The Road to World Cup... Apathy?

We're not even 4 days into World Cup 2014 and already I find myself disinterested in proceedings.  Maybe this will change when Germany finally plays tomorrow, although I'm not sure.  In the meantime though, I find my disinterest interesting. 

As a kid, soccer was that thing that my parents forced me to participate in 3 times per week because you had to force your kids participate in some sort of sport and I wasn't especially good at any of the others.  (I really wasn't good at soccer either, but I was at least not terrible enough at it to shame my mom in front of the other parents as had happened with, say, baseball and basketball.) 

During high school and my undergraduate years, when I did become quite athletic, I enjoyed the game as a recreational activity but never paid any attention to the professional scene anywhere. 

Now that age has teamed up with work and back and foot injuries to severely limit my actual playing time, I find myself increasingly drawn into the sport as a whole and follow the Bundesliga and La Liga as best I can without satellite or cable TV (thanks, internet!). 

But the shift from maximum participation/minimum interest to minimum participation/maximum interest isn't the only irony here, as the World Cup has a special place in all of this.  As a kid, it was the one time when soccer became fun--my brother and I would charge around the park with the other neighborhood kids, pretending to be Germany or Brazil or France or, well, anyone except Argentina since somewhere along the line we had learned that they were dirty, stinkin' cheaters, although we didn't have a clue what "Hand of God" was supposed to refer to.  

Now though, when my interest in the sport has reached its highest level yet, I find myself totally detached from the party atmosphere that the World Cup seemed to bring when I was a kid (and which FIFA and its many sponsors certainly want you to think it will bring no matter what).  In the last 24 hours my sport-related thoughts have focused on:

1. Joy over the Cardinals sweeping the Nationals, followed by furious mental calculation to determine what things might look like if the postseason started tomorrow.  Conclusion/Fantasy: having achieved a wild-card spot in the playoffs, we first crush the Dodgers on our way to turning the tables on the Giants, beating them as badly as they beat us oh-so-painfully-recently to win the pennant, and then we beat whatever AL team comes out on top over there (let's say Oakland, because they are marginally less irritating than most AL teams) to win the World Series.  BOOM.

2. Schadenfreude over the Miami Heat's epic destruction at the hands of the Spurs in game 5.

3. Mild interest over Roger Federer winning the Halle tournament for the 7th time. 

4. Oh, yeah--Switzerland, France and Argentina won their matches against Ecuador, Honduras and Bosnia, respectively... yawn.  Nobody could have possibly projected those outcomes.

But why do I feel so apathetic?  Certainly I think that greater knowledge of FIFA's many, many, many (just insert about twelve more "many"s here) scandals has put a damper on things.  I also find the insistence on the World Cup somehow being the apotheosis of the sport rather irritating.  Because let's face it, if you're looking for the competition that features the highest quality of play, this is definitely not it--that would probably be the Champions League.  Most of the major European clubs in general are better than the national teams that show up for the World Cup (and as far as national teams go, one can certainly argue that the Euro Cup has a higher overall level of quality at least until the format is expanded to become more inclusive). 

Furthermore, while I can definitely point to specific clubs that I follow, I don't feel much connection to any national team.  I'm not sure exactly why this is; I can say "I've lived in Madrid" and "I have friends in Dortmund" and "I've followed Real and BVB's progress for the past 10 months," but I can't do the same for any national team.  I'm an American, but I don't feel any nationalistic urge to support team USA just because I've lived here for most of my life.  Sure, I like it when they do well, but I'm not going to be furiously checking my phone for score updates like I would during el classico or the DFB Pokal. 

If there's a national team I feel most attached to, it's Germany, though again I am not 100% sure why.  Perhaps it's because I've studied German for 17 years now.  Perhaps it's because Germany's was the first jersey that my brother and I ran around the yard in, back when the World Cup was still a big deal.  (Perhaps those two things are subconsciously connected--who knows?)  At any rate, even in this situation my first reaction to the news that Marco Reus had been injured during the international friendly against Armenia was not "Oh no!  Germany will miss out on their best attacker during the World Cup!" but rather "M@*&$%2 F@*%^@# this better not impact his season at BVB next year!"

So, how do you feel about the World Cup?  Do you dig it? Do you just want it to be over with? Do you not care one direction or another?  What makes you a fan or not of national teams?  Regardless of the sport, do you find them as engaging as a domestic/local club or team?