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"The Biggest Party on the Planet: An American at the World Cup" by Mark Baldwin

"The Biggest Party on the Planet" is a raucous, irreverent look at the wild times, spectacle and culture clash that can only happen when adventurous fanatics follow their National Teams to foreign shores.
Available on Amazon and via Kindle.

From the temples of Seoul to Berlin's Brandenburg Gate to the Staples Center in Los Angeles, Mark C. Baldwin follows all the passion and the action, with uniquely American sensibilities. It is equal parts sports book, travelogue, and comedy of errors. It is the story of one man's quest to experience firsthand the largest and most celebrated event known to humankind. It plays out over eight years, three continents and two World Cups: Korea 2002 and Germany 2006.

Author Mark C. Baldwin is an Emmy-winning documentary producer as well as a writer and editor of episodic television. You’ve seen his work on The History Channel, Discovery, HBO, Lifetime, CBS, ABC, NBC, Fox, TNT, the CW, and PBS. Mark is life-long soccer player and fan, who first attended a World Cup Qualifier in 1985. Since then he has attended games in Italy, Korea, Germany, the Czech Republic, Canada, Costa Rica and the United States. As his wife will tell you, he’s always ready to watch a game, or play in one.

SoccerNation.com interviewed Baldwin on soccer today:

“Major League Soccer has changed how young people relate to the sport. Before MLS, you saw kids dropping out of soccer when they got into High School. An athlete could dream of a career in Baseball, Football, Basketball or Hockey, but to really have a career in soccer meant going overseas. For most people in the U.S. that was an exotic option at best, open to only a very few. Now that kids can see professionals really making a living in their own country playing the game they love, they can aspire to be pro soccer players themselves. It's not some abstract concept anymore, but a concrete, undeniable reality,” says Baldwin.

“When I was a kid, I was a very competitive player, but I was told to forget about soccer at the college level. I was told there were no scholarships available, and that the sport was poorly organized.” Soccer has certainly chanced since then. Not only is soccer in Sothern California extremely well organized providing a broad variety of options, but there are a lot of scholarships available for hardworking soccer players. Many coaches work with their players to make sure that the players have the best scholarship opportunity. As Baldwin points out “Nowadays, who wouldn't want to be a soccer player at UCLA or the University of Virginia?”

It's a wide open field now, and realizing one's dream of playing soccer professionally or in the NCAA is a question of grit, determination and hard work.

BALDWIN on the MLS:

“It drives me a little nuts when American soccer fans won't get behind MLS. I can't tell you how many times I've talked to people who bragged, "Oh, I only watch the Premiere League" or "I only watch Serie A." I wrote about a few of these in my book. Certainly those are great leagues, but I have to argue that if you want to have a league of that caliber, you have to support the league that you have so it can develop. I'm sure there were people in Italy who refused to support Italian teams when soccer started there, because only the English game was worth watching. If it had been left up to these people, Serie A would not be the wonderful world-class league that it is today. It needed a fan base in order to grow and improve. You'd have to say the same for Spain, Germany, Holland, Brazil, and Argentina. Where would they be if people hadn't supported their domestic leagues out of snobbery.”

BALDWIN on Education:

Teachers should take note of International Soccer, and especially the World Cup as tools for teaching Geography and Social Studies. Any soccer fan worth his or her salt knows where the Ivory Coast is, where the Czech Republic is, or where Argentina is. They might know a thing or two about the Ukraine ---- it's where Shevchenko is from, or they might have noticed that people from the Republic of Georgia have names that end in "adze" (like Shota Arveladze). Kids will compete to learn this stuff, just like kids will compete to know more baseball stats than their buddies. Soccer fans voraciously view profiles on TV of their favorite players that show what their life was like in Romania, Nigeria or Costa Rica. In a large country like ours that tends not to learn much about foreign lands, soccer is one way to expand our world knowledge. Both through the people I've played with and the places I've gone to see games, I've broadened my view of the world immeasurably. And I've discovered I can strike up a conversation with nearly anyone in the world by asking them about their favorite team.

Here's an excerpt from "The Biggest Party on the Planet: An American at the World Cup."

June 5th 2002 - USA vs. Portugal

The air crackled with enthusiasm. Win, lose or draw, life can't be bad if you're half way around the globe at a World Cup Game. People scrambled around, waving banners, chanting, cheering, taking pictures with fans sporting decorations from both sides of the fence. This is the Biggest Party on the Planet ---- and you're invited.

When we reached ours seat, we discovered that we were sitting with Sam's Army --- the U.S. supporter's group. They follow the team around the world, trying to make them feel like someone's on their side. We've been with Sam's Army before, and it's always a boisterous experience. We knew they’d watch the entire game standing. They have worked out songs and chants for any and all occasions, and are dedicated to making their presence felt. Among them are a few guys in Elvis costumes, and the SoccerHead guy, who has shaved his head in the pattern of a soccer ball, and dyed the remaining patches of hair red, white, and blue. We were in the end zone, right behind the goal that the U.S. was to attack in the first half.

The U.S. team took the field to warm up and the festivities began. The goalkeepers came out first, and Sam's Army started the chants, "Frie ----- del, Frie----- del," "Ka-sey Kel-ler" followed by a five clap, and some more nondescript yelling to Tony Meola, of WC '94 fame. We were turning a few heads with all the noise.

Then the Portuguese team hit the field. The rest of the stadium came to life, and you'd have thought it was the Superbowl. Waves of white noise drowned us out, though Sam's Army kept up a strong, pulsating stream of its own.

The Koreans were, for the most part, cheering for the Portuguese. In addition to Portuguese star-worship, the Koreans figured that Portugal would be one of the two teams to advance from this group to the next round, so they wanted the U.S. and Poland to be crushed as badly as possible, increasing their own chances. Plus, there was the Apollo Ohno thing, but more about that later.

The ceremonial flavor of the match was impressive. The teams paraded onto the field with Korean school children as escorts. The flags of the two countries were carried out, and our national anthems played. I grew up in the 60s and 70s during a period of great disillusionment with government. Grappling with the Vietnam and Nixon eras, it was hard not questioning blind patriotism and the symbols of nationalism. Since then, I’ve discovered that there's something about the international character of soccer that makes you instantly respond in a very deep and sincere way to the trappings of your native country. Thousands of miles from home, outnumbered by the opposition, shoulder to shoulder with compatriots, and preparing to duke it out on the field with a foreign squad, the Red, White and Blue suddenly seems to make sense as a rallying symbol.

The referee finally blew his whistle. The ball was kicked off, we were all standing, electrified beyond belief. OUR WORLD CUP HAD BEGUN!

The Portuguese team started by controlling the ball and outrunning the U.S. The U.S. didn’t look bad, but they were obviously starting conservatively, and feeling out the Portuguese.

Suddenly, in the 3rd minute, Earnie Stewart put a beautiful corner kick directly on Brian McBride's head. McBride hammered the ball at the Portuguese goalkeeper, who managed to parry it out of the goalmouth. The ball dropped in front of an onrushing John O'Brien. The Playa del Rey native slammed the rebound into the back of the net, and amazingly, the U.S. was ahead. Sam's Army went absolutely bananas. The huge pro-Portugal contingent (i.e. 97% of the stadium) went resoundlingly silent.

The Portuguese team shook it off and started attacking. What was one goal? They had guys that could light up the nets all day, especially against a soccer neophyte like the USA. They started working their magic, spinning the ball around, making crisp short passes, working it up field. The U.S., contrary to expectation, did a good job of dispossessing the fabled golden generation, and counter-attacking. They put a few more shots on goal, and generally looked pretty damned good. Around minute 29, Landon Donovan scooped up a rebound on the right wing, and tried to thread in a cross to McBride, who was open at the top of the box. The man coming out to mark Donovan, however, deflected the ball. It spun high and back toward the keeper, who was caught off-guard by the redirection. The ball found its way into the Portuguese net. Donovan shrugged as if to say, "I'll take it." The Portuguese team stood in shock, just staring at each other. They were down 2-0 to the biggest nobody in the kingdom of Soccer. This just couldn’t be happening.

A few minutes later, Minnesota native Tony Sanneh brought the ball up the right wing, made a beautiful, pinpoint cross and Brian McBride sent one of his trademark diving headers into the goal. Three unanswered goals. Euphoria reigned. Sam's Army chanted on. The rest of the stadium sounded like a morgue.

Of course the Portuguese turned on the heat. They stuck one in before the end of the half, and the crowd exploded with thunderous cheers.

When half time gave a moment to contemplate, none of us could believe that we were up 3-1. Hannia and I looked into each other’s eyes. We looked and felt thoroughly intoxicated.

In the second half, hapless Jeff Agoos put in an own goal, meaning that Portugal was one goal from a tie.

Still, attack as they might, the Portuguese couldn't quite push the U.S. around. Tony Sanneh, Eddie Pope, and Agoos were monstrously tough in the back, and the midfielders supported like crazy. Figo and Rui Costa flailed away, showing character and ability, but the Yanks were a match for them, and then some. This ranked not as a flukey upset, but as a stellar performance by the U.S., who met the challenge of a World Class opponent with laudable tactics and technique. When the final whistle blew, the U.S. team was ecstatic. They'd done the unthinkable. The Portuguese slunk out with their tails between their legs. The Sam’s Army section burst into delirious cheering and applause.

Outside the stadium, the party was in full swing. Groups of U.S. supporters danced in delirium, chanting "Ole, ole, ole, USA! USA!" for the myriad Television cameramen from across the globe. Hordes of Koreans stopped red, white, and blue clad fans (myself included) and insisted on taking pictures with us. Hyundai Motors had a stage show going with dancing girls and techno-pop. Conga lines sprang up spontaneously. In one single game, the U.S. had wiped out the nightmare of '98. Win, lose or draw from here on out, this was their defining moment.

When we hit home on the #2 bus, Gyosu and family all greeted us at the door.

"Congratulations on your victory," they all chimed in bowing and smiling. They offered us watermelon and soju, a rice wine, something like Japanese sake.

They were surprised and concerned that we'd taken so long to come home, so I had to allay their fears. "Big celebration," I told them. They nodded and smiled. They understood. On the television behind them, the news summaries endlessly repeated highlights in incomprehensible Korean.