Who Would've Thunk? The women's pro soccer league, the WUSA, folds. Does this explain why USA Today has been humping it these last few weeks with gratuitous, multi-page player profiles of Mia Hamm and Julie Foudy? Anyhow, USA Today says, in its print edition:

. . . the 3-year-old WUSA had seen a steady decline in attendance and paltry TV ratings. But the overriding reason for its $20 million budget shortfall for 2003 and $90 million overall loss was a lack of big-time corporate sponsorship, WUSA founder and chairman John Hendricks said Monday.

But the league was capitalized with $40 million, which was expected to last five years. They blew through it in one year. There's a clarion call of responsible fiscal management. Who can even guess why corporations weren't running to dump money into such an enterprise? Expect this to be editorialized by Christine Brennan and her cohort as a "tremendous blow" to women's sports, or some other dire formulation. Its a tremendous blow only to people who still think, despite years of evidence to the contrary, that Americans have some burning desire to watch soccer -- if only it were offered to them!