It's almost time for the world's greatest sporting event. No, not the boring Olympics, which I can barely stand to watch at all anymore. I'm talking about the World Cup. That's right, folks, it's soccer time! The 2006 Cup will be held in Germany from June 9 to July 9. This past Sunday we went to see the U.S. team play their final tune-up at Rentschler Field in Hartford, where they came away with a 1-0 win versus Latvia, not to be confused with Dr. Doom’s home of Latveria. Good thing, because I’d feel bad for those “insolent dolts” when they got home from losing (okay, I promise no more comic book references for a while). But if you’re not a soccer fan, now’s a great time to jump on the bandwagon. The U.S. is still an underdog (despite their #5 world ranking) to go too far into the tournament due to their tough group, but the team is talented and a breakthrough is possible into the elite group of teams vying for the title. And this is the first World Cup shown in HD (the tourney takes place every four years) thanks to ABC and ESPN. So I’m going to lace ‘em up and get ready by kicking a ball around. If you want to join me, we play a pick-up game every Wednesday night – see you there!