Colin’s top takes of the week.

First, he’s joined by Danny Parkins, host of “First Things First” on FS1.

They start with the World Cup and Colin argues that even non-soccer fans can spot greatness on the soccer field, and that the USMNT has looked great so far, and even though we may not win it… we’ve substantially closed the gap with the world’s best teams (3:30).

Colin points to changes made by Adam Silver leading to a new NBA Finals champion every year and that parity has been better than dynasties for the sport (12:30).

Then, Colin is joined by Mike Mulvihill, President of Insights and Analytics for FOX Sports.

They start with FOX’s process for predicting the TV numbers for the World Cup to advertisers, and Mike explains that the viewership is similar to two full NFL regular seasons and will reach around 150 million viewers (24:30). He also discusses the breakdown between casual and die-hard soccer fans (27:00).

Finally, they discuss the impact of Messi and Ronaldo’s star power (30:30), and dive into the rise of soccer culture in the United States in recent years (33:00).

All lines provided by @hardrockbet

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