Televised sports in the US are built for advertisements. Peppering the game with constant commercial breaks makes it difficult to enjoy. If the pace of televised sports picked up - more action, less commercial breaks, less standing around - I'd be more inclined to watch. The constant breaks in action are also to the detriment of whatever fluidity the sport may have once enjoyed, and it's hard to get into a game that they keep stopping and chopping up. I find football particularly boring because there are only a few exciting plays per game and most of the "action" consists of the players picking themselves up and strolling back to the huddle, being in the huddle, walking to the line, lining up, then another 6 seconds of actual play if you're lucky. Basketball is the most exciting to watch, but it has been moulded to fit the needs of advertisers too imo.
The nice thing about spectator sports is that they are very much a part of the public domain and provide an accepted, and almost expected, ice breaker and conversation topic. "Did you catch the game last night?" is one of the few phrases a guy can use to open a conversation with any other guy in almost any situation, worldwide. In not being a patron of these events, one runs the risk of being, at best, regarded as something of a queer fish, and at worst, of ostracisement. Many is the time I've faced drop-jawed disbelief upon admitting that I follow neither Cricket nor footy (Aus rules), and if I confess that I find both sports as dull as a rainy Sunday afternoon in the town of Dullsville, supporters tend to react as though I had just called their first born "funny lookin'."
I don't have any problem with people enjoying sports though. If it brings them joy, then that's all that matters. I still roll my eyes at dreadfully unfit guys eating cheese fries in "sports bars," and there's definitely an opiate of the masses element to it all, but it's none of my business to tell them why they shouldn't be watching something they enjoy.
