![2009 World Series Champions and Barack Obama](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a2/2009_World_Series_Champions_and_Barack_Obama.jpg)
Sports are an important part of
culture
Culture () is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior, institutions, and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities, and habits of the individuals in these groups.Tyl ...
in the United States. Historically, the
national sport
A national sport is considered to be an intrinsic part of the culture of a nation. Some sports are ''de facto'' (not established by law) national sports, as sumo is in Japan and Gaelic games are in Ireland and field hockey in Pakistan, while oth ...
has been
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...
. However, in more recent decades,
American football
American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...
has been the most popular sport in terms of broadcast viewership audience.
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...
has grown into the mainstream American sports scene since the 1980s, with
ice hockey
Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...
and
soccer
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
doing the same around the turn of the 21st century. These sports comprise the "Big Five". In the first half of the 20th century,
boxing
Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermined ...
and
collegiate football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States.
Unlike most ...
were among the most popular sports after baseball.
Golf
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...
,
tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
, and
collegiate basketball are other spectator sports with longstanding popularity. Most recently,
Mixed martial arts
Mixed martial arts (MMA), sometimes referred to as cage fighting, no holds barred (NHB), and ultimate fighting, and originally referred to as Vale Tudo is a full-contact combat sport based on striking, grappling and ground fighting, inc ...
, has been breaking records in attendance and broadcast viewership for all
combat sports
A combat sport, or fighting sport, is a competitive contact sport that usually involves one-on-one combat. In many combat sports, a contestant wins by scoring more points than the opponent, submitting the opponent with a hold, disabling the oppo ...
.
Based on revenue, the
are the
National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...
(NFL),
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...
(MLB), the
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United S ...
(NBA), the
National Hockey League
The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...
(NHL), and
Major League Soccer
Major League Soccer (MLS) is a men's professional soccer league sanctioned by the United States Soccer Federation, which represents the sport's highest level in the United States. The league comprises 29 teams—26 in the U.S. and 3 in Canada ...
(MLS). At $16 billion in revenue, the NFL is the most profitable sports league in the world.
The market for professional sports in the United States is roughly $69 billion, roughly 50% larger than that of all of Europe, the Middle East, and Africa combined. All these leagues enjoy wide-ranging domestic media coverage and, except for Major League Soccer, all are considered the preeminent leagues in their respective sports in the world. Although American football does not have a substantial following in other nations, the NFL does have the highest average attendance (67,254) of any professional sports league in the world. MLS has the second highest average attendance of any sports league in the U.S. (21,789), followed by MLB with an average of 18,900. Of these five U.S.-based leagues, all but the NFL have at least one team in Canada.
Professional teams in all major sports in the United States operate as
franchises
Franchise may refer to:
Business and law
* Franchising, a business method that involves licensing of trademarks and methods of doing business to franchisees
* Franchise, a privilege to operate a type of business such as a cable television p ...
within a league, meaning that a team may move to a different city if the team's owners believe there would be a financial benefit, but franchise moves are usually subject to some form of league-level approval. All major sports leagues use a similar type of regular-season schedule with a post-season
playoff
The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...
tournament. In addition to the major league–level organizations, several sports also have professional
minor league
Minor leagues are professional sports leagues which are not regarded as the premier leagues in those sports. Minor league teams tend to play in smaller, less elaborate venues, often competing in smaller cities/markets. This term is used in Nor ...
s, active in smaller cities across the country. As in
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
and
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...
, sports leagues in the United States do not practice
promotion and relegation
In sports leagues, promotion and relegation is a process where teams are transferred between multiple divisions based on their performance for the completed season. Leagues that use promotion and relegation systems are often called open leagues. ...
, unlike most sports leagues in Europe.
Sports are particularly associated with
education in the United States
Education in the United States is provided in public and private schools and by individuals through homeschooling. State governments set overall educational standards, often mandate standardized tests for K–12 public school systems and sup ...
, with most
high schools
A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...
and
universities
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...
having organized sports, and this is a unique sporting footprint for the U.S.
College sports
College athletics encompasses non-professional, collegiate and university-level competitive sports and games.
World University Games
The first World University Games were held in 1923. There were originally called the ''Union Nationale des É ...
competitions play an important role in the American sporting culture, and
college basketball
In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...
and
college football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States.
Unlike most ...
are nearly as popular as professional sports in some parts of the country. The major sanctioning body for college sports is the
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
(NCAA). Colleges collectively receive billions of dollars from TV deals, sponsorships, and ticket sales. In 2019, the total revenue generated by NCAA athletic departments added up to $18.9 billion.
Based on
Olympic Games
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...
, World Championships, and other major competitions in respective sports, the United States is the most successful nation in baseball, basketball, athletics, swimming, lacrosse, beach volleyball, figure skating, tennis, golf, boxing, diving, shooting, rowing and snowboarding, and is all time one of the top five most successful nations in ice hockey, wrestling, gymnastics, volleyball, speed skating, alpine skiing, bobsleigh, equestrian, sailing, cycling, weightlifting and archery, among others. This makes the United States the most successful sports nation in the world. The United States has been referred to by some as the Hegemon of World Sports. The United States has placed first in the Summer Olympic medal table
18 times out of 29 Summer Olympics and 28 appearances. Unlike most other nations, the United States government does not provide funding for sports nor for the
United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) is the National Olympic Committee and the National Paralympic Committee for the United States. It was founded in 1895 as the United States Olympic Committee, and is headquartered in Col ...
.
History
American football
American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...
,
indoor American football
Indoor American football, or arena football, is a variation of gridiron football played at ice hockey-sized indoor arenas. While varying in details from league to league, the rules of indoor football are designed to allow for play in a smaller a ...
,
baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding tea ...
,
softball
Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...
, and
indoor soccer
Indoor soccer or arena soccer (known internationally as indoor football, fast football, or showball) is five-a-side version of minifootball, derived from association football and adapted to be played in walled hardcourt indoor arena. Indoor socc ...
evolved out of older British (
Rugby football
Rugby football is the collective name for the team sports of rugby union and rugby league.
Canadian football and, to a lesser extent, American football were once considered forms of rugby football, but are seldom now referred to as such. The ...
,
British baseball
Welsh baseball ( cy, Pêl Fas Gymreig), is a bat-and-ball game played in Wales. It is closely related to the game of rounders.
In the tradition of bat-and-ball games, baseball has roots going back centuries, and there are references to "ba ...
,
Rounders
Rounders is a bat-and-ball game played between two teams. Rounders is a striking and fielding team game that involves hitting a small, hard, leather-cased ball with a rounded end wooden, plastic, or metal bat. The players score by running aroun ...
, and
association football
Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...
) sports.
However,
basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...
,
volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules. It has been a part of the official program of the Summ ...
,
beach volleyball
Beach volleyball is a team sport played by two teams of two or more players on a sand court divided by a net. Similar to indoor volleyball, the objective of the game is to send the ball over the net and to ground it on the opponent's side of the ...
,
racquetball
Racquetball is a racquet sport and a team sport played with a hollow rubber ball on an indoor or outdoor court. Joseph Sobek invented the modern sport of racquetball in 1950, adding a stringed racquet to paddleball in order to increase velo ...
,
pickleball
Pickleball is an indoor or outdoor racket/paddle sport where two players (singles), or four players (doubles), hit a perforated hollow polymer ball over a net using solid-faced paddles. Opponents on either side of the net hit the ball back and ...
,
skateboarding
Skateboarding is an extreme sport, action sport originating in the United States that involves riding and performing tricks using a skateboard, as well as a recreational activity, an art form, an entertainment industry Profession, job, and a ...
,
snowboarding
Snowboarding is a recreational and competitive activity that involves descending a snow-covered surface while standing on a snowboard that is almost always attached to a rider's feet. It features in the Winter Olympic Games and Winter Paralympi ...
,
Ultimate
Ultimate or Ultimates may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Music Albums
* ''Ultimate'' (Jolin Tsai album)
* ''Ultimate'' (Pet Shop Boys album)
*''Ultimate!'', an album by The Yardbirds
*''The Ultimate (Bryan Adams Album)'', a compilatio ...
,
wind-surfing
Windsurfing is a wind propelled water sport that is a combination of sailing and surfing. It is also referred to as "sailboarding" and "boardsailing", and emerged in the late 1960s from the aerospace and surf culture of California. Windsurfing ga ...
, and
Water Skiing
Water skiing (also waterskiing or water-skiing) is a surface water sport in which an individual is pulled behind a boat or a cable ski installation over a body of water, skimming the surface on two skis or one ski. The sport requires suffic ...
are fully American inventions,
some of which have become popular in other countries and worldwide.
In colonial Virginia and Maryland, sports occupied a great deal of attention at every social level. In England, hunting was severely restricted to landowners. In America, game was more than plentiful. Everyone—including servants and slaves—could and did hunt, so there was no social distinction to be had. In 1691, Sir
Francis Nicholson
Lieutenant-General Francis Nicholson (12 November 1655 – ) was a British Army general and colonial official who served as the Governor of South Carolina from 1721 to 1725. He previously was the Governor of Nova Scotia from 1712 to 1715, the ...
, the governor of Virginia, organized competitions for the "better sort of Virginians onely who are especially in the South. It involved owners, trainers and spectators from all social classes and both races. However, religious evangelists were troubled by the gambling dimension, and democratic elements complained that it was too aristocratic, since only the rich could own very expensive competitive horses.
Olympics
The
United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) is the National Olympic Committee and the National Paralympic Committee for the United States. It was founded in 1895 as the United States Olympic Committee, and is headquartered in Col ...
(USOPC) is the
National Olympic Committee
A National Olympic Committee (NOC) is a national constituent of the worldwide Olympic movement. Subject to the controls of the International Olympic Committee, NOCs are responsible for organizing their people's participation in the Olympic Games ...
for the United States. U.S. athletes have won a total of 2,522 medals (1,022 of them being gold) at the
Summer Olympic Games
The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The inau ...
and another 305 at the
Winter Olympic Games
The Winter Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'hiver) is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympic Games, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were he ...
. Most medals have been won in the
sport of athletics
Athletics is a group of sporting events that involves competitive running, jumping, throwing sports, throwing, and walking. The most common types of athletics competitions are track and field, road running, cross country running, and racewalking ...
(
track and field
Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...
) (801, 32%) and
swimming
Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...
(553, 22%). American swimmer
Michael Phelps
Michael Fred Phelps II (born June 30, 1985) is an American former competitive swimmer. He is the most successful and most decorated Olympian of all time with a total of 28 medals. Phelps also holds the all-time records for Olympic gold me ...
is the most decorated Olympic athlete of all time, with 28 Olympic medals, 23 of them gold.
The United States has sent athletes to every celebration of the modern
Olympic Games
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...
except the
1980 Summer Olympics
The 1980 Summer Olympics (russian: Летние Олимпийские игры 1980, Letniye Olimpiyskiye igry 1980), officially known as the Games of the XXII Olympiad (russian: Игры XXII Олимпиады, Igry XXII Olimpiady) and commo ...
hosted by the Soviet Union in Moscow, which it
boycotted
A boycott is an act of nonviolent, voluntary abstention from a product, person, organization, or country as an expression of protest. It is usually for moral, social, political, or environmental reasons. The purpose of a boycott is to inflict som ...
because of the
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
.
American athletes have won a total of 2,673 medals (1,075 of them gold) at the
Summer Olympic Games
The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The inau ...
and another 305 (105 of them gold) at the
Winter Olympic Games
The Winter Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'hiver) is a major international multi-sport event held once every four years for sports practiced on snow and ice. The first Winter Olympic Games, the 1924 Winter Olympics, were he ...
, making the United States the most prolific medal-winning nation in the history of the Olympics. The US is ranked first in the all-time medal table even if
all the incarnations of Russia and Germany are combined, leading the second-placed Russians by 402 gold and 917 total medals. These achievements are even more impressive considering the fact that the American Olympic team remains the only in the world to receive no government funding.
The United States hosted both Summer and Winter Games in 1932, and has hosted more Games than any other country – eight times, four times each for the Summer and Winter Games:
* The
1904 Summer Olympics
The 1904 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the III Olympiad and also known as St. Louis 1904) were an international multi-sport event held in St. Louis, Missouri, United States, from 29 August to 3 September 1904, as part of an extended s ...
in St. Louis,
1932 Summer Olympics
The 1932 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the X Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1932) were an international multi-sport event held from July 30 to August 14, 1932 in Los Angeles, California, United States. The Games were held duri ...
and
1984 Summer Olympics
The 1984 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXIII Olympiad and also known as Los Angeles 1984) were an international multi-sport event held from July 28 to August 12, 1984, in Los Angeles, California, United States. It marked the secon ...
in Los Angeles; and the
1996 Summer Olympics
The 1996 Summer Olympics (officially the Games of the XXVI Olympiad, also known as Atlanta 1996 and commonly referred to as the Centennial Olympic Games) were an international multi-sport event held from July 19 to August 4, 1996, in Atlanta, ...
in Atlanta;
* The
1932 Winter Olympics
The 1932 Winter Olympics, officially known as the III Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Lake Placid 1932, were a winter multi-sport event in the United States, held in Lake Placid, New York, United States. The games opened on February ...
and
1980 Winter Olympics
The 1980 Winter Olympics, officially the XIII Olympic Winter Games and also known as Lake Placid 1980, were an international multi-sport event held from February 13 to 24, 1980, in Lake Placid, New York, United States.
Lake Placid was elected ...
in Lake Placid, New York; the
1960 Winter Olympics
The 1960 Winter Olympics (officially the VIII Olympic Winter Games and also known as Squaw Valley 1960) were a winter multi-sport event held from February 18 to 28, 1960, at the Squaw Valley Resort (now known as Palisades Tahoe) in Squaw Vall ...
in Squaw Valley, California; and the
2002 Winter Olympics
The 2002 Winter Olympics, officially the XIX Olympic Winter Games and commonly known as Salt Lake 2002 ( arp, Niico'ooowu' 2002; Gosiute Shoshoni: ''Tit'-so-pi 2002''; nv, Sooléí 2002; Shoshoni: ''Soónkahni 2002''), was an internation ...
in Salt Lake City, Utah.
Los Angeles will host the Summer Olympics for a third time in
2028
Predicted and scheduled events
* January 1 – Books, films, and other works published in 1932 will enter the public domain in the United States.
* January 12 – Partial lunar eclipse.
* January 26 – Small annular solar eclip ...
, marking the ninth time the U.S. hosts the Olympic Games.
The United States has won the
most gold and overall medals in the Summer Olympic Games, even if the medal totals of the Soviet Union/CIS and Russia are combined, and has topped the medal table 18 times.
The country has won the second most gold and overall medals in the Winter Olympic Games, behind Norway, but has topped the medal table only one time, in 1932. If all of Germany's and Russia's incarnations are combined, the United States slips to fourth in the
all-time Winter Olympic Games table.
Amateurism and professionalism
The exclusion of professionals caused several controversies throughout the history of the modern Olympics. The
1912 Olympic pentathlon
A pentathlon is a contest featuring five events. The name is derived from Greek: combining the words ''pente'' (five) and -''athlon'' (competition) ( gr, πένταθλον). The first pentathlon was documented in Ancient Greece and was part of t ...
and
decathlon
The decathlon is a combined event in Athletics (sport), athletics consisting of ten track and field events. The word "decathlon" was formed, in analogy to the word "pentathlon", from Greek language, Greek δέκα (''déka'', meaning "ten") and ...
champion
Jim Thorpe
James Francis Thorpe ( Sac and Fox (Sauk): ''Wa-Tho-Huk'', translated as "Bright Path"; May 22 or 28, 1887March 28, 1953) was an American athlete and Olympic gold medalist. A member of the Sac and Fox Nation, Thorpe was the first Native ...
was stripped of his medals when it was discovered that he had played
semi-professional
Semi-professional sports are sports in which athletes are not participating on a full-time basis, but still receive some payment. Semi-professionals are not amateur because they receive regular payment from their team, but generally at a consid ...
baseball before the
Olympics
The modern Olympic Games or Olympics (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques) are the leading international sporting events featuring summer and winter sports competitions in which thousands of athletes from around the world participate in a var ...
. His medals were posthumously restored by the
IOC
The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...
in 1983 on compassionate grounds.
The advent of the state-sponsored "full-time amateur athlete" of the
Eastern Bloc
The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...
countries eroded the ideology of the pure
amateur
An amateur () is generally considered a person who pursues an avocation independent from their source of income. Amateurs and their pursuits are also described as popular, informal, autodidacticism, self-taught, user-generated, do it yourself, DI ...
, as it put the self-financed amateurs of the Western countries at a disadvantage. The
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
entered teams of athletes who were all nominally students, soldiers, or working in a profession, but all of whom were in reality paid by the state to train on a full-time basis.
The situation greatly disadvantaged American athletes, and was a major factor in the decline of American medal hauls in the 1970s and 1980s. As a result, the Olympics shifted away from
amateurism
An amateur () is generally considered a person who pursues an avocation independent from their source of income. Amateurs and their pursuits are also described as popular, informal, self-taught, user-generated, DIY, and hobbyist.
History
Hist ...
, as envisioned by
, to allowing participation of
professional athlete
In professional sports, as opposed to amateur sports, participants receive payment for their performance. Professionalism in sport has come to the fore through a combination of developments. Mass media and increased leisure have brought larg ...
s, but only in the 1990s, after the
collapse of the Soviet Union
The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...
and its influence within the
International Olympic Committee
The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...
.
Individual sports
Motorsports
![RichardPetty1985Pocono](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a9/RichardPetty1985Pocono.jpg)
Major international competitions, such as the
Formula One
Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...
Grand Prix series and
MotoGP
Grand Prix motorcycle racing is the premier class of motorcycle road racing events held on road circuits sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM). Independent motorcycle racing events have been held since the start ...
are generally less popular in the United States than they are in the rest of the world. However, some Americans have achieved great success in these international series, such as
Mario Andretti
Mario Gabriele Andretti (born February 28, 1940) is an Italian-born American former racing driver. One of the most successful drivers in the history of motorsports, Andretti is one of only two drivers to have won races in Formula One, IndyCar, t ...
and
Kenny Roberts
Kenneth Leroy Roberts (born December 31, 1951, in Modesto, California) is an American former professional motorcycle racer and racing team owner. In 1978, he became the first American to win a Grand Prix motorcycle racing world championship. He ...
. In the United States, the dominant form of
auto racing
Auto racing (also known as car racing, motor racing, or automobile racing) is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition.
Auto racing has existed since the invention of the automobile. Races of various sorts were organise ...
is
oval track racing
Oval track racing is a form of closed-circuit motorsport that is contested on an oval-shaped race track. An oval track differs from a road course in that the layout resembles an oval with turns in only one direction, and the direction of traffic ...
, especially
stock car racing
Stock car racing is a form of automobile racing run on oval tracks and road courses measuring approximately . It originally used production-model cars, hence the name "stock car", but is now run using cars specifically built for racing. It ori ...
, with other homegrown motorsports also having local popularity.
Americans, like the rest of the world, initially began using public streets to host automobile races, but these venues were often unsafe to the public as they offered relatively little crowd control. Promoters and drivers in the United States discovered that
horse racing
Horse racing is an equestrian performance sport, typically involving two or more horses ridden by jockeys (or sometimes driven without riders) over a set distance for competition. It is one of the most ancient of all sports, as its basic p ...
tracks could provide better conditions for drivers and spectators than public streets. This, in turn, was succeeded by
board track racing
Board track racing was a type of motorsport popular in the United States during the 1910s and 1920s. Competition was conducted on circular or oval race courses with surfaces composed of wooden planks. This type of track was first used for moto ...
(which was short-lived as many of the tracks were highly flammable and difficult to maintain) followed by
oval track racing
Oval track racing is a form of closed-circuit motorsport that is contested on an oval-shaped race track. An oval track differs from a road course in that the layout resembles an oval with turns in only one direction, and the direction of traffic ...
, which remains the dominant form of racing in the United States but is not used in the rest of the world;
road racing
Road racing is a form of motorsport racing held on a paved road surface. The races can be held either on a closed circuit or on a street circuit utilizing temporarily closed public roads. Originally, road races were held almost entirely on publ ...
has generally waned. However, an extensive, albeit illegal
street racing
Street racing is typically an unsanctioned and illegal form of auto racing that occurs on a public road. Racing in the streets is considered an ancient hazard, as horse racing occurred on streets for centuries, and street racing in automobiles is ...
culture still persists.
IndyCar Series
![Danica Patrick 2008 Indy 500 Pole Day](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/19/Danica_Patrick_2008_Indy_500_Pole_Day.jpg)
Historically,
open wheel racing
An open-wheel single-seater (often known as formula car) is a car with the wheels outside the car's main body, and usually having only one seat. Open-wheel cars contrast with street cars, sports cars, stock cars, and touring cars, which have thei ...
was the most popular form of U.S. motorsport nationwide. However, an acrimonious split (often referred to by many as "The Split") in 1994 between the primary series, CART (later known as
Champ Car
Champ Car World Series (CCWS) was the series sanctioned by Open-Wheel Racing Series Inc., or Champ Car, a sanctioning body for American open-wheel car racing that operated from 2004 to 2008. It was the successor to Championship Auto Racing Teams ( ...
), and the owner of the
Indianapolis Motor Speedway
The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is an automobile racing circuit located in Speedway, Indiana, an enclave suburb of Indianapolis, Indiana. It is the home of the Indianapolis 500 and the Verizon 200, and and formerly the home of the United State ...
(the site of the Indy 500),
Tony George
Anton Hulman "Tony" George (born December 30, 1959) is the former Chairman, President, and CEO of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and Hulman & Company, serving from 1989 to 2009. He was also formerly on the Board of Directors of both entities. ...
, led to the formation of the Indy Racing League, now known as
INDYCAR
INDYCAR, LLC, is an American-based auto racing sanctioning body for Indy car racing and other disciplines of open wheel car racing. The organization sanctions five racing series: the premier IndyCar Series with its centerpiece the Indianapolis ...
, which launched the rival IndyCar Series in 1996. From that point on, the popularity of open wheel racing in the U.S. declined dramatically. The feud was settled in 2008 with an agreement to merge the two series under the IndyCar banner, but enormous damage had already been done to the sport. Post-merger, IndyCar continues to run with slight viewership gains per year. However, as a result, the only post-Split IndyCar race that still enjoys widespread popularity among the general public is the
Indianapolis 500
The Indianapolis 500, formally known as the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, and commonly called the Indy 500, is an annual automobile race held at Indianapolis Motor Speedway (IMS) in Speedway, Indiana, United States, an enclave suburb of Indi ...
.
NASCAR
![Green flag at Daytona](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/Green_flag_at_Daytona.JPG)
The CART-IRL Split coincided with an enormous expansion of
stock car racing
Stock car racing is a form of automobile racing run on oval tracks and road courses measuring approximately . It originally used production-model cars, hence the name "stock car", but is now run using cars specifically built for racing. It ori ...
, governed by
NASCAR
The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...
, from its past as a mostly regional circuit mainly followed in the
Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
to a truly national sport. NASCAR's audience peaked in the early 2000s, and has declined quite a bit ever since the implementation of the
Chase for the Cup
The NASCAR playoffs is a championship playoff system used in NASCAR's three national series. The system was founded as 'The Chase for the Championship' on January 21, 2004, and was used exclusively in the NASCAR Cup Series from 2004 to 2015. Si ...
in 2004, though it continues to have around 2–4 million viewers per race. Among NASCAR's popular former drivers are
Jeff Gordon
Jeffery Michael Gordon (born August 4, 1971) is an American former professional stock car racing driver, who is the Vice Chairman for Hendrick Motorsports. He raced full-time from 1993 to 2015, driving the No. 24 Chevrolet for Hendrick M ...
,
Dale Earnhardt
Ralph Dale Earnhardt Sr. (; April 29, 1951February 18, 2001) was an American professional stock car driver and team owner, who raced from 1975 to 2001 in the former NASCAR Winston Cup Series (now called the NASCAR Cup Series), most notably dri ...
,
Jimmie Johnson
Jimmie Kenneth Johnson (born September 17, 1975) is an American professional auto racing driver. A seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion, he competes part-time in the series driving for Petty GMS Motorsports. Johnson's seven Cup championships, ...
,
Tony Stewart
Anthony Wayne Stewart (born May 20, 1971), nicknamed Smoke, is an American semi-retired professional stock car racing driver, current NASCAR team co-owner of Stewart-Haas Racing, and current co-owner of the Superstar Racing Experience. He is a ...
,
Dale Earnhardt Jr.
Ralph Dale Earnhardt Jr. (born October 10, 1974) is an American semi-retired professional stock car racing driver, team owner, author, and an analyst for ''NASCAR on NBC''. He currently competes part-time in the NASCAR Xfinity Series, driving t ...
, and
Richard Petty
Richard Lee Petty (born July 2, 1937), nicknamed "The King", is an American former stock car racing driver who raced from 1958 to 1992 in the former NASCAR Grand National and Winston Cup Series (now called the NASCAR Cup Series), most notabl ...
. Among NASCAR's popular active drivers are
Kevin Harvick
Kevin Michael Harvick (born December 8, 1975) is an American professional stock car racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 4 Ford Mustang for Stewart-Haas Racing.
Harvick is the 2014 Cup Series champio ...
,
Alex Bowman
Alex Michael Bowman (born April 25, 1993) is an American professional stock car racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 48 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for Hendrick Motorsports, part-time in the NASCAR Xfinity Seri ...
,
Kurt Busch
Kurt Thomas Busch (born August 4, 1978) is an American professional auto racing driver. He last competed full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 45 Toyota Camry TRD for 23XI Racing. He is the 2004 NASCAR Cup Series champion and the ...
,
Kyle Busch
Kyle Thomas Busch (born May 2, 1985) is an American professional stock car racing driver and team owner. He currently competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 8 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for Richard Childress Racing and part-t ...
,
Chase Elliott
William Clyde "Chase" Elliott II (born November 28, 1995) is an American professional stock car racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 9 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for Hendrick Motorsports. He won the 2014 NAS ...
,
Ryan Blaney
Ryan Michael Blaney (born December 31, 1993) is an American professional stock car racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 12 Ford Mustang for Team Penske. He is the son of former NASCAR driver Dave Blaney ...
, and
Kyle Larson
Kyle Miyata Larson (born July 31, 1992) is an American professional auto racing driver. He competes full-time in the NASCAR Cup Series, driving the No. 5 Chevrolet Camaro ZL1 for Hendrick Motorsports. Larson is the 2021 NASCAR Cup Series champ ...
. NASCAR's most popular race is the
Daytona 500
The Daytona 500 is a NASCAR Cup Series motor race held annually at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida. It is the first of two Cup races held every year at Daytona, the second being the Coke Zero Sugar 400, and one of three ...
, the opening race of the season, held each year at
Daytona Beach, Florida
Daytona Beach, or simply Daytona, is a coastal Resort town, resort-city in east-central Florida. Located on the eastern edge of Volusia County, Florida, Volusia County near the East Coast of the United States, Atlantic coastline, its population ...
in February.
Other motorsports
Notable
sports car races
Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, ...
in the United States are the
24 Hours of Daytona
The 24 Hours of Daytona, also known as the Rolex 24 At Daytona for sponsorship reasons, is a 24-hour sports car endurance race held annually at Daytona International Speedway in Daytona Beach, Florida. It is run on the Sports Car Course layou ...
,
12 Hours of Sebring
The 12 Hours of Sebring is an annual motorsport endurance race for sports cars held at Sebring International Raceway, on the site of the former Hendricks Army Airfield World War II air base in Sebring, Florida, US. The event is the second round ...
, and
Petit Le Mans
The Petit Le Mans ( French for ''little Le Mans'') is a sports car endurance race held annually at Road Atlanta in Braselton, Georgia, USA. It uses the rules established for the 24 Hours of Le Mans by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO), which a ...
, which have featured in the
World Sportscar Championship
The World Sportscar Championship was the world series run for sports car racing by the FIA from 1953 to 1992.
The championship evolved from a small collection of the most important sportscar, endurance, and road racing events in Europe and No ...
,
IMSA GT Championship
IMSA GT was a sports car racing series organized by International Motor Sports Association. Races took place primarily in the United States, and occasionally in Canada.
History
The series was founded in 1969 by John and Peggy Bishop, and Bill F ...
,
Intercontinental Le Mans Cup
The Intercontinental Le Mans Cup (shortened ILMC) was an endurance sports car racing tournament organised by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) started in 2010. ,
FIA World Endurance Championship
The FIA World Endurance Championship is an auto racing world championship organized by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) and sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The series supersedes the ACO's former Intercont ...
,
American Le Mans Series
The American Le Mans Series (ALMS) was a sports car racing series based in the United States and Canada. It consisted of a series of endurance and sprint races, and was created in the spirit of the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
The American Le Mans' hea ...
,
Rolex Sports Car Series
The Rolex Sports Car Series was the premier series run by the Grand American Road Racing Association. It was a North American-based sports car series founded in 2000 under the name Grand American Road Racing Championship to replace the failed ...
and currently the
IMSA SportsCar Championship
The IMSA SportsCar Championship, currently known as the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship under sponsorship, is a sports car racing series based in the United States and Canada and organized by the International Motor Sports Association (IMS ...
.
Another one of the most popular forms of motorsports in the United States is the indigenous sport of
drag racing
Drag racing is a type of motor racing in which automobiles or motorcycles compete, usually two at a time, to be first to cross a set finish line. The race follows a short, straight course from a standing start over a measured distance, most c ...
. The largest drag racing organization is the
National Hot Rod Association
The National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) is a drag racing governing body, which sets rules in drag racing and hosts events all over the United States and Canada. With over 40,000 drivers in its rosters, the NHRA claims to be the largest motorspo ...
.
Several other motorsports enjoy varying degrees of popularity in the United States:
short track motor racing
Oval track racing is a form of closed-circuit motorsport that is contested on an oval-shaped race track. An oval track differs from a road course in that the layout resembles an oval with turns in only one direction, and the direction of traffic ...
,
motocross
Motocross is a form of off-road motorcycle racing held on enclosed off-road circuits. The sport evolved from motorcycle trials competitions held in the United Kingdom.
History
Motocross first evolved in Britain from motorcycle trials competi ...
,
monster truck
A monster truck is a specialized off-road vehicle with a heavy duty suspension, four-wheel steering, large-displacement V8 engines and oversized tires constructed for competition and entertainment uses. Originally created by modifying stock pic ...
competitions (including the popular
Monster Jam
Monster Jam is a live motorsport event tour operated by Feld Entertainment. The series began in 1992, and is sanctioned under the umbrella of the United States Hot Rod Association. Events are primarily held in North America, with some additional ...
circuit),
demolition derby
Demolition derby is a non-racing motorsport usually presented at county fairs and festivals. While rules vary from event to event, the typical demolition derby event consists of five or more drivers competing by deliberately ramming their vehic ...
,
figure 8 racing
Figure 8 racing is a form of stock car racing in which automobiles race on a track that purposely intersects itself, increasing the risk of collisions. Figure 8 racing is most common and popular in the United States and Canada. Because of the r ...
,
mud bogging
Mud bogging (also known as mud racing, mud running, mud drags, or mudding) is a form of off-road motorsport popular in Canada and the United States in which the goal is to drive a vehicle through a pit of mud or a track of a set length. Winners ...
and
tractor pulling
Truck and tractor pulling, also known as power pulling, is a form of a motorsport competition in which antique or modified tractors pull a heavy drag or sled along an , track, with the winner being the tractor that pulls the drag the farthe ...
.
Golf
Golf is played in the United States by about 24 million people. The sport's national governing body, the
United States Golf Association
The United States Golf Association (USGA) is the United States national association of golf courses, clubs and facilities and the governing body of golf for the U.S. and Mexico. Together with The R&A, the USGA produces and interprets the rules ...
(USGA), is jointly responsible with
The R&A
The R&A is the collective name of a group of companies that together play a significant role within the game of golf. Historically, "the R&A" was a colloquial name for the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews; in 2004, the club spun off ...
for setting and administering the rules of golf. The USGA conducts four national championships open to professionals: the
U.S. Open,
U.S. Women's Open
The U.S. Women's Open, one of 15 national golf championships conducted by the United States Golf Association (USGA), is the oldest of the LPGA Tour's five major championships, which includes the Chevron Championship, Women's PGA Championship, W ...
,
U.S. Senior Open
The U.S. Senior Open is one of the five major championships in senior golf, introduced in 1980. It is administered by the United States Golf Association (USGA) and is recognized as a major championship by both the PGA Tour Champions and the Eu ...
, and the
U.S. Senior Women's Open
The U.S. Senior Women's Open is one of fourteen U.S. national golf championships organized by the United States Golf Association. The newest USGA championship, it is open to women whose 50th birthday falls on or before the first day of competitio ...
, with the last of these holding its first edition in
2018
File:2018 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: The 2018 Winter Olympics opening ceremony in PyeongChang, South Korea; Protests erupt following the Assassination of Jamal Khashoggi; March for Our Lives protests take place across the United ...
. The
PGA of America
The Professional Golfers' Association of America (PGA of America) is an American organization of golf professionals that was founded in 1916. Consisting of nearly 29,000 men and women members, the PGA of America's undertaking is to establish ...
organizes the
PGA Championship
The PGA Championship (often referred to as the US PGA Championship or USPGA outside the United States) is an annual golf tournament conducted by the Professional Golfers' Association of America. It is one of the four men's major championships ...
,
Senior PGA Championship
The Senior PGA Championship, established in 1937, is the oldest of the five major championships in men's senior golf. It is administered by the Professional Golfers' Association of America and is recognized as a major championship by both PGA ...
and
Women's PGA Championship
The Women's PGA Championship (branded as the KPMG Women's PGA Championship for sponsorship reasons) is a women's professional golf tournament. First held in 1955, it is one of five majors on the LPGA Tour. It is not recognized as a major by the ...
. Three legs of the
Grand Slam of Golf are based in the United States: the PGA Championship, U.S. Open and
The Masters
The Masters Tournament (usually referred to as simply The Masters, or the U.S. Masters outside North America) is one of the four major championships in professional golf. Scheduled for the first full week of April, the Masters is the first maj ...
. (
The Open Championship
The Open Championship, often referred to as The Open or the British Open, is the oldest golf tournament in the world, and one of the most prestigious. Founded in 1860, it was originally held annually at Prestwick Golf Club in Scotland. Later th ...
, known in the U.S. as the British Open, is played in the United Kingdom.)
The
PGA Tour
The PGA Tour (stylized in all capital letters as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in the United States and North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also k ...
is the main professional golf tour in the United States, and the
LPGA Tour
The Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA) is an American organization for female golfers. The organization is headquartered at the LPGA International in Daytona Beach, Florida, and is best known for running the LPGA Tour, a series of weekl ...
is the main women's professional tour. Also of note is
PGA Tour Champions
PGA Tour Champions (formerly the Senior PGA Tour and the Champions Tour) is a men's professional senior golf tour, administered as a branch of the PGA Tour.
History and format
The Senior PGA Championship, founded in 1937, was for many years ...
, where players 50 and older compete. Golf is aired on several television networks, such as
Golf Channel
Golf Channel (also verbally referred to as simply Golf) is an American sports television television network, network owned by the NBC Sports Group division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. Founded in Birmingham, Alabama, it is currently ...
,
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...
,
ESPN
ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...
,
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainmen ...
and
Fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
.
Notable American male golfers include
Walter Hagen
Walter Charles Hagen (December 21, 1892 – October 6, 1969) was an American professional golfer and a major figure in golf in the first half of the 20th century. His tally of 11 professional majors is third behind Jack Nicklaus (18) and Tiger ...
(11 majors),
Ben Hogan
William Ben Hogan (August 13, 1912 – July 25, 1997) was an American professional golfer who is generally considered to be one of the greatest players in the history of the game. He is notable for his profound influence on golf swing theory and ...
,
Jack Nicklaus
Jack William Nicklaus (born January 21, 1940), nicknamed The Golden Bear, is a retired American professional golfer and List of golf courses designed by Jack Nicklaus, golf course designer. He is widely considered to be one of the greatest go ...
(record 18 major wins),
Arnold Palmer
Arnold Daniel Palmer (September 10, 1929 – September 25, 2016) was an American professional golfer who is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most charismatic players in the sport's history. Dating back to 1955, he won numerous ev ...
, and
Tiger Woods
Eldrick Tont "Tiger" Woods (born December 30, 1975) is an American professional golfer. He is tied for first in PGA Tour wins, ranks second in men's major championships, and holds numerous golf records.
*
*
* Woods is widely regarded as ...
(15 major wins). Notable female golfers include
Patty Berg
Patricia Jane Berg (February 13, 1918 – September 10, 2006) was an American professional golfer. She was a founding member and the first president of the LPGA. Her 15 major title wins remains the all-time record for most major wins by a femal ...
(record 15 major wins),
Mickey Wright
Mary Kathryn "Mickey" Wright (February 14, 1935 – February 17, 2020) was an American professional golfer who played on the LPGA Tour. She became a member of the tour in 1955 and won 82 LPGA Tour career events including 13 major champions ...
(13 majors),
Louise Suggs
Mae Louise Suggs (September 7, 1923 – August 7, 2015) was an American professional golfer, one of the founders of the LPGA Tour and thus modern ladies' golf.
Amateur career
Born in Atlanta, Suggs had a very successful amateur career, beginning ...
and
Babe Zaharias
Mildred Ella "Babe" Didrikson Zaharias (; Didrikson; June 26, 1911 – September 27, 1956) was an American athlete who excelled in golf, basketball, baseball and track and field. She won two gold medals in track and field at the 1932 Summer O ...
.
Tennis
Tennis
Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...
is played in the United States in all five categories (Men's and Ladies' Singles; Men's, Ladies' and Mixed Doubles); however, the most popular are the singles. The pinnacle of the sport in the country is the
US Open played in late August at the
USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center
The USTA Billie Jean King National Tennis Center is a stadium complex within Flushing Meadows–Corona Park in Queens, New York City, United States. It has been the home of the US Open Grand Slam tennis tournament, played every year in August a ...
in New York. The
Indian Wells Masters
The Indian Wells Masters, also known as the Indian Wells Open and BNP Paribas Open is an annual tennis tournament usually held in early- and mid-March at the Indian Wells Tennis Garden in Indian Wells, California, United States. The owner is La ...
,
Miami Open and
Cincinnati Masters
The Cincinnati Masters or Cincinnati Open (branded as the Western & Southern Open for sponsorship reasons) is an annual outdoor hardcourt tennis event held in Mason, Ohio near Cincinnati. The event started on September 18, 1899, and is the olde ...
are part of the
ATP Tour Masters 1000
The ATP Masters 1000 tournaments (previously known as ATP Masters Series) is an annual series of nine tennis tournaments featuring the top-ranked players on the ATP Tour. The series' events have been held in Europe and North America since the ...
and the
WTA 1000
WTA 1000 tournaments is a category of tennis tournaments on the WTA Tour, governed by the Women's Tennis Association. The old WTA Premier Mandatory and Premier 5 tournaments merged into a single highest tier and it is implemented since the r ...
.
The United States has had considerable success in tennis for many years, with players such as
Don Budge
John Donald Budge (June 13, 1915 – January 26, 2000) was an American tennis player. He is most famous as the first tennis player — male or female, and still the only American male — to win the Grand Slam, and to win all four Grand Slam ev ...
,
Billie Jean King
Billie Jean King (née Moffitt; born November 22, 1943) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. King won 39 major titles: 12 in singles, 16 in women's doubles, and 11 in mixed doubles. King was a member of the victorious United States ...
(12 major singles titles),
Chris Evert
Christine Marie Evert (born December 21, 1954), known as Chris Evert Lloyd from 1979 to 1987, is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. Evert won 18 major singles titles, including a record seven French Open titles and a joint-record ...
(18 major singles titles),
Jimmy Connors
James Scott Connors (born September 2, 1952) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He held the top Association of Tennis Professionals (ATP) ranking for a then-record 160 consecutive weeks from 1974 to 1977 and a career total of 268 ...
(8 major singles titles),
John McEnroe
John Patrick McEnroe Jr. (born February 16, 1959) is an American former professional tennis player. He was known for his shot-making and volleying skills, his rivalries with Björn Borg and Jimmy Connors, and his confrontational on-court beha ...
(7 major singles titles),
Andre Agassi
Andre Kirk Agassi ( ; born April 29, 1970) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. He is an eight-time major champion and an Olympic gold medalist, as well as a runner-up in seven other majors.
Agassi is the second of five men to ach ...
(8 major singles titles) and
Pete Sampras
Petros "Pete" Sampras ( el, Πέτρος Σάμπρας; born August 12, 1971) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. His professional career began in 1988 and ended at the 2002 US Open, which he won, defeating longtime rival Andre ...
(14 major singles titles), and
Ricardo Alonso González (14 major singles titles) dominating their sport in the past. More recently, the Williams sisters,
Venus Williams
Venus Ebony Starr Williams (born June 17, 1980) is an American professional tennis player. A former world No. 1 in both singles and doubles, Williams has won seven Grand Slam singles titles, five at Wimbledon and two at the US Open. She is ...
(7 major singles titles) and
Serena Williams
Serena Jameka Williams (born September 26, 1981) is an American inactive professional tennis player. Considered among the greatest tennis players of all time, she was ranked world No. 1 in singles by the Women's Tennis Association (WTA) for ...
(23 major singles titles), have been a dominant force in the women's game, and the
twin brothers
Twin Brothers is a Navajo Sandstone mountain in Zion National Park in Washington County , Utah, United States.
Description
Twin Brothers is situated immediately north of The East Temple, and immediately south of Mountain of the Sun, toweri ...
Bob
Bob, BOB, or B.O.B. may refer to:
Places
*Mount Bob, New York, United States
*Bob Island, Palmer Archipelago, Antarctica
People, fictional characters, and named animals
*Bob (given name), a list of people and fictional characters
*Bob (surname) ...
and
Mike Bryan
Michael Carl Bryan (born April 29, 1978) is an American former doubles world No. 1 tennis player. With his twin brother Bob, he was the world's top doubles player for more than nine years, first achieving the top ranking in Septemb ...
have claimed almost all significant career records for men's doubles teams.
Track and field
USA Track & Field
USA Track & Field (USATF) is the United States national governing body for the sports of track and field, cross country running, road running and racewalking (known as the sport of athletics outside the US). The USATF was known between 1979 and ...
is the governing body for track and field in the United States. It organizes the annual
USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships
The USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships is an annual track and field competition organized by USA Track & Field, which serves as the American national championships for the sport. Since the year 1992, in the years which feature a Summer Olym ...
and
USA Indoor Track and Field Championships
The USA Indoor Track and Field Championships is an annual indoor track and field competition organized by USA Track & Field, which serves as the American national championships for the sport. In years which feature a World Indoor Championships in ...
. The
Diamond League
The Diamond League is an annual series of elite track and field athletic competitions comprising fourteen of the best invitational athletics meetings. The series sits in the top tier of the World Athletics (formerly known as the IAAF) one-day mee ...
currently features one round in the United States, the
Prefontaine Classic
The Prefontaine Classic, an Oregon Track Club event, is one of the premier track and field meets in the United States, held in Eugene, Oregon. Every year it draws a world caliber field to compete at Hayward Field on the campus of the University o ...
; the series formerly included the
Adidas Grand Prix
The USA Track & Field, USATF New York Grand Prix is an annual athletics meeting held at Icahn Stadium in New York City, United States. First started in 2005 as the Reebok Grand Prix and then Adidas Grand Prix, it was previously one of the IAAF ...
as well. Three of the
World Marathon Majors
The World Marathon Majors (WMM) (known for sponsorship reasons as the Abbott World Marathon Majors) is a championship-style competition for marathon runners that started in 2006. A points-based competition founded on six major marathon races recog ...
are held in the United States: the
Boston Marathon
The Boston Marathon is an annual marathon race hosted by several cities and towns in greater Boston in eastern Massachusetts, United States. It is traditionally held on Patriots' Day, the third Monday of April. Begun in 1897, the event was i ...
,
Chicago Marathon
The Chicago Marathon is a marathon (long-distance foot race) held every October in Chicago, Illinois. It is one of the six World Marathon Majors. Thus, it is also a World Athletics Label Road Race. The Chicago Marathon is the fourth-largest r ...
and
New York City Marathon
The New York City Marathon (currently branded TCS New York City Marathon after its headline sponsor) is an annual marathon () that courses through the five boroughs of New York City. It is the largest marathon in the world, with 53,627 finishe ...
. The
Freihofer's Run for Women
Freihofer's Run for Women is an annual five-kilometer road running competition for women that is usually held in late May or early June in Albany, New York, United States. First held in 1979, the race has grown into a sizable event that holds IAA ...
is also an IAAF Road Race Label Event. Amateur organizations such as the
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
and
Amateur Athletic Union
The Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) is an amateur sports organization based in the United States. A multi-sport organization, the AAU is dedicated exclusively to the promotion and development of amateur sports and physical fitness programs. It has ...
sanction cross-country running in fall, indoor track and field in winter, and outdoor track and field in spring.
Jesse Owens
James Cleveland "Jesse" Owens (September 12, 1913March 31, 1980) was an American track and field athlete who won four gold medals at the 1936 Olympic Games.
Owens specialized in the sprints and the long jump and was recognized in his lifet ...
was a notable US track athlete who achieved international fame at the
1936 Summer Olympics
The 1936 Summer Olympics (German: ''Olympische Sommerspiele 1936''), officially known as the Games of the XI Olympiad (German: ''Spiele der XI. Olympiade'') and commonly known as Berlin 1936 or the Nazi Olympics, were an international multi-sp ...
in
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, Germany, by winning four gold medals: 100 meters, long jump, 200 meters, and 4 × 100-meter relay. He was the most successful athlete at the Games and, as a black man, was credited with "single-handedly crushing
Hitler's
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Nazi Germany, Germany from 1933 until Death of Adolf Hitler, his death in 1945. Adolf Hitler's rise to power, He rose to power as the le ...
myth of
Aryan supremacy
White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White su ...
", although he "wasn't invited to the White House to shake hands with the President, either".
Americans have frequently set world standards in various disciplines of track and field for both male and female athletes.
Tyson Gay
Tyson Gay (born August 9, 1982) is an American track and field sprinter who competes in the 100 and 200 meters. His 100 m personal best of 9.69 seconds is the American record and makes him tied for the second fastest athlete over 100 m ...
and
Michael Johnson hold various sprint records for male athletes, while
Florence Griffith Joyner
Florence Delorez Griffith Joyner (born Florence Delorez Griffith; December 21, 1959 – September 21, 1998), also known as Flo-Jo, was an American track and field athlete. She set world records in 1988 for the 100 m and 200 m. During the late 1 ...
set various world sprint records for female athletes.
Mary Slaney
Mary may refer to:
People
* Mary (name), a feminine given name (includes a list of people with the name)
Religious contexts
* New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below
* Mary, mother of Jesus, also calle ...
set many world records for middle-distance disciplines.
A turning point occurred in US track in the
running boom of the 1970s The running boom of the 1970s occurred in high- and middle-income countries. It was particularly pronounced in the United States and occurred in other countries including the United Kingdom, Australia, New Zealand and in Europe.
The boom was primar ...
.
After a series of American successes in various distances from marathoners
Frank Shorter
Frank Charles Shorter (born October 31, 1947) is an American former long-distance runner who won the gold medal in the marathon at the 1972 Summer Olympics and the silver medal at the 1976 Summer Olympics. His Olympic success, along with the ac ...
and
Bill Rodgers as well as middle-distance runners
Dave Wottle
David James Wottle (born August 7, 1950) is an American retired middle-distance track athlete. He was the gold medalist in the 800 meter run at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich and a world record holder in the 800 meters. In 1973, Wottle al ...
and
Steve Prefontaine
Steve Roland "Pre" Prefontaine (January 25, 1951 – May 30, 1975) was an American long-distance runner who from 1973 to 1975 set American records at every distance from 2,000 to 10,000 meters. He competed in the 1972 Summer Olympics, and ...
, running as an American pastime began to take shape. The U.S. win in the
1976 Olympic men's decathlon, achieved by then-
Bruce Jenner
Caitlyn Marie Jenner (born William Bruce Jenner; October 28, 1949) is an American media personality and retired Olympic gold medal-winning decathlete.
Jenner played college football for the Graceland Yellowjackets before incurring a kn ...
, made Jenner a national celebrity. High school track in the United States became a unique foundation for creating the United States middle-distance running talent pool, and from 1972 to 1981 an average of 13 high school boys in the United States would run under 4:10 in the mile per year.
During this time, several national
high school records in the United States were set and remained largely unbroken until the 2000s. The number of high school boys running the mile under 4:10 per year dropped abruptly from 1982,
and female participation in many distance events was forbidden by athletic authorities until the 1980s. However a renaissance in high school track developed when
Jack Daniels, a former Olympian, published a training manual called "Daniels' Running Formula", which became the most widely used distance training protocol among American coaches
along with
Arthur Lydiard
Arthur Leslie Lydiard (6 July 1917 – 11 December 2004) was a New Zealand running, runner and athletics (sport), athletics coach. He has been lauded as one of the outstanding athletics coaches of all time and is credited with popularising the ...
's high-mileage regimen.
Carl Lewis
Frederick Carlton Lewis (born July 1, 1961) is an American former track and field athlete who won nine Olympic gold medals, one Olympic silver medal, and 10 World Championships medals, including eight gold. His career spanned from 1979 to 1996, ...
is credited with "normalizing" the practice of having a lengthy track career as opposed to retiring once reaching the age when it is less realistic of gaining a personal best result. The United States is home to school-sponsored track and field, a tradition in which most schools from middle school through college feature a track and field team. Owing to the number of American athletes who satisfy Olympic norm standards, the US holds
national trials to select the best of its top-tier athletes for Olympic competition.
Combat sports
Boxing
![Oscar De La Hoya, Feb 2011](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0d/Oscar_De_La_Hoya%2C_Feb_2011.jpg)
Boxing is an iconic sport in the US and is the focus of the most successful sporting movies both critically and commercially with Oscar winning films like
Rocky
''Rocky'' is a 1976 American sports drama film directed by John G. Avildsen and written by and starring Sylvester Stallone. It is the first installment in the ''Rocky'' franchise and stars Talia Shire, Burt Young, Carl Weathers, and Burgess M ...
,
Raging Bull
''Raging Bull'' is a 1980 American biographical sports drama film directed by Martin Scorsese, produced by Robert Chartoff and Irwin Winkler and adapted by Paul Schrader and Mardik Martin from Jake LaMotta's 1970 memoir '' Raging Bull: My St ...
and
The Fighter
''The Fighter'' is a 2010 American biographical sports drama film directed by David O. Russell, and stars Mark Wahlberg (who also produced), Christian Bale, Amy Adams, and Melissa Leo. The film centers on the lives of professional boxer Micky ...
. As with many sports it has allowed Black Athletes to breakthrough to become major figures of US culture, with
Joe Louis
Joseph Louis Barrow (May 13, 1914 – April 12, 1981) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1934 to 1951. Nicknamed the Brown Bomber, Louis is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential boxers of all time. He rei ...
,
Mike Tyson
Michael Gerard Tyson (born June 30, 1966) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1985 to 2005. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" and "Kid Dynamite" in his early career, and later known as "The Baddest Man on the Planet", Tyson is cons ...
and
Muhammad Ali
Muhammad Ali (; born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.; January 17, 1942 – June 3, 2016) was an American professional boxer and activist. Nicknamed "The Greatest", he is regarded as one of the most significant sports figures of the 20th century, a ...
all becoming known on the world stage.
Boxing in the United States
Boxing's origins began in the United States in 19th century. The United States became the center of professional boxing in the early 20th century.
History
The sport of boxing came to the United States from England in the late 1700s and took ro ...
became the center of professional boxing in the early 20th century. The National Boxing Association was founded in 1921 and began to sanction title fights.
Joe Louis
Joseph Louis Barrow (May 13, 1914 – April 12, 1981) was an American professional boxer who competed from 1934 to 1951. Nicknamed the Brown Bomber, Louis is widely regarded as one of the greatest and most influential boxers of all time. He rei ...
was an American professional boxer who competed from 1934 to 1951. He reigned as the world heavyweight champion from 1937 to 1949, and is considered to be one of the greatest heavyweight boxers of all time. In 2005, Louis was ranked as the best heavyweight of all time by the International Boxing Research Organization, and was ranked number one on ''The Ring (magazine), The Ring'' magazine's list of the "100 greatest punchers of all time".
Louis had the longest single reign as champion of any heavyweight boxer in history.
Louis is widely regarded as the first person of African-American descent to achieve the status of a nationwide hero within the United States, and was also a focal point of anti-Nazi sentiment leading up to and during World War II.
He was instrumental in integrating the game of golf, breaking the sport's color barrier in America by appearing under a sponsor's exemption in a Professional Golfers' Association of America, PGA event in 1952.
In the 1960s and 1970s,
Muhammad Ali
Muhammad Ali (; born Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr.; January 17, 1942 – June 3, 2016) was an American professional boxer and activist. Nicknamed "The Greatest", he is regarded as one of the most significant sports figures of the 20th century, a ...
became an iconic figure, transformed the role and image of the African American athlete in America by his embrace of racial pride, and transcended the sport by refusing to serve in the Vietnam War.
In the 1980s
Mike Tyson
Michael Gerard Tyson (born June 30, 1966) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1985 to 2005. Nicknamed "Iron Mike" and "Kid Dynamite" in his early career, and later known as "The Baddest Man on the Planet", Tyson is cons ...
emerged as a serious contender. Nicknamed "Iron Mike", Tyson won the heavyweight unification series to become world heavyweight champion at the age of 20 and the first undisputed champion in a decade. Tyson soon became the most widely known boxer since Ali due to an aura of unrestrained ferocity, such as that exuded by Jack Dempsey or Sonny Liston. His career culminated in Evander Holyfield vs. Mike Tyson II where he famously bit off a piece of Holyfield's ear.
Since the late 1990s boxing has declined in popularity for a myriad of factors such as more sports entertainment options and combat alternatives such as MMA's Ultimate Fighting Championship, UFC amongst a younger demographic. Lack of mainstream coverage in newspapers and access on major television networks. Also the lack of a US Heavyweight world champion.
It was hoped in 2015 that the Floyd Mayweather Jr. vs. Manny Pacquiao fight would re-invigorate interest in the sport in the United States but because the fight was disappointing it was perceived as doing further harm to the image of the sport in the United States.
Other Combat Sports
Mixed martial arts in the United States largely developed in the 1990s, and has achieved popularity in the early 21st century. Many companies promote MMA cards, with the U.S. based Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) the most dominant.
Traditional "folkstyle" Wrestling in the United States, wrestling is performed at the scholastic and college levels. Scholastic wrestling, High school wrestling is a popular participatory sport in the United States, with Collegiate wrestling, college wrestling and the Olympic Games, Olympic wrestling styles of Freestyle wrestling, freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling, Greco-Roman having a spectator following. The Olympic styles of freestyle and Greco-Roman are performed at all age levels in the United States and in international competition.
Judo in the United States is not very popular and is eclipsed by more popular martial art forms like Karate in the United States, karate and taekwondo.
Swimming and water sports
Swimming in the United States, Swimming is a major competitive sport at high school and college level, but receives little mainstream media attention outside of the Olympics.
Surfing in the United States and watersports are popular in the U.S. in coastal areas. California and Hawaii are the most popular locations for surfing. The Association of Surfing Professionals was founded in 1983.
Five separate national governing bodies (NGBs) make up USAS: USA Swimming (sport), Swimming, USA Diving (sport), Diving, United States Synchronized Swimming, USA Water Polo, and U.S. Masters Swimming. Of the five, only U.S. Masters Swimming (USMS) is not a member of the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USMS's main aim is adult swimming, exclusive of Olympic-swimming which is the domain of USA Swimming).
Popular team sports
Overview
The most popular team sports in the United States are American football, baseball, basketball, ice hockey, and soccer. All five of these team sports are popular with fans, are widely watched on television, have a Major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada, fully professional league, are played by millions of Americans, enjoy varsity status at many NCAA Division I#Overview, Division I colleges, and are played in high schools throughout the country.
![NA Five Big Sports Franchises Names](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/9e/NA_Five_Big_Sports_Franchises_Names.svg)
# TV viewing record measures the game with the most TV viewers in the U.S. since 2005 for each sport: 2015 Super Bowl, 2016 NBA Finals Game 7, 2016 World Series Game 7, 2014 FIFA World Cup Final, and 2010 Winter Olympics Gold medal ice hockey game.
# The column titled "States (HS)" represents the number of states that sponsor the sport at the high school level. For the purpose of this table, Washington, D.C. is counted as a state.
American football
![Patriots-Steelers 2005](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/79/Patriots-Steelers_2005.jpg)
Football has the most participants of any sport at both high school and college levels, the vast majority of its participants being male.
The National Football League, NFL is the preeminent professional football league in the United States. The NFL has 32 franchises divided into two conferences. After a 17-game regular season, each conference sends seven teams to the NFL Playoffs, which eventually culminate in the league's championship game, the Super Bowl.
Nationwide, the NFL obtains the highest television ratings among major sports. Watching NFL games on television on Sunday afternoons has become a common routine for many Americans during the football season.
Super Bowl Sunday is the biggest annual sporting event held in the United States. The Super Bowl itself is always among the highest-rated programs of all-time in the Nielsen ratings.
The NFL has the highest average List of sports attendance figures, attendance (67,591) of any professional sports league in the world and has the highest List of professional sports leagues by revenue, revenue
out of any single professional sports league.
Since 2019, at least one other professional football league has played in each NFL offseason: the Alliance of American Football played eight weeks in 2019 AAF season, winter 2019 before its owner withdrew funding; the XFL (2020), XFL—a reimagining of a XFL (2001), 2001 league of the same name—played five weeks in 2020 XFL season, winter 2020 before government stay-at-home orders forced the league to shut down (it is scheduled to resume under new ownership in 2023 XFL season, winter 2023), and the United States Football League (2022), United States Football League—which used abandoned trademarks from, but shares no ownership with, a United States Football League, 1980s league of the same name—began play in 2022 USFL season, spring 2022. All of these leagues pay substantially lower salaries than the NFL and have had lower and less consistent attendance, though popularity in non-NFL markets (such as the XFL's St. Louis BattleHawks) can be robust.
Millions watch
college football
College football (french: Football universitaire) refers to gridiron football played by teams of student athletes. It was through college football play that American football rules first gained popularity in the United States.
Unlike most ...
throughout the fall months, and some communities, particularly in rural areas, place great emphasis on their local high school football teams. The popularity of college and high school football in areas such as the
Southern United States
The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, or simply the South) is a geographic and cultural region of the United States of America. It is between the Atlantic Ocean ...
(Southeastern Conference) and the Great Plains (Big 12 Conference and Big Ten Conference) stems largely from the fact that these areas historically generally did not possess markets large enough for a professional team. Nonetheless, college football has a rich history in the United States, predating the NFL by decades, and fans and alumni are generally very passionate about their teams.
During football season in the fall, fans have the opportunity to watch high school games on Fridays and Saturdays, college football on Saturdays, and National Football League, NFL games on Sundays, the usual playing day of the professional teams. However, some colleges play games on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, while the NFL offers weekly games on Monday Night Football, Monday (since 1970) and Thursday Night Football, Thursday (since 2006). As recently as 2013, one could find a nationally televised professional or college game on television any night between Labor Day and Thanksgiving weekend.
![1986 Jeno's Pizza - 02 - Butch Johnson](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/1986_Jeno%27s_Pizza_-_02_-_Butch_Johnson.jpg)
Indoor American football, Indoor football or arena football, a form of football played in indoor arenas, has several professional and semi-professional leagues. The Arena Football League was active from 1987 to 2008 and folded in 2009, but several teams from the AFL and its former minor league, AF2, af2, relaunched the league in 2010. The AFL folded again in 2019. Most extant indoor leagues date to the mid-2000s and are regional in nature.
Dedicated Women's American football, women's football is seldom seen. A few amateur and semi-professional leagues exist, of varying degrees of stability and competition. Football is unique among scholastic sports in the U.S. in that no women's division exists for the sport; List of female American football players, women who wish to play football in high school or college must compete directly with men.
Indoor American football has several professional leagues such as, Indoor Football League, Champions Indoor Football, American West Football Conference, National Arena League, and American Arena League.
Baseball
Baseball and a variant,
softball
Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...
, are popular participatory sports in the U.S. Baseball was the first professional sport in the United States.
The highest level of baseball in the U.S. and the world is
Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...
. The World Series of Major League Baseball is the culmination of the sport's postseason each October. It is played between the winner of each of the two leagues, the American League and the National League, and the winner is determined through a best-of-seven playoff.
The New York Yankees are noted for having won more titles than any other US major professional sports franchise. The Yankees' chief rivals, the Boston Red Sox, also enjoy a huge following in Boston and throughout New England. The Philadelphia Phillies of the National League are the oldest continuous, one-name, one-city franchise in all of Major professional sports teams of the United States and Canada, professional American sports,
and enjoy a fanbase renowned for their rabid support of their team throughout Philadelphia and the Delaware Valley, and have famously been dubbed as the "Meanest Fans in America". Midwest baseball has also grown exponentially with teams like the Chicago Cubs, St. Louis Cardinals, and Cincinnati Reds. Particularly with Chicago sports fans who avidly follow the Chicago Cubs and the Chicago White Sox despite the comparative lack of success for the teams, with Chicago Cub fans being known throughout the country as one of the best baseball fans in the country, most notably for their passionate loyalty to the team despite their not having won a championship from 1908 to 2016 (108 years) which stands as the longest championship drought in US sports history. The sport has also taken hold of fans on the West Coast, most notably the rivalry between the San Francisco Giants and The Los Angeles Dodgers. Historically, the leagues were much more competitive, and cities such as Boston, Philadelphia and St. Louis had rival teams in both leagues up until the 1950s.
Notable American baseball players in history include Babe Ruth (714 career home runs), Ty Cobb (career leader in batting average and batting titles), Cy Young, Honus Wagner, Ted Williams (.344 career batting average), Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle (16-time all star), Stan Musial, Willie Mays, Yogi Berra (18-time All-Star), Hank Aaron (career home run leader from 1974 to 2007), Mike Schmidt (548 career home runs, 10 career Gold Gloves), Nolan Ryan (career strikeouts leader), Roger Clemens (7 Cy Young awards), Derek Jeter and Jackie Robinson, who was instrumental in dissolving the baseball color line, color line and allowing African-Americans into the major leagues.
An extensive minor league baseball system covers most mid-sized cities in the United States. Minor league baseball teams are organized in a six-tier hierarchy, in which the highest teams (Triple-A (baseball), AAA) are in major cities that do not have a major league team but often have a major team in another sport, and each level occupies progressively smaller cities. The lowest levels of professional baseball serve primarily as development systems for the sport's most inexperienced prospects, with the absolute bottom, the rookie leagues, occupying the major league squads' spring training complexes.
Some limited independent professional baseball exists, the most prominent being the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball, Atlantic League, which occupies mostly suburban locales that are not eligible for high level minor league teams of their own because they are too close to other major or minor league teams.
Outside the minor leagues are collegiate summer baseball leagues, which occupy towns even smaller than those at the lower end of minor league baseball and typically cannot support professional sports. Summer baseball is an amateur exercise and uses players that choose not to play for payment in order to remain eligible to play college baseball for their respective universities in the spring. At the absolute lowest end of the organized baseball system is senior amateur baseball (also known as Town Team Baseball), which typically plays its games only on weekends and uses rosters composed of local residents.
Liga de Béisbol Profesional Roberto Clemente is a professional baseball league in Puerto Rico.
Basketball
Of those Americans citing their favorite sport, basketball is ranked second (counting amateur levels) behind football. However, in regards to revenue the NBA is ranked third in popularity.
More Americans play basketball than any other team sport, according to the National Sporting Goods Association, with over 26 million Americans playing basketball.
Basketball was invented in 1891 by Canadian physical education teacher James Naismith in Springfield, Massachusetts.
The
National Basketball Association
The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America. The league is composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada) and is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United S ...
(NBA) is the world's premier professional basketball league and one of the major professional sports leagues of North America. It contains 30 teams (29 teams in the U.S. and 1 in Canada) that play an 82-game season from October to June. After the regular season, eight teams from each conference compete in the playoffs for the Larry O'Brien Championship Trophy.
Since the 1992 Summer Olympics, NBA players have represented the United States in international competition and won numerous important tournaments. The 1992 United States men's Olympic basketball team, Dream Team was the unofficial nickname of the United States men's basketball team that won the gold medal at the 1992 Olympics.
Basketball at both the college and high school levels is popular throughout the country. Every March, a 68-team, six-round, single-elimination tournament (commonly called NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament, March Madness) determines the national champions of NCAA Division I men's college basketball.
Most U.S. states also crown state champions among their high schools. Many high school basketball teams have intense local followings, especially in Midwestern United States, the Midwest and Upper South. Indiana has 10 of the 12 largest high school gyms in the United States, and is famous for its basketball passion, known as Hoosier Hysteria.
Notable NBA players in history include Wilt Chamberlain (4 time MVP), Bill Russell (5 time MVP), Bob Pettit (11 time all NBA team), Bob Cousy (12 time all NBA team), Jerry West (12 time all NBA team), Julius Erving (won MVP awards in both the ABA and NBA), Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (6 time MVP), Magic Johnson (3 time MVP), Larry Bird (3 time MVP), Michael Jordan (6 time finals MVP), John Stockton (#1 in career assists and steals), Karl Malone (14 time all NBA team), Kobe Bryant (NBA's third all-time leading scorer), Tim Duncan (15-time NBA all-star), Shaquille O'Neal (3 time finals MVP) and Jason Kidd (#2 in career assists and steals).
Notable players in the NBA today include James Harden, LeBron James (4 MVP awards), Stephen Curry (2 time MVP), and Kevin Durant (MVP, 4 NBA scoring titles). Ever since the 1990s, an increasing number of players born outside the United States have signed with NBA teams, sparking league interest in different parts of the world.
Professional basketball is most followed in cities where there are no other sports teams in the four major professional leagues, such as in the case of the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Sacramento Kings, the San Antonio Spurs, the Memphis Grizzlies, or the Portland Trail Blazers. New York City has also had a long historical connection with college and professional basketball, and many basketball legends initially developed their reputations playing in the many playgrounds throughout the city. Madison Square Garden, the home arena of the New York Knicks, is often referred to as the "Mecca of basketball."
Minor league basketball, both official and unofficial, has an extensive presence, given the sport's relative lack of expense to operate a professional team. The NBA has an official minor league, known since 2017 as the NBA G League under a naming rights agreement with Gatorade. The most prominent independent league is BIG3, a 3x3 (basketball), three-on-three league featuring former NBA stars that launched in 2017. Several other pro basketball leagues exist but are notorious for their instability and low budget operations.
The Women's National Basketball Association, WNBA is the premier women's basketball league in the United States as well as the most stable and sustained women's professional sports league in the nation. Several of the 12 teams are owned by NBA teams. The United States women's national basketball team, women's national team has won eight Basketball at the Summer Olympics, Olympic gold medals and 10 FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup, FIBA World Cups. Historically, women's basketball in the United States followed a six-on-six basketball, six-woman-per-team format in which three players on each team stayed on the same side of the basketball court, court throughout the game. The six-person variant was abolished for college play in 1971, and over the course of the 1970s and 1980s was steadily abolished at the high school level, with the last states still sanctioning it switching girls over to the men's five-on-five code in the mid-1990s.
Baloncesto Superior Nacional and Baloncesto Superior Nacional Femenino are professional basketball leagues in Puerto Rico.
Ice hockey
Ice hockey, usually referred to in the U.S. simply as "hockey", is another popular sport in the United States. In the U.S. the game is most popular in regions of the country with a cold winter climate, namely the northeast and the upper Midwest. However, since the 1990s, hockey has become increasingly popular in the Sun Belt due in large part to the expansion of the
National Hockey League
The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...
to the southern U.S., coupled with the mass relocation of many residents from northern cities with strong hockey support to these Sun Belt locations.
The National Hockey League, NHL is the major professional hockey league in North America, with 25 U.S.-based teams and 7 Canadian-based teams competing for the Stanley Cup. While NHL stars are still not as readily familiar to the general American public as are stars of the NFL, MLB, and the NBA, average attendance for NHL games in the U.S. has surpassed average NBA attendance in recent seasons, buoyed in part by the NHL Winter Classic being played in large outdoor stadiums.
Minor league professional hockey leagues in the U.S. include the American Hockey League and the ECHL. Additionally, nine U.S.-based teams compete in the three member leagues of the Canadian Hockey League, a "junior" league for players aged sixteen to twenty. College ice hockey, College hockey has a regional following in the northeastern and upper midwestern United States. It is increasingly being used to develop players for the NHL and other professional leagues (the U.S. has junior leagues, the United States Hockey League and North American Hockey League, but they are more restricted to protect junior players' college eligibility). The Frozen Four is college hockey's national championship. The U.S. now has more youth hockey players than all other countries, excluding Canada, combined.
[ USA Hockey is the official governing body for amateur hockey in the United States. The United States Hockey Hall of Fame is located in Eveleth, Minnesota.
Internationally, the United States is counted among the Big Six (ice hockey), Big Six, the group of nations that have historically dominated international ice hockey competition. (The others include Canada, Finland, Sweden, the Czech Republic, and Russia.) One of the nation's greatest ever sporting moments was the "Miracle on Ice", which came during the ]1980 Winter Olympics
The 1980 Winter Olympics, officially the XIII Olympic Winter Games and also known as Lake Placid 1980, were an international multi-sport event held from February 13 to 24, 1980, in Lake Placid, New York, United States.
Lake Placid was elected ...
when the United States men's national ice hockey team, U.S. hockey team beat the Soviet Union 4–3 in the first game of the medal round before going on to beat Finland to claim the gold medal.
Historically, the vast majority of NHL players had come from Canada, with a small number of Americans. As late as 1969–70, Canadian players made up 95 percent of the league. During the 1970s and 1980s, European players entered the league, and many players from the former Soviet bloc flocked to the NHL beginning in the 1990s. Today, slightly less than half of NHL players are Canadian, more than 30% are Americans, and virtually all of the remainder are European-trained. (For a more complete discussion, see National Hockey League#Origin of players, Origin of NHL players.)
Notable NHL players in history include Wayne Gretzky (leading all-time point scorer and 9 time MVP), Mario Lemieux (3 time MVP), Guy Lafleur (2 time MVP), Gordie Howe (6 time MVP), Nicklas Lidström (7 times NHL's top defenseman), Bobby Hull (3 time MVP and 7 time leading goal scorer, Eddie Shore (4 time MVP), Howie Morenz (3 time MVP), Maurice "Rocket" Richard (5 time leading goal scorer), Jean Beliveau (2 time MVP), Bobby Clarke (3 time MVP), and Bobby Orr (8 times NHL's best defenseman). Famous NHL players today include Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews.
The Premier Hockey Federation, founded in 2015 as the National Women's Hockey League, is the first women's ice hockey league in the country to pay its players and features five teams in the northeast and upper midwest, plus two Toronto Six, Canadian Montreal Force, teams. Three of the five U.S.-based teams (the Buffalo Beauts, Minnesota Whitecaps and Metropolitan Riveters) are either owned or operated by, or affiliated with, their metro area's NHL franchise (the Buffalo Sabres, Minnesota Wild and New Jersey Devils, respectively). At the international level, the United States women's national ice hockey team is one of the two predominant international women's teams in the world, alongside its Canada–United States women's national ice hockey rivalry, longtime rival Canada women's national ice hockey team, Team Canada.
Soccer
Association football, Soccer has been increasing in popularity in the United States in recent years. Soccer is played by over 13 million people in the U.S., making it the third-most played sport in the U.S., more widely played than ice hockey and football. Most NCAA Division I college soccer, colleges field both a men's and women's varsity soccer team, and those that field only one team almost invariably field a women's team.
The United States United States men's national soccer team, men's national team and United States women's national soccer team, women's national team, as well as a number of national youth teams, represent the United States in international soccer competitions and are governed by the United States Soccer Federation (U.S. Soccer). The U.S. women's team holds the record for most FIFA Women's World Cup, Women's World Cup championships, and is the only team that has never finished worse than third place in a World Cup. The U.S. women beat the Netherlands women's national football team, Netherlands 2–0 in the 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup final to claim their second consecutive Women's World Cup title, and fourth overall.
Major League Soccer
Major League Soccer (MLS) is a men's professional soccer league sanctioned by the United States Soccer Federation, which represents the sport's highest level in the United States. The league comprises 29 teams—26 in the U.S. and 3 in Canada ...
(MLS) is the premier soccer league in the United States. The league's predecessor was the major professional North American Soccer League (1968–1984), North American Soccer League (NASL), which existed from 1968 until 1984. As of its ongoing 2022 season, MLS has 28 clubs (25 from the U.S. and 3 from Canada). The league plans to expand to 29 teams in 2023. The 34-game schedule runs from mid-March to late October, with the playoffs and championship in November. Soccer-specific stadiums continue to be built for MLS teams around the country, both because football stadiums are considered to have excessive capacity, and because teams profit from operating their stadiums. With an average attendance of over 21,000 per game (prior to COVID-19 pandemic in North America, COVID-19), MLS has the third-highest average attendance of any sports league in the U.S. after the National Football League
The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league that consists of 32 teams, divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The NFL is one of the ...
(NFL) and Major League Baseball
Major League Baseball (MLB) is a professional baseball organization and the oldest major professional sports league in the world. MLB is composed of 30 total teams, divided equally between the National League (NL) and the American League (AL), ...
(MLB),[Major professional sports leagues in the United States and Canada#Attendance] and is the ninth-highest attended professional soccer league worldwide.[MLSsoccer.com, The expansion, refs, Cascadia: MLS Commissioner Don Garber covers it all in annual address, February 27, 2013, http://www.mlssoccer.com/news/article/2013/02/27/expansion-refs-cascadia-commissioner-garber-covers-it-all-march-soccer-addre] Other professional men's soccer leagues in the U.S. include the current second division, the USL Championship (USLC), and three third-level leagues: USL League One (USL1), which launched in 2019 under the auspices of the USLC's operator, the United Soccer League; the National Independent Soccer Association (NISA), which also started in 2019; and MLS Next Pro, launched by MLS in 2022 as the effective replacement for its former MLS Reserve League, reserve league. Another competition, the second North American Soccer League (2011–2017), North American Soccer League, had been the second-level league until being demoted in 2018 due to instability, and soon effectively folded. For several years in the 2010s, the USL organization had a formal relationship with MLS, and a number of its teams (both in the Championship and League One) have been either owned by or affiliated with MLS sides, but most U.S.-based MLS teams moved their reserve sides into Next Pro in 2022, and the rest will do so in 2023.
Younger generations of Americans have strong fan appreciation for the sport, due to factors such as the U.S. hosting of the 1994 FIFA World Cup and the formation of Major League Soccer, as well as increased U.S. television coverage of soccer competitions. Many immigrants living in the United States continue to follow soccer as their favorite team sport. United States will host the 2026 FIFA World Cup, sharing with Canada and Mexico.
Women's professional soccer in the United States has not seen sustained success. Following the demise of two professional leagues in the early 21st century, the Women's United Soccer Association (1999–2001) and Women's Professional Soccer (2009–2011), U.S. Soccer established a new National Women's Soccer League in 2013. The NWSL has now survived longer than both of its two professional predecessors combined. Of its current 12 teams, six share ownership with professional men's clubs—three are wholly owned by MLS team owners, two are wholly owned by USL sides (one each in the USLC and USL1), and another is primarily owned by a French Ligue 1 side. However, at the lower levels of the salary scale, the NWSL was until very recently effectively semi-professional. While minimum salaries are still vastly lower than those in men's leagues (as of 2022, $35,000), players generally enjoy at least a middle-class standard of living because the salary figures do not include team-provided housing and transportation allowances.
Many notable international soccer players played in the U.S. in the North American Soccer League (1968–84), original North American Soccer League, usually at the end of their playing careers—including Pelé, Eusébio, George Best, Franz Beckenbauer, and Johan Cruyff—or in MLS—including Roberto Donadoni, Lothar Matthäus, David Beckham, Thierry Henry, Kaká, David Villa, Wayne Rooney, Zlatan Ibrahimović, Gareth Bale, Lorenzo Insigne, and Xherdan Shaqiri. The best American soccer players enter the National Soccer Hall of Fame, U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame.
The Major Arena Soccer League (MASL) is a North American professional indoor soccer
Indoor soccer or arena soccer (known internationally as indoor football, fast football, or showball) is five-a-side version of minifootball, derived from association football and adapted to be played in walled hardcourt indoor arena. Indoor socc ...
league. MASL is the highest level of arena soccer in the North America and the world.
Other team sports
Overview
The following table shows additional sports that are played by over 500,000 people in the United States.
# Attendance record measures highest single-game attendances. Attendance records are: Volleyball: 2017 NCAA Division I women's championship final; Ultimate: 2014 Montreal Royal (AUDL); Rugby: 2014 New Zealand vs. Ireland in Chicago; and Lacrosse: 2007 NCAA Division I men's championship semifinals.
# TV viewership records are: Volleyball: 2010 NCAA women's championship on ESPN2; Rugby: 2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens on NBC; Lacrosse: 2016 NCAA championship on ESPN2; Ultimate: 2017 US Open Mixed final.
Lacrosse
Lacrosse is a team sport that is believed to have originated with the Iroquois and the Lenape. The sport is most popular in the East Coast area from Maryland to New York. While its roots remain east, lacrosse is currently the fastest growing sport in the nation. The National Lacrosse League is the professional Box lacrosse league, while the Premier Lacrosse League is the professional Field Lacrosse league. Major League Lacrosse was a semi-professional Field Lacrosse league that was operating nationally before MLL–PLL merger, merging into PLL in 2020.
Volleyball
Volleyball is played in the United States, especially at the college and university levels. Unlike most Olympic sports which are sponsored widely at the collegiate level for both sexes, the women's college volleyball teams are more common than men's college volleyball teams. In the 2011–12 school year, over 300 schools in NCAA Division I alone (the highest of three NCAA tiers) sponsored women's volleyball at the varsity level, while fewer than 100 schools in all three NCAA divisions combined sponsored varsity men's volleyball, with only 23 of them in Division I. Men's volleyball has grown at the non-scholarship NCAA Division III level in the 21st century, with a NCAA Division III men's volleyball tournament, national championship established in 2012. As of the most recent 2022 season (2021–22 school year), 113 schools sponsor the sport at that level. At the same time, 26 D-I and 31 D-II members sponsored men's volleyball at the National Collegiate level, defined for the purposes of that sport as the combination of Divisions I and II.
As of 2019, there are currently two leagues that branch across the United States. First of these is the National Volleyball Association (NVA). The NVA currently has 10 teams. The second league is the Volleyball League of America (VLA) and has 5 teams spread across the United States.
The United States men's national volleyball team, men's national team has won three gold medals at the Olympic Games, one FIVB World Championship, two FIVB Volleyball World Cup, and one FIVB World League. Meanwhile, the United States women's national volleyball team, women's national team has won one gold medal at the Olympic Games, one FIVB World Championship and six editions of the FIVB World Grand Prix.
Beach volleyball has increasingly become popular in the United States, in part due to media exposure during the Olympic Games. Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP) is the biggest and longest-running professional beach volleyball tour in the United States.
Rugby union
Rugby union usually referred to in the U.S. simply as "rugby" is played professionally (Major League Rugby), recreationally and in colleges, though it is not governed by the NCAA (see college rugby). An estimated 1.2 million people in the United States play rugby.["Pro League Looks to Kick-Start American Rugby"](_blank)
''The New York Times'', Emma Stoney, April 25, 2016. The United States national rugby union team, U.S. national team has competed at the Rugby World Cup. In rugby sevens, the United States national rugby sevens team, men's national team is one of 15 "core teams" that participate in every event of the annual World Rugby Sevens Series, and the United States women's national rugby union team (sevens), women's national team is one of 11 core teams in the World Rugby Women's Sevens Series, Women's Sevens Series. Major League Rugby, a professional domestic club competition, has been played since 2018.
Rugby union participation in the U.S. has grown significantly in recent years, growing by 350% between 2004 and 2011. A 2010 survey by the National Sporting Goods Manufacturers Association ranked rugby union as the fastest-growing sport in the U.S. The sports profile in the U.S. has received a tremendous boost from the IOC's announcement in 2009 that rugby union (in its seven-a-side variant) would return to the Rugby union at the Summer Olympics, Olympics in 2016. Since the Olympic announcement, rugby union events such as the Collegiate Rugby Championship, the USA Sevens, and the Rugby World Cup have been broadcast on network TV. The USA Sevens, held every year in February or March as part of the World Rugby Sevens Series, has regularly drawn more than 60,000 fans to Sam Boyd Stadium in Las Vegas, though the tournament will move to the Los Angeles area for at least its 2020 edition. The U.S. also hosts an event in the Women's Sevens Series. It had been held alongside the USA Sevens in the 2016–17 season, but was not held in 2017–18 (when the 2018 Rugby World Cup Sevens, Rugby World Cup Sevens for both men and women was held in San Francisco). The USA Women's Sevens returned in 2018, after the World Cup Sevens, but is now a standalone event held in the Denver area that serves as the Women's World Series opener.
College rugby, Rugby union is the fastest growing college sport and sport in general in the United States.
Rugby football
Rugby football is the collective name for the team sports of rugby union and rugby league.
Canadian football and, to a lesser extent, American football were once considered forms of rugby football, but are seldom now referred to as such. The ...
formed the basis of modern American football
American football (referred to simply as football in the United States and Canada), also known as gridiron, is a team sport played by two teams of eleven players on a rectangular field with goalposts at each end. The offense, the team with ...
; the two sports were nearly identical in the late 19th century but diverged into distinct, incompatible codes by the start of the 20th century.
The United States will host the 2031 Rugby World Cup and the 2033 Rugby World Cup, 2033 Women's Rugby World Cup
Cricket
In 2006 it was estimated that 30,000 people in the United States play or watch cricket annually. By 2017, this figure had risen to 200,000 people playing cricket in 6,000 teams. Cricket in the United States is not as popular as baseball and is not as popular among as large a fraction of the population as it is
within either the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth nations or the other ICC List of International Cricket Council members#Full Members, full member (or Test cricket) nations. There are at least two historical reasons for the relative obscurity of cricket within
the United States. One reason was the 19th-century-rise of the summer time bat and ball sport now called baseball, which has displaced cricket as a popular pastime. Another reason was that in 1909 when the ICC was originally organized as the
Imperial Cricket Conference it was open only to Commonwealth nations and thereby excluded the US from participating in the sport at the highest level.
Nevertheless, in 1965 the US was admitted to the renamed ICC as an ICC associate membership, associate member and the sport grew in popularity in the second half of the 20th century. An oft mentioned reason for the growing popularity of cricket is the growing population of immigrants to the US who come from cricket playing nations.
With the launching of the United States Youth Cricket Association in 2010, a more focused effort to bring the game to American schools was begun, with the intention of broadening cricket's fan base beyond expatriates and their children.
ESPN has been stepping up its coverage of cricket in recent years, buying the cricket website Cricinfo in 2007, and broadcasting the final of the 2014 ICC World Twenty20 competition, the 2014 Indian Premier League, English County Championship games, and international Test cricket.
In 2021, Minor League Cricket, a professional Twenty20 cricket league sanctioned by USA Cricket, began play. Major League Cricket is planning to launch its first season in 2023. In addition, various championships and pathways are being offered for youth cricketers, such as the MLC Jr. Championship.
Ultimate and disc sports
Ultimate (sport), Ultimate is a team sport played with a flying disc. The object of the game is to score points by passing the disc to members of your own team until you have completed a pass to a team member in the opposing team's end zone. Over 5.1 million people play some form of organized ultimate in the US.
Alternative sports, using the flying disc, began in the mid-sixties, when numbers of young people looked for alternative recreational activities, including throwing a Frisbee. What started with a few players experimenting with a Frisbee later would become known as playing Flying disc freestyle, disc freestyle. Organized disc sports in the 1970s began with a few tournaments, and professionals using Frisbee show tours to perform at universities, fairs and sporting events. Disc sports such as Flying disc freestyle, disc freestyle, disc dog (with a human handler throwing discs for a dog to catch), Flying disc games#Double disc court, double disc court, Guts (flying disc game), disc guts, Ultimate (sport), disc ultimate, and disc golf became this sport's first events. More-proprietary disc games include KanJam, akin to quoits, invented in Buffalo, New York in the 1980s.
Beginning in 1974, the International Frisbee Disc Association became the regulatory organization for all of these sports. Led from 1975–1982 by Dan "Stork" Roddick, who also served as sports-marketing head for Wham-O, the IFA created an annual tournament at the Rose Bowl (stadium), Rose Bowl called the World Frisbee Championship, which drew over 50,000 fans and live TV coverage. This tournament served as a focal point for the more-developed game of Guts (flying disc game), Disc guts, invented in the 1950s, and the emerging popularity Flying disc games#Freestyle play and competition, freestyle competition (1974) and disc golf (standardized in 1976 by the Professional Disc Golf Association).
Around the same time, high school students at Columbia HS in Maplewood NJ invented a disc game in 1968 that they called Ultimate (sport), Ultimate. Among the three credited with its invention was future hollywood producer Joel Silver. Spread to mostly East Coast colleges by Columbia HS graduates in the early 1970s, and developed nearly in parallel in Southern California, the game began to have unofficial championships played in 1975. Loosely organized in its early years, Ultimate developed as an organized sport with the 1979 creation of the Ultimate Players Association. The sport grew rapidly throughout the country, establishing a Women's division in 1981, splitting its College division from the Club (adult) division in 1984, a Mixed Club division in 1997, and Youth championships from 1998. In 2010, the UPA re-branded as USA Ultimate, to be more in-line with other Sports governing body, sports governing bodies.
As club, college and youth play continued to expand rapidly, more-entrepreneurial enthusiasts looked to turn player interest into spectator dollars. In 2012, the American Ultimate Disc League became the first professional Ultimate league, followed the next year by Major League Ultimate. The two ran in parallel through 2016, when MLU folded; AUDL has sustained play through 2019 and expanded from 8 teams in 2012 to 21 teams in 2019. Although the AUDL's popularity continues to grow, the USA Ultimate Club Division is still viewed as the sport's highest level of play.
In 2015, the International Olympic Committee
The International Olympic Committee (IOC; french: link=no, Comité international olympique, ''CIO'') is a non-governmental sports organisation based in Lausanne, Switzerland. It is constituted in the form of an association under the Swiss ...
granted full recognition to the World Flying Disc Federation for flying disc sports including Ultimate
Ultimate or Ultimates may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Music Albums
* ''Ultimate'' (Jolin Tsai album)
* ''Ultimate'' (Pet Shop Boys album)
*''Ultimate!'', an album by The Yardbirds
*''The Ultimate (Bryan Adams Album)'', a compilatio ...
.
Other sports
The development of snowboarding
Snowboarding is a recreational and competitive activity that involves descending a snow-covered surface while standing on a snowboard that is almost always attached to a rider's feet. It features in the Winter Olympic Games and Winter Paralympi ...
was inspired by skateboarding, sledding, surfing and skiing. It was developed in the United States in the 1960s, became a Winter Olympic Sport at Nagano in 1998 and first featured in the Winter Paralympics at Sochi in 2014.
Australian rules football in the United States was first played in the country in 1996. The United States Australian Football League is the governing body for the sport in the U.S, with various clubs and leagues around the country. The USAFL National Championships, National Championships are held annually. The United States men's national Australian rules football team and the women's national team both regularly play international matches, and play in the Australian Football International Cup, an international tournament. The sport also benefits from an active fan based organization, the Australian Football Association of North America.
Bandy is only played in Minnesota. United States national bandy team, The national team regularly plays in Division A of the Bandy World Championships. In terms of licensed athletes, it is the second biggest winter sport in the world.
Cricket in the United States is not a popular sport, but has a niche market with limited inroads, mainly in immigrant communities. The United States of America Cricket Association governs cricket in the United States.
Cricket used to be the most popular sport in America during the 18th and early 19th centuries, but declined as baseball overtook cricket. The first intercollegiate tournament in America was the Canadian cricket team in the United States in 1844, first annual Canada vs. U.S. cricket match, played since 1844, when it was attended by 10,000 spectators in New York., and the annual match is the oldest international sporting event in the modern world.
The United States national cricket team plays in 2012 ICC World Cricket League Division Four, World Cricket League Division IV, the ICC Americas Championship and qualified for ICC Intercontinental Cup.
Curling is popular in northern states, possibly because of climate, proximity to Canada, or Scandinavian heritage. The national popularity of curling is growing after significant media coverage of the sport in the 2006 Winter Olympics, 2006 and 2010 Winter Olympics, 2010 Winter Olympics.
Gaelic football and hurling are governed by North American GAA and New York GAA. They do not have a high profile but are developing sports, with New York fielding a representative team in the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship.
Field hockey in the United States, Field hockey is played in the United States predominantly by women. It is played widely at numerous NCAA colleges.
Handball in the United States, Handball, a common popular sport in European countries, is seldom seen in the United States. The sport is mostly played in the country on the amateur level. Handball is played in the Summer Olympics, but is not sanctioned by the NCAA; all college and university teams play as club teams. In 2020, a former USA Team Handball CEO Barry Siff said that they are planning to create an American professional team handball league sponsored by Verizon. They are planning to have the owners until the end of 2020, and to launch the league in 2023 with 10 teams with each team initially worth $3 million to $5 million and want to cooperate with NBA or NHL owners in one-tenant arena situations.
Roller in-line hockey, Inline hockey was invented by Americans as a way to play the sport in all climates. The Professional Inline Hockey Association, PIHA is the league with the largest number of List of inline hockey clubs, professional teams in the nation. Street hockey is a non-standard version of inline hockey played by amateurs in informal games.
Rugby league in the United States is governed by the USA Rugby League (USARL). The majority of teams are based on the East Coast. The league was founded in 2011 by clubs that had broken with the established American National Rugby League (AMNRL).
The United States national rugby league team played in their first 2013 Rugby League World Cup, World Cup in 2013 advancing to the quarter finals with wins over Wales national rugby league team, Wales and the Cook Islands national rugby league team, Cook Islands.
The USA Tomahawks national team would go on to lose to champions Australia national rugby league team, Australia 62–0.
Water polo in the United States, Water polo does not have a professional competition in the U.S., so the highest level of competitive play is at the college level and in the Olympics. The NCAA sanctions water polo as a varsity sport for both men and women, and is popular in the U.S. along the west coast, and parts of the east coast. However, no team outside of California has ever reached the finals of the NCAA Division I men's water polo championship.
Organization of American sports
Professional sports
For the most part, unlike sports in Europe and other parts of the world, there is no system of promotion and relegation
In sports leagues, promotion and relegation is a process where teams are transferred between multiple divisions based on their performance for the completed season. Leagues that use promotion and relegation systems are often called open leagues. ...
in American professional sports. Major sports leagues operate as associations of franchises
Franchise may refer to:
Business and law
* Franchising, a business method that involves licensing of trademarks and methods of doing business to franchisees
* Franchise, a privilege to operate a type of business such as a cable television p ...
. The same 30–32 teams play in the league each year unless they move to another city or the league chooses to expand with new franchises.
All American sports leagues use the same type of schedule. After the regular season, the 10–16 teams with the best records enter a playoff
The playoffs, play-offs, postseason or finals of a sports league are a competition played after the regular season by the top competitors to determine the league champion or a similar accolade. Depending on the league, the playoffs may be eithe ...
tournament leading to a championship series or game. American sports, except for soccer and women's basketball, have no equivalent to the cup competitions that run concurrently with leagues in European sports. In soccer, the cup competitions, the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup for men's teams throughout all levels, and the NWSL Challenge Cup for League cup, teams in that league, draw considerably less attention than the regular season. In basketball, the WNBA launched the WNBA Commissioner's Cup, Commissioner's Cup in the 2021 season, but the qualification process for the one-off Cup final, held at midseason, is based on a subset of regular-season games for all teams. Also, the only top-level U.S. professional teams that play teams from other organizations in meaningful games are those in Major League Soccer, MLS. Since the 2012 season, all U.S.-based MLS teams have automatically qualified for the U.S. Open Cup, in which they compete against teams from lower-level U.S. leagues. In addition, three or four U.S.-based MLS teams (depending on the results of the U.S. Open Cup) qualify to play clubs from countries outside the U.S. and Canada in the CONCACAF Champions League. NBA teams have played EuroLeague, European teams in preseason exhibitions on a semi-regular basis, and recent Major League Soccer All-Star Game, MLS All-Star Games have pitted top players from the league against major European soccer teams, such as members of the Premier League.
International competition is not as important in American sports as it is in the sporting culture of most other countries, although Olympic Games, Olympic ice hockey and basketball tournaments do generate attention. The first international baseball tournament with top-level players, the World Baseball Classic, also generated some positive reviews after its inaugural tournament in 2006.
The major professional sports leagues operate draft (sports), drafts once a year, in which each league's teams selected eligible prospects. Eligibility differs from league to league. Baseball and ice hockey operate minor league
Minor leagues are professional sports leagues which are not regarded as the premier leagues in those sports. Minor league teams tend to play in smaller, less elaborate venues, often competing in smaller cities/markets. This term is used in Nor ...
systems for players who have finished education but are not ready or good enough for the major leagues. The NBA also has a NBA G League, development league for players who are not ready to play at the top level.
College sports
The extent to which sports are associated with secondary and tertiary education in the United States is rare among nations. Millions of students participate in athletics programs operated by high schools and colleges. Student-athletes often receive athletic scholarship, scholarships to colleges in recognition of their athletic potential. Currently, the largest governing body of collegiate sports is the National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
(NCAA).
Especially in football and basketball, college sports are followed in numbers equaling those of professional sports. College football games can draw over 100,000 spectators. For upper-tier institutions, sports are a significant source of revenue; for less prominent teams, maintaining a high-level team is a major expense. To ensure some semblance of competitive balance, the NCAA divides its institutions into three divisions (four in football), sorted by the number of athletic scholarships each school is willing to offer.
The most practiced college sports, measured by NCAA reporting on varsity team participation, are: (1) football (64,000), (2) baseball/softball (47,000), (3) track and field (46,000), (4) soccer (43,000), (5) basketball (32,000), (6) cross-country running (25,000), and (7) swimming/diving (20,000). The most popular sport among female athletes is soccer, followed closely by track and field.
Community college athletics are governed separately by the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA).
High school sports
Most public high schools are members of their respective state athletic association, and those associations are members of the National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS). Some states have separate associations for public and non-public high schools.
The 2018–19 school year was the first in 30 years to see a decrease in high school sports participation. Increases through the previous decades had been largely driven by growth in girls' participation. The high school sports with the highest number of participants for 2018–19 are:
;Team sports
# Football – 1,008,417
# Basketball – 939,836
# Baseball/Softball – 854,859
# Soccer – 853,182
# Volleyball – 516,371
;Individual sports
# Track & field (outdoor) – 1,093,621
# Cross country – 488,640
# Tennis – 348,750
# Swimming & diving – 309,726
# Wrestling – 268,565
;Notes
Popular high school sports in various regions of the U.S. include the Texas High School football championships, the Indiana basketball championships, and ice hockey in Minnesota.
The Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament is the largest high school sporting event in the country, with average attendance to the top tier, or "AA", games over 18,000.
Amateur sports
The Amateur Athletic Union
The Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) is an amateur sports organization based in the United States. A multi-sport organization, the AAU is dedicated exclusively to the promotion and development of amateur sports and physical fitness programs. It has ...
claims to have over 670,000 participants and over 100,000 volunteers.. The AAU has existed since 1888, and has been influential in amateur sports for that same time span.
In the 1970s, the AAU received growing criticism. Many claimed that its regulatory framework was outdated. Women were banned from participating in certain competitions and some runners were locked out. There were also problems with sporting goods that did not meet the standards of the AAU. During this time, the Amateur Sports Act of 1978 organized the United States Olympic Committee and saw the re-establishment of state-supported independent associations for the Olympic sports, referred to as Sports governing body, national governing bodies. As a result, the AAU lost its influence and importance in international sports, and focused on the support and promotion of predominantly youthful athletes, as well as on the organization of national sports events.
Government regulation
No American government agency is charged with overseeing sports. However, the President's Council on Physical Fitness and Sports advises the President through the Secretary of Health and Human Services about physical activity, fitness, and sports, and recommends programs to promote regular physical activity for the health of all Americans.The Congress of the United States, U.S. Congress has chartered the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) is the National Olympic Committee and the National Paralympic Committee for the United States. It was founded in 1895 as the United States Olympic Committee, and is headquartered in Col ...
to govern American participation in the Olympic Games, Olympic and Paralympic Games, Paralympic movements, and promote Olympic and Paralympic sports. Congress has also involved itself in several aspects of sports, notably Title IX, gender equity in college athletics, doping (sport), illegal drugs in pro sports, sports broadcasting and the application of antitrust law to sports leagues.
Individual states may also have athletic commissions, which primarily govern individual sports such as boxing
Boxing (also known as "Western boxing" or "pugilism") is a combat sport in which two people, usually wearing protective gloves and other protective equipment such as hand wraps and mouthguards, throw punches at each other for a predetermined ...
, kickboxing and mixed martial arts. Notable state athletic commissions are the Nevada Athletic Commission, California State Athletic Commission, New York State Athletic Commission and New Jersey State Athletic Control Board. Although these commissions only have jurisdiction over their own states, the Full Faith and Credit Clause of the United States Constitution, U.S. Constitution is often interpreted as forcing all other states to recognize any state athletic commission's rulings regarding an athlete's fitness for participating in a sport.
Sports media in the United States
Sports have been a major part of American broadcasting since the early days of radio. Today, television networks and radio networks pay millions (sometimes billions) of dollars for the rights to Broadcasting of sports events, broadcast sporting events. Contracts between leagues and broadcasters stipulate how often games must be interrupted for television commercial, commercials. Because of all of the advertisements, broadcasting contracts are very lucrative and account for the biggest chunk of major professional teams' revenues. Broadcasters also covet the television contracts for the major sports leagues (especially in the case of the National Football League, NFL) in order to amplify their ability to promote their programming to the audience, especially young and middle-aged adult males.
The advent of cable television, cable and satellite dish, satellite television has greatly expanded sports offerings on American TV.[Catsis, ''Sports Broadcasting'' (1996)] ESPN, the first all-sports cable network in the U.S., went on the air in 1979. It has been followed by several sister networks and competitors. Some sports television networks are national, such as CBS Sports Network, Fox Sports 1 and NBC Sports Network, whereas others are regional, such as NBC Sports Regional Networks, Fox Sports Networks and Spectrum Sports. General entertainment channels like TBS (U.S. TV channel), TBS, TNT (U.S. TV network), TNT, and USA Network also air sports events.
Some sports leagues have their own sports networks, such as NFL Network, MLB Network, NBA TV, NHL Network (United States), NHL Network, Big Ten Network, Pac-12 Network and SEC Network. Some sports teams run their own television networks as well.
Sports are also widely broadcast at the local level, ranging from college and professional sports down to (on some smaller stations) recreational and youth leagues. Internet radio has allowed these broadcasts to reach a worldwide audience.
Most popular sports in the United States
In the broadest definition of sports—physical recreation of all sorts—the four most popular sports among the general population of the United States are exercise walking (90 million), exercising with equipment (53 million), swimming (52 million) and camping (47 million). The most popular competitive sport (and fifth most popular recreational sport) is bowling (43 million). Other most popular sports are fishing (35 million), bicycling (37 million), weightlifting (33 million), aerobics (30 million), and hiking (28 million).
According to a January 2018 Poll by Gallup, 37% of Americans consider football their favorite spectator sport, while 11% prefer basketball, 9% baseball, and 7% soccer. There is some variation by viewer demographics. Men, show a stronger preference for football than women, conservatives a stronger preference than liberals, and those over 35 a stronger preference than those under 35. In all groups, however, football is still the most popular. Basketball and soccer are more popular among liberals than conservatives.
Pickleball, a racquet sport invented in the state of Washington in 1965, was designated Washington's official List of U.S. state sports, state sport in 2022. For two years in a row, 2021 and 2022, the sport was named the fastest growing sport in the United States by the Sports and Fitness Industry Association (SFIA). Between 2019 and 2022 the SFIA estimates the number of US players increased almost 40% to 4.8 million. Projections suggest there could be as many as 40 million players in the United States by the end of the decade.
Sports leagues in the United States
The sports leagues
The following table shows the professional sports leagues, which average over 15,000 fans per game and that have a national TV contract that pays rights fees.
Other team sports leagues
* American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL)
* National Volleyball Association (NVA)
* Association of Volleyball Professionals (AVP)
* National Women's Soccer League (NWSL)
* Major Arena Soccer League (MASL)
* United Soccer League (USL)
** Men's leagues:
*** USL Championship (USLC)
*** USL League One (USL1)
*** USL League Two (USL2)
** Women's leagues:
*** USL Super League (USLS; planned launch in 2023)
*** USL W League (USLW)
* MLS Next Pro
* National Independent Soccer Association (NISA)
* Premier Lacrosse League (PLL)
* National Lacrosse League (NLL)
* Minor League Baseball:
** Triple-A (baseball), Triple-A leagues:
*** International League
*** Pacific Coast League
** Double-A (baseball), Double-A leagues:
*** Eastern League (1938–present), Eastern League
*** Southern League (1964–present), Southern League
*** Texas League
** High-A leagues:
*** Midwest League
*** Northwest League
*** South Atlantic League
** Low-A leagues:
*** California League
*** Carolina League
*** Florida State League
** Rookie leagues:
*** Arizona Complex League
*** Florida Complex League
* MLB Partner Leagues:
** American Association of Professional Baseball, American Association
** Atlantic League of Professional Baseball, Atlantic League
** Frontier League
** Pioneer League (baseball), Pioneer League
* Major League Rugby (MLR) (Union)
* USA Rugby League (USARL)
* National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
(NCAA)
* Premier Hockey Federation (PHF)
* American Hockey League (AHL)
* ECHL
* Federal Prospects Hockey League (FPHL)
* Southern Professional Hockey League (SPHL)
* National Pro Fastpitch (NPF)
* United States Australian Football League (USAFL)
* Professional Inline Hockey Association (PIHA)
* Women's National Basketball Association (WNBA)
* NBA G League
* United States Football League (2022), USFL
* XFL (2020), XFL
* National Gay Flag Football League (NGFFL)
* Women's Football Alliance (WFA)
* Major League Cricket (MLC)
Other individual sports leagues
*Auto racing
** IndyCar (was Indy Racing League (IRL), merged with Champ Car
Champ Car World Series (CCWS) was the series sanctioned by Open-Wheel Racing Series Inc., or Champ Car, a sanctioning body for American open-wheel car racing that operated from 2004 to 2008. It was the successor to Championship Auto Racing Teams ( ...
)
** International Motor Sports Association (IMSA, sanctions IMSA SportsCar Championship
The IMSA SportsCar Championship, currently known as the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship under sponsorship, is a sports car racing series based in the United States and Canada and organized by the International Motor Sports Association (IMS ...
)
** NASCAR, National Association of Stock Car Automobile Racing (NASCAR)
** National Hot Rod Association
The National Hot Rod Association (NHRA) is a drag racing governing body, which sets rules in drag racing and hosts events all over the United States and Canada. With over 40,000 drivers in its rosters, the NHRA claims to be the largest motorspo ...
(NHRA)
* Bowling
** PBA Tour
** United States Bowling Congress (USBC)
* Combat
** Bellator Fighting Championships
** Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC)
* Flying Disc
** Professional Disc Golf Association (PDGA)
* Golf
** Legends Tour, for women's golfers 45 and over
** LPGA Tour
*** Epson Tour, developmental tour for the LPGA
** PGA Tour
The PGA Tour (stylized in all capital letters as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in the United States and North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also k ...
*** PGA Tour Champions
PGA Tour Champions (formerly the Senior PGA Tour and the Champions Tour) is a men's professional senior golf tour, administered as a branch of the PGA Tour.
History and format
The Senior PGA Championship, founded in 1937, was for many years ...
, for men's golfers 50 and over; operated by the PGA Tour
*** Korn Ferry Tour, developmental tour for the PGA Tour
* Juggling
** World Juggling Federation (WJF)
* Pickleball
** Major League Pickleball (MLP)
** Professional Pickleball Association (PPA)
** Association of Pickleball Professionals (APP)
* Rodeo
** Professional Bull Riders (PBR)
** Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association (PRCA)
Sports governing bodies
* Automobile Competition Committee for the United States (ACCUS)
* USA Boxing (USAB)
* USA Basketball (USAB)
* USA Cycling (USAC)
* USA Cricket (USAC)
* USA Football (USAF)
* USA Baseball (USAB)
* USA Hockey (USAH)
* USA Pickleball (USAP)
* USA Rugby (Union) (USAR)
* USA Rugby League (USARL)
* USA Table Tennis (USATT)
* USA Team Handball (USATH)
* USA Track & Field
USA Track & Field (USATF) is the United States national governing body for the sports of track and field, cross country running, road running and racewalking (known as the sport of athletics outside the US). The USATF was known between 1979 and ...
(USATF)
* USA Volleyball (USAV)
* United States Aquatic Sports (USAS)
* United States Bobsled and Skeleton Federation (USBFS)
* United States Golf Association
The United States Golf Association (USGA) is the United States national association of golf courses, clubs and facilities and the governing body of golf for the U.S. and Mexico. Together with The R&A, the USGA produces and interprets the rules ...
(USGA)
* United States Rowing Association (USRA)
* U.S. Ski & Snowboard, United States Ski and Snowboard
* United States Snooker Association (USSA)
* United States Soccer Federation (USSF)
* United States Tennis Association (USTA)
See also
* Sports in the United States by state
* Sports Museum of America
* Professional sports in the Western United States
* Record attendances in United States club soccer
* Homosexuality in sports in the United States
* Sport in the United Kingdom
Notes
References
Further reading
* Gerdy, John R. ''Sports: The All-American Addiction'' (2002
online
* Gorn, Elliott J. ''A Brief History of American Sports'' (2004)
* Harris, Othello, George Kirsch, et al. eds. ''Encyclopedia of Ethnicity and Sports in the United States'' (2000
excerpts
* Jackson III, Harvey H. ed. ''The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture: Sports & Recreation'' (2011
online
* Jay, Kathryn. ''More Than Just a Game: Sports in American Life since 1945'' (2004)
online
* Reiss, Steven A. ed. ''Sports in America from Colonial Times to the Twenty-First Century: An Encyclopedia'' (3 vol 2011
excerpt
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sports in the United States
Sports in the United States,