"I want to watch all the World Cup games, but for us, the Knicks is still a priority." George Carson said that sitting inside a Manhattan soccer bar on the opening day of the World Cup. That sentence tells you everything about New York right now.
The city is hosting one of sport's grandest spectacles — 104 games of the World Cup, with Brazil playing its opener just across the Hudson in East Rutherford — and a chunk of the crowd is already eyeing the door for tip-off. The Knicks, 3-1 up in the NBA Finals against San Antonio and one win from their first championship since 1973, have their own gravitational pull.
The bars are managing the chaos
Game 5 tips off in Texas on Saturday night, roughly 30 minutes after Brazil and Morocco wrap up in New Jersey. Scotland vs Haiti kicks off in Massachusetts at 9 p.m. — running directly against the NBA game. For New York's soccer bars, that means 20 screens, competing loyalties, and a cover charge at the door.
Jack Keane, the Irishman who owns The Football Factory near Madison Square Garden, put it plainly: "I hope they put it to bed Saturday night, so we can just say, well done, Knicks. Have your parade, and that's it. Now we can concentrate on the soccer." His bar drew more than 2,000 people for Game 4 on Wednesday. "The Knicks crowd was the same as the Champions League final crowd," he said. That's not a small thing for a bar that hosts PSG, Chelsea, Aston Villa, Leeds, and AC Milan supporters groups.
A few blocks away at Smithfield Hall — home to Man United, West Ham, Barcelona, Bayern, Inter, Roma, and Marseille supporters — co-owner Kieron Slattery noted the NBA had turned his typically seated, long-format crowd into a standing one. "It's like a soccer game atmosphere," he said.
The city belongs to both, for now
Joel Ramirez, a Dallas transplant with Mexican roots who bar-hops by ethnicity during tournaments, reckons the football fans will outnumber the basketball crowd on Saturday. "There's going to be pound for pound a lot more football fans in the city," he said. "I'll be watching both."
Even Spike Lee, who was courtside for the Knicks' Game 4 comeback at Madison Square Garden, showed up at Brazil's New Jersey training base in green and gold hours earlier. New York contains multitudes.
For the World Cup's early odds and group-stage markets, Brazil drawing a large, split-attention crowd for their opener is a peculiar backdrop. The Seleção aren't exactly lacking motivation — but their biggest local fanbase will have one eye on San Antonio's roster and a potential Knicks parade route.
Keane framed the World Cup's appeal simply: "Everyone's got a shirt in the closet. Everyone's going to claim either their own identity or a parent or a grandparent, get on the bandwagon." The NBA Finals might steal Saturday. The other 103 games belong to the beautiful game.
