Over the years, the United States has gained a reputation for arrogance and self-centeredness. A couple of opinions expressed in The New York Times last week did nothing to dispel this perception.

No, it wasn't something Jesse Helms said.

In last Tuesday's edition, Mark McGwire spouted off about the New York Mets and Chicago Cubs opening the 2000 Major League Baseball season with two games in Tokyo, saying, among other things:

"The Japanese have their own brand of baseball over there. Our game is too international as it is . . . I take the game seriously. To me, to go play worldwide doesn't turn my crank. I want to play here in America. I have nothing against anybody else in another country. This game belongs here. People come to America, they come here to watch our game."

I guess McGwire forgot about the two MLB teams in Canada. Or maybe he considers it part of America.

With about one-quarter of major leaguers hailing from outside the U.S. -- including last year's American League Rookie of the Year, Cy Young Award winner, Most Valuable Player and World Series MVP -- why shouldn't the game be promoted abroad?

Last year, the idea of the St. Louis Cardinals being one of the teams involved in the Japan openers was floated. McGwire shot it down and convinced his teammates to follow his anti-international stance. Big Mac is entitled to his opinion, but once he got his way, he should have concentrated on bashing baseballs, not MLB's trip to Japan.

McGwire didn't want to come here, but how nice it's been to see members of both the Cubs and Mets (even Rickey Henderson!) genuinely enjoying themselves since arriving last Saturday.

McGwire says greed motivated the owners to hold games in Japan. Well, not that he would know, but there are a fair number of people over here wearing Cardinals caps and No. 25 jerseys in reverence to the home-run champion, and that merchandise revenue helps pay his roughly $10 million-a-year salary. As long as players continue to drive up costs, the owners will have no choice but to keep looking for new sources of revenue. Giving fans in different countries a chance to see real games live seems like a pretty good way to me.

The other New York Times story of note appeared a day earlier in the business section. It centered around the National Basketball Association's sagging popularity since Michael Jordan's retirement and the fact that Vince Carter (sometimes referred to as the "Air Apparent" or "Air Canada") is playing north of the border for the Toronto Raptors.

Donnie Deutsch, an American marketing expert, was quoted as saying: "David Stern needs to make some move to get Carter to Chicago or New York. The rest of the league needs him in a big media market."

The Toronto Sun followed this up by citing a "highly placed NBA executive" who said, "We won't push him out, but we would like to see him with a U.S.-based team."

While the executive wasn't named, the view is likely shared by many of his Fifth Avenue cronies. Raptors coach Butch (no relation to Vince) Carter certainly believes a conspiracy is in the air, telling the Sun, "We don't fit the NBA's lifestyle. It's in the best interests of the NBA to break us up."

The irony here is that the league had already loaded the deck in an attempt to prevent the next phenom from going to Canada. When Toronto and Vancouver were awarded expansion franchises for the 1995-96 season, they were barred from a chance at the No. 1 draft pick in their first four years.

The plan didn't work; in the 1998 draft, four teams passed on Carter before the Golden State Warriors claimed him fifth. In what may go down as the biggest steal in NBA history, the Warriors promptly traded Carter and cash to the Raptors for his University of North Carolina teammate Antawn Jamison, the fourth overall pick in that draft.

You might think the NBA would be happy to see a star player increase the league's popularity outside the U.S., the way Wayne Gretzky popularized hockey down south after the Edmonton Oilers could no longer afford him. But that doesn't seem to be the case.

One can only wonder what steps will be taken to ground "Air Canada" and return him to American soil.