Blog — world cup

Lebron James, in an essay recently released announcing his return to Cleveland, wrote the following: Before anyone ever cared where I would play basketball, I was a kid from Northeast Ohio. It’s where I walked. It’s where I ran. It’s where I cried. It’s where I bled. It holds a special place in my heart. People there have seen me grow up. I sometimes feel like I’m their son. Their passion can be overwhelming. But it drives me. I want to give them hope when I can. I want to inspire them when I can. My relationship with Northeast Ohio...

Sports are one of the few things that can, nearly universally, impact and effect people and places around the world. Whether it’s the 2013 Boston Red Sox, whose World Series run united the city and helped breathe life back into it after the tragic Marathon bombings, or the New York Yankees, who, during the Fall of 2001, was America’s team, reaching the World Series only to lose to the Diamondbacks. Even so, it’s almost unimaginable that a sport can evoke emotions so strong as to prompt a country, in the midst of a civil war, to end fighting and unite....

The World Cup is a massive event. Roughly 46% of the global population watched the 2010 World Cup in South Africa and though still TBD, 2014 World Cup viewership totals are expected to surpass 2010 figures by a substantial amount. Said in other terms, close to 4 billion people will have watched the 2014 World Cup. And though World Cup fever has substantially subsided in the U.S. after the American national team’s heartbreaking loss to Belgium, the implications and effects of the World Cup are still very much felt, and will continue to be felt, in the U.S. and elsewhere,...