when we get into these discussions and ah because the World Cup is obviously held up as the pinnacle of the sport. But the reality is that, you know, every year, you know, and we used to have these discussions sometimes at SB Nation where it was like this big revelation that it's like, actually, the Super Bowl is not the most watched sporting event on any given year. It is almost always the Champions League final when you talk about worldwide audience. And And also the best soccer team in the world invariably plays in the Champions League final.
00:10:24
Speaker
And we grant, you know, they get crowned every year and they're made up of, you know, sometimes they have a heavy a heavy sampling of one nation's players or another, but it is never a monolithic group who all play for the same team. And it's it's not even fair to say that the World Cup is a bunch of all-star teams because there there are maybe a couple...
00:10:46
Speaker
You know, you can you can say they're sort of all star team like, but they it's it's that's even overstating it, I think, to say they're all star teams. Yeah, it's it is it is kind of a preposterous concept.
00:11:00
Speaker
And I love that. It's absurd, and you know, and it only gets more absurd the longer you look at it. Like, it's absurd to have it in the United States right now.
00:11:10
Speaker
This is the worst possible. This should be the worst possible time to be a visitor. It should be yes the most conflicted time possible to be a fan, particularly, you know, the United States team. If you're an American fan, you know. Right. which i have to Especially if you're not an American. Especially if you're not American.
00:11:29
Speaker
Yeah, especially if you're not American. It's hard. See, it looks like for some ah for some ah nations, it's difficult to get a visa right now. Why? Because we have a fascist administration in place that people voted in for reasons I will never understand. I don't have to. All I know is that despite all of this, when you come here, it works.
Diverse Cultures in US World Cup
00:11:50
Speaker
people like People like hanging out. People like people like ah trying your food. um It works if you have it in Korea and Japan. It works if you have it here. It works if you have it in France. um People like hanging out.
00:12:01
Speaker
And, you know, like against all odds, that's undefeated. Yeah. ah You know, one of the things that has really struck me about this tournament in particular is that for all the warts and the very justified complaints about this, about FIFA, about the U.S. government, about everything that went into the build, like there was...
00:12:20
Speaker
There was almost a wall of negativity that was leading into this. The tickets are too expensive. It's too hard to get in. There's going to be ice patrolling the streets. ah There's going to be empty stands. There's going to be all these things. And I think these were all perfectly warranted and justified complaints and concerns. And and it's just been amazing to me how it has sort of...
00:12:42
Speaker
Washed away and maybe not washed away, but it's been covered. been We've forgotten about it. we've we've ah We've compartmentalized that part of it. And we've ah we've been able to enjoy this tournament for what it is, which is, like you said, it's an amazing spectacle. But beyond that, I think what has struck me is the way that foreigners have come to this country and sort of had...
00:13:03
Speaker
almost open that it's like realizing that the United States is not a monolith, that it's like the people are not the government. And that ah this is actually an amazing place that has a lot of different environments that, you know, Seattle is not like New York, that is not like Miami and is not like Texas. And, ah and the food is, is varied. And I think what's been like both,
00:13:26
Speaker
Frustrating because it could have been better, but also really satisfying is seeing sort of the Instagrams of all these foreign influencers just rave about their experiences.
00:13:37
Speaker
Yeah. And, you know, that's, of course, you know, that's what will get the clicks, baby, because, you know, Americans, we want to be loved like anyone else. Right. Did you come here? Did you have a good time? Right.
00:13:48
Speaker
Like, I think everyone's meeting. I think everyone's meeting the median voter at once. Yeah. The median voters. The median voter is a crazy person, man. They might be like, yeah, i voted for Trump three times. She's like, well, that's crazy. They're like, yeah, man, you want some food? You're like, what? Yeah, man, I hope you have a good time while you're here in Dallas. What? No, you don't. Yeah, I do.
00:14:08
Speaker
That doesn't make sense. No, none of it makes sense. You want me to like, we can't have any big definitive, like we can't have any big definitive judgments on the United States of America or anywhere else until you go there and you go, yeah, man, people are crazy. Generally pleasant.
00:14:24
Speaker
Generally pleasant, but all over the map, all over the map, you know? yes And I think it helps guests because as you know, if if you've traveled as a guest, you generally want to be on your best behavior.
00:14:36
Speaker
So everyone is on their best behavior. Hey man, I saw Colombian fans in the stands against Uzbekistan. I saw this clip. This little kid, little Uzbek kid, you know, our kid ended with an Uzbek jersey, you know, who knows? He might be from like Marietta, Georgia and just wear it, just feeling it, right?
00:14:50
Speaker
um But he's got an Uzbekistan jersey on. He's crying because they're losing. And and columbia the Columbia fans start chanting, Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan, because he's crying. right They want to make him feel better. i that This is all happening at once. I don't need you to not be cynical about it if that's your default setting. I'm just saying it's a wild experience when you get a bunch of people together for whatever reason. We haven't even... like like Joy as an act of resistance is real, if that's what you feel at this particular moment. I think it's true at any moment in human history. If you're experiencing some joy, go ahead, lean into it. but um
00:15:30
Speaker
But at the same time, ah that this is FIFA and the United States putting on an event, like the United States government basically co-sponsoring an event, and people are still having a good time. That's an indictment of FIFA and the United States government.
00:15:43
Speaker
Right. Because we're doing that like this is happening despite all of that. Right. Right. And I think that's that's sort of what struck me. ah And I guess one of the other reasons that I i wanted, i was particularly curious in your perspective on all this is I feel like you have maybe a...
00:16:01
Speaker
better set. Like we get, we are very much in a bubble and I suppose you could argue that college football fans are, are a different kind of bubble, but it seems like a much bigger bubble at the very least. And, you know, ah in, in some ways, I guess I'm, I'm surprised by the way that this is seemingly broken through, but does it, does it feel to you as if this is sort of making inroads in ways that previous tournaments that beat previous us runs have maybe not been I hope so. but The ratings seem to indicate, you know, if you just judge by TV ratings and by, you know, sort of the general like media reaction, we don't have, you know, you don't, it's not scientific. we' We won't know for years whether this picked up or not, but I think it is fair to say that, you know, if you go back and you look at 94, 94 is a watershed moment for United States soccer.
00:16:51
Speaker
Because if you take everybody and I just say, go back 20 years. Like if you look at everybody who was our age during 94 and you look forward 20, 20 years, they're all at least paying
Long-term Impact of the World Cup
00:17:00
Speaker
attention. They all at least are like, okay, yeah, I got an EPL team or I'll watch this. Right. um And I think if you look now, we won't know for 10 to 20 years what the impact of this tournament was. I know some really cool things have happened and that people are been exposed to some cool things that happened.
00:17:17
Speaker
um You know, for me, the 94, the 94 tournament was fascinating because, you know, you have to see like Roberto Baggio blow, a you know, PK over the bar, right against, you know, one of the last like really, really, really, really big Brazilian teams, right.
00:17:32
Speaker
um And that was fascinating. That was amazing to me, right? That doesn't come twice in a lifetime. You just got to see and an old Leo Messi scored twice for Argentina against Austria.
00:17:48
Speaker
That's the kind of thing that kids will go, hey, listen, I saw that. Their kids will be like, you're really old. Yeah, really old. I saw Messi play, you know? um that' that's awesome That's awesome. I don't... That's the kind of thing that like...
00:18:01
Speaker
I think that's a seed and you plant it and then you see, um then you see what grows from the ground afterwards, whether it's making you an EPL fan, whether it's making you the kind of casual who's, I think this is the most important thing, by the way, is not to see like, okay, can we get this person out to see the MLS team?
00:18:20
Speaker
That to me is not the most important thing. The most important thing is, did you experience something where you center the game in your life as a positive thing? Whether it's to reach out to people, whether it's to make your life better, whether it's something beautiful you admire, whether it's a way that you meet, interact, or connect with people, whether it is just solid just a solid bellwether that you hang the year on where you go, okay, it's soccer season. Like I'm, I'm good for, you know, but from nine to 12 on a Saturday or Sunday, I know what I'm doing, right. I'm getting some coffee and I'm going to watch the EPL or whatever.
00:18:53
Speaker
um That's the most important thing for me. Everything else after that is just some sort of delusion of marketing, right. Some sort of consumer outcome that you want to achieve, which is fine, but it's not what, it's not what I would be concerned with as a long-term effect.
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Communal Joy in Soccer
00:21:09
Speaker
Yeah, I would say that, you know, the thing that has always struck me about the, what hooked me about the World Cup in which I had never really experienced myself was the communal aspect of watching these games that feels a little different than,
00:21:23
Speaker
normal then then you know or i suppose it it it is similar to you know folks who will go out to ah the the pub on a saturday morning and and watch premier league games all day or whatever but yeah uh that there is something about soccer that seems to bring out this communal uh joy and and i think the thing that i've always found most powerful about uh soccer and i do think it is different is that it's so much about the build-up and the anticipation and that these massive explosions of joy when you when you're not guaranteed it, right? Like you're, you're not in any given game. You, you might go to a zero, zero draw and, in walk away, totally disappointed. But because of those, the, the, every goal that your team scores feels that much bigger and that much power, more powerful. And, and there is something I so feel like that's in soccer that, uh, lends itself to that communal sort of like hugging the neighbor next to you. You're the stranger next to you.
00:22:19
Speaker
Yeah, it's the on-ramp is so low and so easy, right? Yeah. It's just so gentle. Like even even the World Cup, like you don't. I remember the the Japan Korea one was awesome because that was when Ireland qualified.
00:22:33
Speaker
And, you know, Irish fans, there are these stories about Irish fans just taking, you know, Japanese fans who are going to the game or commuters who didn't have a ticket. And they were like okay, you have a ticket now. They're like, I don't speak English. They're like, we don't care.
00:22:45
Speaker
It's fine. Here's a beer. You want to go to the game? They're like, oh yeah, I want to go to the game. Cool. I'm going to paint you green. And they're like... I'm in. That's it. yeah Like I, like the, the invitation, I love the world cup as invitation, right. For all the graft, for all the controversy, you know, for all of the, um, Alexi lawless as fascist mascot bullshit surrounding it. I, I love, i love the invitation because ultimately this is the kind of thing where it's free.
00:23:14
Speaker
It's free. Like the basic, the basic product If you're watching and you just want to watch, or if you just want to hang out, it's free because it's soccer. Soccer is free. Like watch these players. These are the best players in the world.
00:23:28
Speaker
And they're out there going, well, maybe this will work. Maybe that'll work. You know, ah but let's try this. Let's try that. You know, the improvisational element of the game, the low barrier to entry, just to play at any age and then to watch and appreciate it.
00:23:44
Speaker
You know, like you said, yeah, May not happen, but like simple one or two times a game, something incredible is going to happen and you never know when. Yeah. ah you know You mentioned Lexi there and and I'm just, curious have you happened to see the way that he and ah Henri and Zlatan have been interacting by any chance? It's been, it's great. I get clips. So I'm watching on Telemundo and in part, because I don't want to watch a likely lawless. I don't, sure you know, I don't want to see that man earn money.
00:24:12
Speaker
Um, But I do get clips. And that's the best part about being on the internet is that somebody just cuts it up and feeds it to you. It's bad. It's bad. that's That's rank. That is a rotten studio dynamic. That's not Shaq being upset at something that Charles said on the NBA on TNT.
00:24:30
Speaker
You know, that's a guy who doesn't get the joke. That's a guy who doesn't ah want to be or can play the role of butt of the joke. Yeah, i don't feel like he has got... Because for all the sort of... ah kind of clownish behavior that Alexei has engaged in over
Alexi Lalas' Controversial Commentary
00:24:50
Speaker
the years. And at times I found, i thought it was actually, there was an appeal to it because I thought he was doing a good job of sort of creating conversation around the game. And it does feel like it's it's sort of taken a turn and it has, and it and it it feels like for the first time, he's really being sort of like called out by his colleagues on live television.
00:25:11
Speaker
And it it'll be interesting to see if what the fallout from that is because this does feel not like something we're used to seeing so much on, on big yeah television. He messed around and got important at work.
00:25:22
Speaker
That's the problem is that the world cup came around and you go, okay, well, here's our guy. We've had this guy for a long time. Right. And what does he do? Well, he's a vibe. That's it. Do you remember anything Alexi Lawless says? He doesn't say it. like He's good at No. He does the thing that a lot of TV people do.
00:25:37
Speaker
um and which Because I've done TV. I can say this. I've done it too. Sometimes they're like you have 30 seconds. and You're like, I got 30 seconds of confident loud. That's it. 30 seconds of confident and loud. And then that's about it.
00:25:47
Speaker
Unfortunately, he's been put on a stage with Thierry Henry. um You Zlatan's just kind of a throw in who occasionally insults him and doesn't like him. But Thierry Henry is an amazing commentator.
00:25:59
Speaker
And screen presence. And he's delightful. And he has good listening skills. And he in his second language, no less, or third language at this point, Jerry Henry, in addition to all of that, is way better in his job.
00:26:15
Speaker
So like the the question that he's got, and it's it's very funny because like the definitive, like I think Alexei Lawless is for better or worse a standard bearer for what can go wrong with Gen X. And the comedy of Gen X is like soul is office space. And he's been forced to confront the basic question at the core of that movie, which is what exactly do you do here?
00:26:36
Speaker
Because this guy is way better at all of it. And this guy is here to let you know how much he hates you and how much better he was at soccer. That's it. And Rebecca Lowe is, of course, like the peak competence of of running a studio show.
00:26:52
Speaker
Yeah. And I think that that is as so that's also been one of the things I don't remember if she was on the Fox broadcast in Qatar, but I do feel like the I i don't think he would I don't I think that was Rob Stone who was in her role. Yeah. In 2020. I think the point guy. Yeah.
00:27:09
Speaker
And ah and and it has been sort of refreshed it's it's kind of this been this bizarre thing because it's like half of what you have come to expect from a Premier League or Champions League ah studio show and half of what Fox is normally doing.
00:27:23
Speaker
And it it does create this interesting contrast. And... ah i don't know i don't I don't know if what that was purposeful. I don't quite understand how this happened because Fox seems to have purposefully created a lineup of talent ah for them in previous years that was designed not for peak. ah like This was not part of what they normally did, I did not think.
00:27:44
Speaker
No, no, I don't think it was what they did. But the addition of the addition of Henri really is just upset that like sometimes chemistry exposes people or lack of chemistry exposes people, you know, whether it's ah on a sports pitch or whether it's on TV.
00:28:00
Speaker
And I think people have seen that he's slow. He's slow. He's not particularly insightful. you know The thing that he was an insider at, which was you know the inner workings of the United States men's national team. I don't know. He called for he called for the manager to be fired last year.
00:28:17
Speaker
didn't get fired. What kind of decent info do you think he's getting? you know do you think yeah like That's not Steve Sampson or Greg Berhalter there, right? Or Bruce Arena. yeah that or bo arena or Yeah, or Arena or any
00:28:33
Speaker
I would even believe that he had more insight into the Jurgen Klinsmann sort of like school because at least Klinsmann was had been ah swimming around American soccer circles for a long time by the time he took over the.
00:28:46
Speaker
But so what's what what does he do here? What's his angle? does he just sit there Does he just sit there and you know blame the United States women's team's political beliefs for why they lost to Sweden? Yeah, I had almost forgotten.
00:28:59
Speaker
Yeah. was did Was being woke the thing that caused you to miss a penalty kick? Right. you know Because that's what Lexi Lawless wanted me to believe. It sure was. ah wanted at the same time, i think this is the first time that at the world cup that we've seen sort of college football style ah studio. They kind of like the, the, the studio where you have the fans in the background and that, that has been kind of refreshing. And I do love the idea of bringing sort of like college football elements into American soccer.
00:29:35
Speaker
i I think any exchange there and I just wrote a like between the sports, I wrote a whole thing on how we should have more like FA Cup style cups in college football. Like we should have a essentially a minor league or a minor tournament, right? That's just yeah completely open and doesn't rely on anything that the playoff does. We should have a preseason. We should have jamborees.
00:29:56
Speaker
um You know, we should be as creative as soccer has been in terms of ah cutting the product up into different forms and digesting it. I think that goes for broadcasting as well. There's a lot of color. There's no reason to keep everybody in the booth, right?
00:30:09
Speaker
Turn them loose. no let them into the Let them into the crowd. um That's an amazing thing to do at the World Cup because half the reason you're there is to see everyone else. you know i'm going I'm going to a Scotland match because I want to hang out with Scottish soccer fans. The team is a secondary concern to me.
00:30:27
Speaker
that's That seems to capture the World Cup about perfectly. ah Yeah. is that Go ahead. Oh, I just love being around.
00:30:38
Speaker
i just love being around fans of of teams. of you know and And I find myself being like in my my logical brain thinking, like yeah, it would be fun to watch Spain play some random team. But then I realize
Celebration of Fan Passion
00:30:50
Speaker
if I'm not surrounded by people who are – passionately supporting one of these teams.
00:30:55
Speaker
I don't know if I actually care that much about this, but you put me, you know, like yesterday I was watching Belgium, uh, Iran, and there were a lot of Iranian fans around and it did not take long for me to become ah a big Iran fan.
00:31:10
Speaker
Yeah. This is the, this is the, um, I think ah Victoria Zeller put it really well on Blue Sky when um she's like, listen, I just learned where this country was. And I'm paraphrasing here. But now I will absolutely die for them. that's yeah like I think that's part of the fun is to say, hey, Cabo Verde, you are important. going to that had to be Cabo Verde. It was the most, Cabo Verde is the most important team in the world right now. Like that's, you love that. You just, you go, okay, hey, um um I hope people do that.
00:31:45
Speaker
You know, um I know people do that for us. I know there's not not as many because for a lot of reasons, you know, I know I, man, I i mark the hell out for Columbia every time they play because, you know,
00:31:57
Speaker
I don't know. i'm i'm a I'm a sucker for backheels and announcers who take 45 seconds to finish the goal call. Yes. Because even for Spanish announcers, Colombian announcers go above and beyond the call of gold. an echo? like like like that like when i remember James Rodriguez, when he sort of had his big coming out, ah like the the guy had reverb on his mic. And I was like, oh, that is... Because he thought about it. He was like, yeah, we'll put a little reverb on this.
00:32:24
Speaker
There you go. There you go. Well, ah Spencer, it's been an absolute joy having you on. i I also want to just say as someone who has left the SB Nation world and set out on an independent journey, I have ah really enjoyed seeing Channel 6 do as well as it has been.
00:32:46
Speaker
um i hope that you are surrounded by people who know who Nick Saban is. I'm sure you are, which I'm sure is very gratifying. It'd be hard to find one. I know one, yeah but but I know it'd be hard to find another.
00:32:58
Speaker
Right. Anything else other than the, or actually tell us tell me a little bit about, tell our listeners about channel six, because i I, would imagine we may have some listeners who are not entirely familiar
Spencer Hall on Channel 6
00:33:10
Speaker
with it. During college football season, it's primarily college football delivered to your inbox twice a week. um When it is not, sometimes it's college football, but most of the time it's just a, it's a menagerie of things we find interesting, including I'm definitely writing about Alexi Lawless this week and about everything I just talked about, which is, you know, don't ever mess around and get important at work, especially if you're not good at your job.
00:33:30
Speaker
Yeah, i well, that's ah that's probably a good note to to end on. ah Once again, thank you for joining us. I'm Jeremiah Shan. This is No Saniete as part of the Sounder at Heart podcast network, and we will catch you next time.
00:34:13
Speaker
Let's go at Sounders.