Howdy! Seeing as I couldnt see an "Other Sports" Sub Forum, I figured here was the best place for such a topic! I've recently decided to give watching American Football a go! For various reasons I decided while eating my Christmas Dinner no less, and by the end of the meal I had picked a team (Minnesota Vikings) and arranged watching my first game. I've never really been into team sports, never really played them nor watched them. I think I can count one one hand the number of times I've watched Football or Rugby games in my life. So its safe to say it was quite a new experience for me :3 A new experience that I did enjoy, its a bit of a shame I only picked it up so late into the regular season though. But does give me a bit of time to figure out whats going on when I watch it before the start of next season (depending how well the Vikings get on in the Playoffs...) Any other MAPpers follow it?
You picked a good game to watch, the Vikings haven't had a great season. They're my favorite team, I grew up watching them, but they aren't the best and will probably lose early in the playoffs - but you never know, maybe they'll surprise us! The Vikings have arguably the best running back in the game (Adrian Peterson) and a new quarterback (Christian Ponder) who has really been running very hot, or very cold, all season. If he's having an on day this weekend the Vikings could beat the Packers.
Yeah it was unlucky AP missed out on the record by only 9 yards =\ I was reading some stats earlier which suggest the vikings generally beat the Packers lol, but this season it's 1-1 and could go either way
I used to enjoy watching American Football when Channel 4 showed it back in the early eighties. Nowadays though it only seems to be on really late at night, if at all (unless it's on something like Sky TV which I don't have.) Last time I saw some, half the teams seemed to be ones I'd never heard of before! The franchise system is totally alien for British sports fans - unless you support the MK Dons, of course. I remember the Colts moving from Baltimore to Indianapolis and doing it in the middle of the night, so that their fans wouldn't realise until it was too late. So if if you want to pick an NFL team to support, it might be best to pick someone like the Green Bay Packers who aren't going to bugger off somewhere else at a moments notice.
Yeah, both the NY teams play in NJ (sharing the same stadium...) was recently invited to a live game there which is a little harder to follow as you don't have all the fancy animations on screen to help with the plays. Disappointing example unfortunately as it ended in 7-6 and the home team refused to try to score a touchdown from the 4 yard line with 1 min to go in the event that they failed to kick the conversion and the other team managed to score and convert before zero... pretty lame but strategic. They have some weird rules that are hard to grasp - EG you can dispute a Refs call but if they are proven correct by the video replay you lose a timeout. The best part of the game is the tailgaiting - the entire parking lot (which is Massive) is full of people with full on BBQ, beers, flatscreen TVs etc, though my seats probably had the edge on that with catered food and drink (at 15K they should have been though!) but I reckon the food from the trucks outside was way better.
The Vikings seem to be quite a set team, been around since the 60's or something, should be safe enough, if there are still tickets in the right price range when I get paid I'm hoping to go see the Vikings vs Steelers game at wembley =D
football is a great sport. the playoffs are definitely the time to watch, the best teams have survived and now play each other. so don't worry that you're just now starting to watch. watching live is also amazing so definitely go to see if you can. are all playoff games available to watch at your location? you can also buy video access on nfl.com if the hours time difference doesn't work for you. quick note on watching.... watch what happens at the point of contact between the offensive and defensive lines. a good analogy is the 'scrum' in rugby. whichever side wins that battle consistently is the side that's going to eventually win the war. sure the quarterback, running back, linebackers, corner backs and wide receivers get all the glory. but the real battle is between the goliaths in the trenches. cheers.
I watched Sunday's Vikings Packers game live, The upcoming Playoff game is going to be a problem, as I can only watch it at my mates as I've not got Sky Sports at home and the guys who I watched it with last week are DJing at the local on Saturday, so the plan is to avoid hearing about it and they shall record it and we'll watch it on sunday afternoon. I'll try and pay more attention to the 'Scrum' although at the moment I'm only just following what is going on and trying to understand the rules lol
some basic rules then... think of american football as a kind of mashup between rugby league and union and some of our own rules for good measure, like the forward pass. lol when the ball crosses the plane of the endzone, your team gets 6 points (and 1 point for the kick afterward). if your team kicks the ball through the uprights, you get 3 points. there is a two-point play called a safety and that's when a defense tackles a ball carrier inside their own endzone. as an offense, you can keep possession of the ball if you go 10 yards in 4 plays. as long as you make those 10 yards (and the defense doesn't take it away), you can keep the ball until you can either kick through the uprights or put the ball in the endzone. many teams on their 4th play, or 4th "down", kick the ball away (or "punt") to the other team to allow their defense room to operate and try to get the ball back. offenses can run with the ball, or pass the ball forward. blocking for offensive ball-holders is allowed, unlike rugby. defenses attempt to keep teams from going 10 yards in 4 plays, or force a turnover to get the ball back quickly. that could entail intercepting a forward pass or causing a ball carrier to drop the ball (a "fumble").
Hehe cheers for that ^_^ between you and what the guys were explaining during Sunday's game I've got a vague understanding, I'm sure after watching a few more games I'll get the hang of it and then be able to start watching what else is going on in the game, rather than just trying to keep my eye on the ball as it were.
I like the idea of American Football but when ever I try to watch it its hard for my European brain to take the constant stopping and starting when im so accustomed too the fluidity of Rugby and Football (Soccer).
This is pretty much what I use to do as well. I use to watch it regularly when it was on Channel 4, back when Elway was quarterbacking Denver.
The first game I remember was the Superbowl when the Redskins beat the Dolphins (so John Elway was on the losing side that day.) John Riggins rushed for about 50,000 yards from fullback and just destroyed Miami in the end - although if I remember rightly the Dolphins were leading at half time. That must have been either 1983 or 1984. Are you sure it wasn't your parents who told you about John Elway, Frodo? Edit: just realised that I had a bit of a 'senior moment' when I posted that! It was Dan Marino who was QB for the Dolphins back then. John Elway was probably still at college!
Free pass for you for the next few days! Redskins v Broncos was 1987 and I started watching whilst I was in senior school around 86/87. I still have my Number 7 Broncos shirt!
Okay! This thread has dislodged a random piece of information from amongst the sawdust between my ears which I could never quite believe, but since there seems to be some educated peeps on here I'll ask the question. Apparently (and I'm lead to believe this is fact) the average career of a pro footballer only lasts 4 years, due to the amount of injuries sustained and the fact that they play through them (quarterzone injections etc) rather than taking time out to heal?
I live in Wisconsin, which means I am a Green Bay Packers fan, although I retain a soft spot for the Cincinnati Bengals, who were my hometown team growing up (they were eliminated on Saturday :cry. IMHO, football is the world's best television sport. I'd rather go to a baseball or basketball game in person, but football works wonderfully on TV. The average pro football career is about four years, yes. Football is a rough sport, rougher even than rugby in many ways. But that's not the only reason careers are often so short. Just like in other sports, most players simply aren't good enough to make long-term careers for themselves at the highest level. That number is skewed heavily by loads of players who spend a year or two warming the bench and never even get in the game, let alone get injured.
