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Given the relative Puritanism of Americans in comparison to the French or Italians regarding nudity, it's not likely that we'll be seeing Tom Brady trading jockstraps with Brett Favre anytime soon, but the shift toward repositioning our national sports heroes as sex objects appears to be underway.

One possible catalyst for the shift is the simple fact that, thanks mostly to the internet, people in the States are being given a window into the ways in which other, more sexually liberal cultures view their sportsmen. As Towle noted, “The internet has quickly become the most powerful conduit for the exchange and promotion of information.

As the more relaxed sexual attitudes of Europe have reached the U.S., there has definitely been a reaction. After the Dieux du Stade calendars caused such a splash, I saw an explosion of both amateur and professional sports teams trying to promote themselves and raise money using male beefcake calendars.”

Frank, however, feels that the impact of the internet might not be quite that strong, at least for now. “For American athletes to feel any sort of pressure from these calendars,” he said, “they would have to know they exist, and for them to know they exist, they would have to read certain blogs, like mine, which I'm sure most of them don't, except for the figure skaters. Maybe we'll see a Gods of Figure Skating calendar out sometime soon.”

But the internet is not the only way that these sexed-up images are making their way across the pond. Thanks in part to the success of Footballers' Wives on BBC America, ABC recently ordered an American version of the show titled Football Wives, which moves the action from the bedrooms of British soccer stars to those of American football players. No telling yet whether the gay content of the original series (which mostly centered around bisexual superstar Conrad Gates) will be preserved on this side of the pond, but the fact that gay director Bryan Singer is attached to the project certainly suggests it might be.

And in the arena of actual athletics (not just nudie calendars and sordid soaps), fashion-forward soccer god David Beckham (upon whom Conrad Gates was at least partially based) was recently signed by the Los Angeles Galaxy soccer team for an unprecedented amount of money. Will Beckham bring the more relaxed European attitude toward athletes sexing up their image to American sports? Towle thinks so. “It's likely the arrival of Beckham will spawn a sea change in how athletes market themselves,” he said.

We can only hope Towle is right — and not just for obvious, voyeuristic reasons. After all, presenting images of healthy, accomplished men and celebrating male athletic beauty could have a positive effect on general attitudes toward fitness and health in an increasingly obese culture obsessed with quick-fix plastic surgery and diet pills.

As Broeksma put it, “It makes men more aware of themselves, [and they] may live healthier as a result. … It brings more contrast in the male being that was till recently considered predominantly to be someone providing the family income, wearing a dull suit and a tie. It brings the message that not only women may look good.”

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