America's Favorite Sports

Baseball

Various bat-and-ball games have been played in many parts of the world for ages, but it is difficult to trace the origins of modern-day baseball. Some point to the Irish game of “rounders” as the possible ancestor, but there are other candidates as well. Baseball as we know it today developed in mid-19th-century America. By 1869, the first professional baseball club was formed. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, two American leagues -- the National League and the American League -- were formed. In 1903, the World Series was established as a competition between the champions of the two leagues. Thus, Major League Baseball was formed.

Baseball is played by two teams of nine players. The teams alternate, with a member of one of the teams hitting the ball with a bat and the other team catching and pitching the ball. The hitting team scores by having a player run across the four “bases” on the baseball field that form what is called a “diamond.” The player is able to run when the batter hits the ball. The pitching team uses various tactics (striking out, forcing out, tagging, or catching the ball in the air) to prevent the batting team from scoring a run. A professional or college baseball game lasts for nine “innings.” In each inning each team member has one turn to bat and to score “runs” before it makes three “outs.” Baseball is one of the few sports not governed by a clock.

Baseball is popular throughout North America, Central America, the Caribbean and some parts of East Asia. American Major League Baseball has numerous players from Latin America and some from East Asia, especially Japan. Known for its leisurely pace, punctuated by dramatic climaxes, it has an almost mythical place in popular American culture. Considered a quintessential American game, it has been depicted in numerous works of literature and film as a metaphor for life’s dreams and sudden turns of fortune. Baseball also has been used to promote civil rights, for example by Jackie Robinson, who in 1947 integrated baseball by becoming the first African American to play in the major leagues.

Basketball

Though popular throughout the world, the game was invented in the United States by a Canadian, Dr. James Naismith. Naismith was an instructor at a YMCA training school in Springfield Massachusetts. In December 1891, he decided to create an indoor game to help his students keep physically fit during harsh New England winters. The game quickly caught on, and by 1906 the original peach basket was replaced with a metal hoop and a backboard. As the ball used in basketball improved in quality, dribbling, or bouncing the ball off the floor as teams advanced, was introduced. Basketball involves two teams of five players, each competing to score the most points into the opponents’ basket.

At first, basketball was mainly an amateur sport popular in high schools, colleges and recreational facilities. It became an Olympic sport in 1936. In 1946, the first professional basketball league was organized. In 1949, it became the National Basketball Association (NBA) -- the dominant American professional basketball league to this day.

Basketball is the third most popular American sport. It is played both indoors and outdoors. It is especially popular among African-American youth. A simplified version known as “pickup basketball” became a favorite inner-city pastime with its own subculture and mythology. (See the 1992 feature movie White Men Can’t Jump by Ron Shelton and the 1994 documentary Hoop Dreams by Steve James.) American basketball stars like Michael Jordan and Earvin “Magic” Johnson not only have popularized the sport but also have given back to their communities and helped many charitable causes. U.S. professional basketball in recent years has been attracting many international stars, who are playing for several major NBA teams.

Tennis

Tennis is another European import that has become incredibly popular in the United States among people of all ages and social backgrounds. An indoor version of tennis known as “court tennis” or “royal tennis” or “jeu de paume” was played by royalty and aristocracy in the 16th and 17th centuries in Western Europe, especially in England and France. Tennis as we know it today was created in late 19th-century England. Its rules were standardized in the 1890s, making it one of the oldest continuously played sports in the world. Tennis is played in singles or doubles on a hard court made of grass, clay, concrete or asphalt, divided by a net. One player serves, while the opposing player receives the serve. A point is scored when the receiving player does not hit the ball back, hits the net or misses the designated scoring area.

The four most famous tennis tournaments are known collectively as the Grand Slam tournaments. They include Wimbledon in London, the U.S. Open in New York, the Australian Open in Melbourne and the French Open in Paris. For men, the most Grand Slam singles wins -- 14 in total – went to American Pete Sampras between 1990 and 2002. For women, the most prolific winner was Australian Margaret Court, who won 24 Grand Slam titles between 1960 and 1973. Tennis is also an Olympic sport -- it was played from the start of the Olympics in 1896 until 1924 and has been played again from 1988 to today.

Tennis has changed a great deal since its ostensibly elitist origins in Victorian-era England. It is expanding throughout the world, especially to Asia, Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. In the United States, tennis has been a vehicle for the advancement of civil rights, as shown by the careers of African Americans Arthur Ashe and Althea Gibson. It is also a popular recreational activity, with 25.1 million players, according to the New Tennis Participation Trends Report.

Soccer

The world’s most popular sport -- commonly referred to as “soccer” in America and “football” everywhere else -- is gaining a mass following in the United States. In fact, it is already the fourth-most-watched sport in America, although it still is lags far behind the “big three” -- American football, baseball and basketball.

Until recently, soccer’s popularity was driven mainly by the growing U.S. Latino population. It also was considered a “safe” alternative to American football and suitable for small children and girls. International successes of American women’s teams (the Olympic gold in 1996 and 2004 and silver in 2000, with the help of American soccer star Mia Hamm) helped build the sport’s popularity in the United States. Americans came to appreciate the incredible stamina, precision and team coordination required by the game. Men’s soccer is becoming increasingly popular in America. From 1967 to 1984, America had the North American Soccer League, which featured world football stars such as Franz Beckenbauer and Pelé. Major League Soccer (MLS) debuted in the United States in 1996. MLS has gained popularity in the United States, especially after 2002, when an American team made up mostly of MLS players reached the quarterfinals in the World Cup.

Still a bit of an exotic “import,” U.S. soccer is expanding, and MLS keeps adding new teams to its roster. Made up primarily of U.S. players, the league also has brought over international superstars, like David Beckham, to America. According to experts, soccer will experience major growth in the United States during the coming decades.

Auto Racing

Apart from “soccer moms,” a social, cultural and political term describing predominantly middle-class, suburban housewives driving their kids to soccer games or practices, America also has “NASCAR dads,” mostly white, working-class or lower-middle-class men bonding with their sons (and daughters, too) by watching loud, thrilling, often dangerous car races. Auto racing, especially NASCAR (the National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing), is the fifth-most-popular spectator sport in the United States and the second (after football) most frequently watched on television.

Auto racing began soon after the creation of the first cars. France hosted the first official car race in 1895. Today, track racing breaks into two main types: “single-seater” and “stock” car racing. In single-seater racing, also known as open-wheel racing because of the outside placement of the car’s wheels, the car is a one-person, incredibly fast vehicle built specifically for racing. The most famous variety of single-seater racing is Formula One. Stock car racing, known also as touring racing, theoretically uses beefed-up versions of normal passenger cars, although the relationship of a racing “stock car” to its consumer prototype can be rather tenuous. The third, less popular kind of car racing is called “drag racing,” or “hot-rod racing,” in which cars rapidly accelerate and race in pairs over very short distances -- a quarter of a mile (about 400 meters) or even an eighth of a mile (about 200 meters).

In America, the most popular car events are NASCAR stock car races in which cars race laps around an oval-shaped track. NASCAR’s roots are mainly in the U.S. Southeast states, but its popularity has grown throughout the United States and beyond.

Auto races are often laboratories for new automotive designs and technologies. Possibly the most famous U.S. Formula One event, “Indy 500,” has switched entirely to biofuels, running its cars on ethanol.

American Football

The game known today as American football (or simply “football” to most Americans) evolved from various types of rugby played in English-speaking countries. American football’s rules gradually were standardized by New England Ivy League universities, which met in 1876 to adopt an adjusted version of England Rugby Union rules. American football in the 19th century was a pretty rough sport, with many injuries and even deaths. In 1905-1906, at the urging of President Roosevelt, football rules were reformed to make American football safer, creating the game that is played today. By the 1970s, the two major professional American football leagues merged into the National Football League (NFL), and the Super Bowl, the championship game of the NFL, came to the be the most-watched event on U.S. television.

American football is played on a 110-meter by 50-meter field. The objective is to get to the opponents’ “end zone,” which is the area at either end of the field. Teams can score by running the football into the end zone or throwing the ball and having it be caught in the end zone by a player from the same team. Getting the ball in the end zone gives the team six points and a chance to score one or two points on a single play after scoring the six points. A team also can score three points by kicking the ball between the posts set up in the end zone.

After developing from elitist Ivy League beginnings into the most popular and “democratic” American game, American football is played mainly, though not exclusively, in the United States. In Canada, it is played under slightly different rules. In Japan, football is played by the semi-professional X-League. There is also a German American-football league, and the interest in this sport is slowly spreading to other countries.