..and There Was Great Sadness

But I'm here to cheer you up, okay? Because all of the wonderful, feel good, never-give-up, resilient, family, team, rah-rah-RAH, stuff you read and heard about the American team after they beat Brazil?

Well, just cross out United States and put "Japan" and the story gets even better.

Look, I wanted our gals to win. I wanted Abby Wambach to retire to that comfortable 20k per gig speaking engagement lifestyle that a GOLD-medal winning World Cup champion would have surely earned. I wanted about 20 more TV appearances by lovelies Ali Krieger and Hope Solo and Alex Morgan.

But give it up to Japan, okay?

Here's your key stat, to keep it all in perspective.

Japan reportedly has only 25,000 registered female youth soccer players, compared to more than 1 million in the U.S. The Japanese never had advanced beyond the Women’s World Cup quarterfinals. Several members of the current side personally were affected by the March earthquake and tsunami, including defender Aya Sameshima, who worked part time at the damaged Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant and played professionally for the team sponsored by the company

Okay?

I mean, suck on that for a while and tell me how it tastes?

WE had a grumpy goalie four years ago to "overcome" this time. THEY had a tsunami that rose up and swallowed about a dozen cities.

It's not even in the same league.

I know that those Japanese chicks are so homely they would have a hard time getting work in a local rub-n-tug joint here in our country, but don't hold that against them, okay? The Japanese goalie looks like a troll doll giveaway from McDonald's.

Hope Solo is awesome to look at! She's like the athletic love child of Hines Ward and Gweneth Paltrow. It pissed me off that I won't get to see her do Letterman, Leno, Today Show, PTI, SportsCenter, Dancing With the Stars, and a million other things.

Because we don't do losers in this country. As Ricky Bobby said: "You're either first, or last."

We're last.

We blew it. We suck. Oh well, tip your cap to Japan. And just re-write all that stuff about US, and make it about THEM. They deserve it.

/insert Stewie voice

"Soooooo.... how's that nuclear meltdown thing going, eh? Got it all, mopped up, yet?"