From TheBestLinks.com
Miscellaneous
What is meant by "historically known as Gridiron Football"? The only place I know of where it's called that is in Australia and New Zealand.
"American football does not much resemble soccer,
the sport which most of the rest of the world,
with the notable exception of many of the
nations in the British Commonwealth, calls "football"."
This is saying that Commentwealth nations do not call soccer football.
Is this correct?
Surely the commenwealth *does* call soccer football.
Robin.
Most popular sport? I presume you mean "spectator sport", but in terms of attendances? TV ratings?
Oh, and I understand there's no amateur football competitions for adults outside of colleges. Is that so? --Robert Merkel
This would require actual research :-), but "most popular" in terms of polls of sports fans as to which sport is their favorite (usually phrased as "spectator sport"; I think golf typically registers as the most popular participant sport).
As for amateur adult football, usually this takes the form of touch or flag football. (That might be worth writing about.) -- RjLesch
This is the most "outsider" article I've ever read on football. It sounds like it was written by a Belgian who had attended several British lectures on the history and development of the game, but had never actually seen it played. The words "violence", "collision", "intimidation", and "war" appear nowhere in the article. "Block" and "tackle" each appear precisely once, nowhere near the dainty discussion of the "scrimmage".
I'm the most casual of football fans, but I sure hope some other hands put some meat on these bones.
- A quite accurate comment. Intro paragraph should seem more suitable now. Tempshill 22:36, 17 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Just because it isn't organized like Unamerican Football is no reason for this most peculiar non-sequitur:
- American football is not a participant sport - there are no organised amateur club competitions.
It is certainly a participant sport. Children start playing organized football at age 13. I played junior-high football, and if you saw my flimsy weak body in my ridiculous uniform, amateur is exactly the word that would have sprung to your lips, assuming you weren't politely stifling a laugh. There are millions of children and adults playing football. There are more than 350,000 high-schoolers playing football in Texas alone.
Besides, there is an intramural club football league at MIT and I believe other colleges and universities, not to mention so-called semi-pro leagues where players get a uniform, three beers, and $10 for bashing each other for four quarters. There are even women's amateur and semi-pro teams.
There are quite a few markup problems in the article as well, and no x-ref to Canadian football, where that same "number 3 rugby ball" will also be found.
Ortolan88 19:40 Jul 28, 2002 (PDT)
Is football really the most popular spectator sport? What about horseracing and NASCAR? -- Zoe
- That's a good question. Maybe it depends on how you define it. My guess is that, in terms of the number of people who are actively interested in the games, football is the most popular, but I have no data to back that up, so perhaps I am wrong. I don't think total attendance is a fair comparison, since attendance at a sporting event isn't necessarily reflective of how many people are interested in the sport (by watching games on TV, reading sports articles about it, etc.) Horse racing might have higher total attendance then football (I don't know if it does or not), but it is an all-year sport and the same (small, I think) number of people go to the track. As for NASCAR, its popularity (I think) tends to be focused in the South. Again, I think more people follow football actively than NASCAR. But I have no data to back myself up on that assertion. soulpatch
What about the history of American fotball? Is it derived from Rugby? --zeno 06:37 Jan 20, 2003 (UTC)
- Yes, for the most part. What I can tell you is all off the top of my head, so take this with a grain of salt, because I might have some deatils wrong. But from what I know, it was originally a college sport, derived mostly from rugby, with a long series of rules changes that took place in the late 1800s and early 1900s. A few terms that are used in modern American football have their origin in rugby, such as "scrimmage" that comes from the rugby "scrum", and the "touchdown" comes from the rugby score where you actually had to touch the ball down. The number of points you get for a touchdown, and the score for the kick after the touchdown, were also tinkered with a lot back then. At some point the concept of limited length of possession with downs was introduced (I'm not sure when), and the forward pass was added to the sport in the early 1900s after President Theodore Roosevelt threatened to ban the game because so many serious injuries were happening. There are a few obscure rules that are (or at least to be) left over from rugby. I don't know if this particular rule still exists, but I recall that 30 years ago or so the NFL had a rule where you could get a free kick for a field goal after a fair catch, and I think that was some sort of a holdover from rugby even though it was almost never used in modern American football. User:soulpatch
Within the context of the American football article, it would perhaps sound nicer to call it "football" rather than the lengthy phrase "American football" every time. (Note, this suggestion only applies if Mintguy and other fans of REAL FOOTBALL -- or what I grew up calling soccer -- agree that no ambiguity or confusion would result.) --Uncle Ed 15:35 Feb 21, 2003 (UTC)
- Oh, wow! No offense, but I'm sorry I read this page. I agree with whoever said (above) that this is the most "outsider" article they've ever read. It seems to have been written by a fan of another form of football. There's no way this article does football justice.
- This article needs help! But I guess if I'm not willing to work on this article, I shouldn't be complaining.
- Unfortunately I too am primarily a fan of the game "Americans blithly call soccer", so I'm not sure I want to spend the time it would take to salvage a little dignity out of this article, but somebody who is a football fan needs to do it. I mean, come on! "blithly"? About a word that came from England and is used in the US out of necessity. Gimme a break!
- I was raised on both forms of football (round ball and pointy ball) and they are BOTH great games. Too bad whoever wrote this article obviously doesn't think so.
- I agree with Uncle Ed. In the context of this article, the word "football" means American football, so there's no need to put "American" in front of it every time. It's all about context. The title of the article says it all. I'm sure fans of REAL FOOTBALL wouldn't take kindly to someone putting "Association" in front of every occurance of the word "football" in articles about "the beautiful game".
- Flag and touch football essentially the same (except for the flags, of course <g>). And then there's Arena football, which is now national network TV.
- And, hey, let's not forget the cheerleaders. <g> Bluelion 08:16 Feb 22, 2003 (UTC)
This article claims football is the most popular spectator sport in the US. I believe this is incorrect, and that the most popular spectator sport is auto racing. Is there a source for this statement? DanKeshet
- Though I've heard the same claim (re racing) I've also heard high school football is the tops, which makes some amount of sense to me. Graft
Auto racing?? NASCAR is regionally popular, but I don't think it compares to even baseball nationally. Any proof that it does??? What other auto racing is there? NHRA? Indy 500? Does that attract over 40% of TV housholds? I seriously doubt it. The Super Bowl does. Added together, I doubt auto racing has reached the popularity of baseball or football. Bluelion 21:56 Mar 6, 2003 (UTC)
Add high school, college and pro football together, I doubt auto racing is even close. I don't doubt that auto racing claims that it's tops. It's hype. Bluelion
Here's an article that's addmittedly over a year old, in which NASCAR claims to be No. 2 behind, guess what, the NFL.
NASCAR: We're No. 2! By Chris Jenkins, USA TODAY (http://www.usatoday.com/sports/motor/_stories/2002-01-16-usat-notes.htm)
Of course, sports executives are supposed to make wild claims. It doesn't mean I believe it.
Apparently, David Carter, a sports marketer, wasn't entirely convinced by the numbers in a poll NASCAR conducted. Quoted in the article- I think there's a little bit of grandstanding in those numbers, because they positioned the poll,... A recent ESPN Sports Poll measuring various sports' fan bases ranked NASCAR seventh, behind the NFL, Major League Baseball, college football, the NBA, figure skating and college basketball.
NASCAR's TV ratings are, according to NASCAR, equal to NFL regular season TV ratings. Both NFL postseason games, and college bowl games get better ratings, and the Super Bowl gets much better ratings.
In comparing football to auto racing, some wild claims have been made by auto racing marketers. Plain and simple: it's advertising hype.
And anyway, are NHRA drag racing, for example, and NASCAR even the same sport? That's about like saying that American football and Association football (soccer) are the same sport.
NASCAR is the fastest-growing spectator sport in the US. There's no real question about that, and their attendance numbers are impressive. NFL and college football aren't growing, but their numbers are impressive, too.
Football is the most popular spectator sport in the US, a claim confirmed by every unbiased article I have read. Bluelion 13:03 Mar 7, 2003 (UTC)
Football = most popular sport
2002 NCAA football attendance (http://www1.ncaa.org/eprise/main/Public/pa/stats/football/attendance/summary)
SEC, Big 10 and Big 12 football outdraw NASCAR. The attendance total for Div. I-A football 34,384,264 is about equal to even the wildest claims for all forms of auto racing combined. That's not even counting NFL attendance. And some people seriously question some of the the auto racing numbers. NASCAR, easily the most popular form of auto racing, doesn't publish official attendance figures. Goodyear, which had been tabulating racing attendance figures, no longer does. The last report by Goodyear was for the 1998 season (http://www.racegoodyear.com/98attend.html#attendance), and showed a total of just over 17 million for all forms of auto racing. CART/ Indy cars appears in serious trouble or, as one pundit put it, in free fall, and NASCAR just a lost a major sponsor, RJ Reynolds tobacco (Winston).
As noted before, NFL postseason games and college bowl games get better ratings than auto racing.
The 2002 Div.I-A football attendance figures were a record high, BTW. Bluelion 14:17 Mar 11, 2003 (UTC)
Needs a "Strategy and Tactics" section.
The beginning reads like an ad. "Every ounce of their strength"? No such measurement is possible to my understanding.
Super Bowl audience
"Its championship game, the Super Bowl, is annually watched by nearly half of US television households, and is also televised in other countries. "
The Super Bowl is generally claimed to be the most-watched show on television, worldwide. Can anyone substantiate this easily? Otherwise, I'll try to look it up myself.
This article is still treating football unfairly in some places, and saying that the Super Bowl "is also televised in other countries" when in fact it has a worldwide audience of something like half a billion (I can't remember exactly) is, I think, one of them.
- Rereading the paragraph is question, I've changed my mind and I see no need to go into specific audience figures after all. A simple change makes the sentence less dismissive. 150 countries is a conservative estimate, which saves qualifying it with nit-picking about exactly how many countries in each year. That kind of detailed information could potentially be added to Super Bowl.
Deaths in football
I'll provide a reference for the assertion about the number of deaths. i have a 10-year-old reference but hope to find a more recent one. Trontonian 20:36, 25 Sep 2003 (UTC)
The intro paragraph as it stands is very POV and anti-Football. InanimateCarbonRod 00:05, 30 Sep 2003 (UTC)
- Ok, having read the piece and now these comments, I'm forced to ask: what are you people smoking, and can *I* have some? I can't quite figure out what you mean by "anti-football"; I certainly didn't acquire any such impression from reading the piece myself. I'm itching to fix two minor thinkos and add a graf about how those medically retired players who won't trash the game certainly got paid well (by the hour) for their work... but anti-football? I thought it was a very clear short intro to the game; appropriate for something like an encyclopedia. Baylink 10:46, 15 Dec 2003 (us:EST)
Injuries in football
This section is broken. It says that there are 8 deaths and 160 concussions a year due to football injuries. Now, I can believe that there are 160 concussions a year in the NFL (that's about 1 per 10 players), and the next sentence suggests that this might be the meaning intended. But no way are there 8 deaths a year in the NFL (that's 1 per 4 teams!) due to playing injuries, but this paragraph taken as a whole doesn't make it clear whether or not that is what is being said.
If those who put the figures in are still around, could they clarify the issue? Onebyone 13:25, 20 Oct 2003 (UTC)
- I think they refer to all football in America but then they are to low. I found 2002 5 died directly in the game and 10 died of exercise-aggravated disease in youth through pro leagues.[1] (http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2003-08/uonc-ffp080703.php) 23 died in 2001. Rmhermen 14:21, Oct 20, 2003 (UTC)
- The article says, "injuries suffered in the game", though, which would exclude exercise-aggravated disease. Perhaps it would be better to include those and say something like "died due to injury or illness caused by playing football". Onebyone 16:10, 20 Oct 2003 (UTC)
I've reverted three items introduced by 166.145.74.231, because they don't fit into their context and therefore interrupt the flow and reduce the clarity of the article.
The three reverts are:
- (American comedian George Carlin has a classic, and very popular routine about this, called "Baseball and Football".)
Not helpful in a paragraph whose purpose is to give the basics of what American football is. Perhaps it could be added to George Carlin?
- New technology from a company called Princeton Video Image provides a visual indication of the line to gain on the field in network television broadcasts; the company is also responsible for virtual advertisements and the 360 degree "Matrix"-like instant replay called EyeVision used in the broadcast of SuperBowl XXXV.
Not relevant to a discussion of the basics (offensive and defensive teams, how many downs). It's interesting and belongs somewhere, perhaps television?
- The game is rotated amongst the stadia of the various teams, with sites chosen years in advance; to date, no contender has ever played in a Super Bowl in their home stadium.
I think this belongs in the Super Bowl article. The point of the paragraph from which I removed it is show that football is very popular (look at the first sentence). The interesting fact about home teams won't help.
- Opus33 22:50, 15 Dec 2003 (UTC)
1) I wouldn't call the intro anti-football, but it is very POV. 'Enemy'? How about opponent. Brute strength? Many sports qualify--can anyone say shot put, or wrestling, or, jeez, too many to list. War? Less biased writers would say any team sport qualifies--one group pits its most able-bodied members against another group's, in pursuit of a victory. Personal violence? How about boxing. The 'Injuries' section is also a bit POV--injury reports are also common in baseball and basketball articles. What is the source(s) for the deaths and concussions numbers? Also, could have some discussion/comparison of injuries during the pre-helmet years. The 'Football and drugs' section also seems a bit POV--it ignores the fact that high school and college training programs/equipment are much more prevalent and advanced than in the 1960s.
2) How can anyone question football being the most popular (in terms of total viewers/listeners--in the stands, and TV and radio)? Sure, if you just count people in the stands at regular-season professional meets, autoracing, baseball, and basketball may be close, but when you add TV audiences, playoffs, the Superbowl, and amateur levels (high school and college, let alone pick-up street games), it's a runaway. At many colleges, football revenues fund all the other sports combined. Also, part of the reason baseball and basketball are even close is because they play so many games--baseball teams play close to 100 games per year, compared to 20, tops, for football teams. Pro baseball and basketball games generally have attendances around 10-20,000 people, while pro (and even college!) football attendance is often 60-100,000 per game.
3) Other than my recent, small addition, the article ignores semi-pro football.
4) The article also completely ignores Australian-rules football. Sure, the focus of the article is American football, but if you bring up Canadian football, it only seems fair...
5) No amateur organized meets? Besides college, high school, and even jr high school teams/leagues, there is also http://www.popwarner.com/
Missing Penalty?
What ever happened to unnecessary roughness? --Jerzy(t) 03:19, 2004 Mar 12 (UTC)
- Should be a personal foul, which is not listed. --- Decumanus 03:22, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)
- Tnx, that quick answer was worth an edit conflict! --Jerzy(t) 03:26, 2004 Mar 12 (UTC)
Hopefully my first edit to American football succeeds in reflecting that clarification. But better yet, what about describing the union of the three categories the article enumerates more precisely than as "penalties". Are those besides personals called "technical fouls", or is that just basketball? --Jerzy(t) 08:52, 2004 Mar 12 (UTC)
and the league considered by many to be the genesis of modern American professional football,the American Football League (AFL,1960-1969). The NFL merged with the American Football League in 1970, after the AFL began to successfully sign stars from the NFL. After the merger, the NFL adopted innovative features pioneered by the AFL, such as names on player jerseys, official scoreboard clocks (in the NFL, field and scoreboard clocks often did not agree, leading to confusion), and the two-point conversion. Even before the merger, the NFL adopted the AFL's revolutionary concept of network television broadcasts and sharing of gate and television revenues by both the home and visiting teams. Eventually, the NFL adopted virtually every pioneering aspect of the American Football League, except its name.
I removed this section because it is pov and it appears in almost every article on american football. the person who puts this in apperently has some agenda to lionized the AFL.
"Yankball"
The article claims that it's known in some parts of the world as "yankball". Is there any evidence this is the case? Whatever parts of the world that is must not post on the internet, since there are only a handful of hits for the term, some of which are the Wikipedia article. I'm sure many people have slang terms for American football, but is "yankball" a particularly prevalent one or more common than other slang terms? --Delirium 16:37, May 22, 2004 (UTC)
Its what I hear it get called whenever it is mentioned (which is a rarity), I've even heard it coming from a Greek so it seems pretty widespread over Europe at least --Josquius 11:50, 26 Aug 2004 (UTC)
What it's all about
I agree that this article needs quite a bit of work ... one section that really stood out for me was the "What it's all about" section (starting with the very title and content: football's about George Carlin, doctrine, and scandals? huh?)
- The Carlin section either needs to be elaborated or eliminated ... I don't know his routine, but the way it's described now isn't funny or enlightening (baseball and American football are indeed different ... but aren't they supposed to be?)
- I'm not sure what the point of the character building section is. The attributes mentioned are unique to neither America nor American football).
These points are just the beginning, but an article like this can only be healed one section at a time. CES 07:49, 6 Jul 2004 (UTC)
I just want to say, that american football is a great hobby for everyone. I started to play football about 6 months ago, and every time I come home from my practice, I'm happy. I have been always a short and skinny boy, and just about any contact sport I have played I have been always the one who got "beated". Now I'm a WR, and usually the CBs are guys who are as "big" as me. But the only problem here in Finland (where I live), is that there's not enough players. - JayJay
Removed this comment for being silly and irrelevent:
Like most team sports (and individual sports in the context of a meet like the Olympics), American football is often seen as a metaphor for war.
And also, because the paragraph is the unit of composition, and the comment had nothing to do with the rest of the paragraph. - user:TimShell Sep 6 2004
Perfect Season
On german wikipedia there is a discussion about the phrase "perfect season", meaning that a team has a perfect season,
when it wins all games of a season. My question ist: Is this a commonly used phrase in football (or in US sports general), and does it have this definition? Is it a phrase at all? Strangely, I did not find it in en.wikipedia. 128.97.70.87 00:11, 17 Sep 2004 (UTC)
Yes, "perfect season" (or "perfect record") is used for a team that does not lose a game. This almost never happens, though, so the term isn't used much.
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