America's Football Research Paper

Football: America's Favorite Sport

"INTERCEPTION!" shouts the announcer. The game is 20-14. Your team who is losing, just intercepted the ball at your 10 yard line. There is one minute left in the fourth quarter and each team has only one time out. You are the quarter back and now have to take the ball down-field to win the game. What's your call? Imagine being in that scenario. One minute to make a touchdown so you can go into overtime. You are on the other end of the field and if you make a touchdown to early then you have to make sure that your defense can stop their offense from scoring and ending the game. That is exciting! This game is not only great to play but it is also a great game to watch. In fact, this is America's
favorite sport. According to James Buckley Jr. more than 100 million people watch football on Sunday. More than 10 million people watch college football. The Super Bowl is even more watched. Sometimes 130 Million Americans watch it and 500 million from around the world. (41) Football attracts people with the different elements of the game. Football is a physical, intellectual, and unique game. Football had many great coaches and players to grace the field and because of them there were great games. Football is a very popular sport.
There is something about football that makes people love it. People might think some teams are sure to win against another team but you never know: sometimes the underdogs win. John Madden says that people ask him two questions. Where is his bus and who is going to win the super bowl. He answers by saying that he always knows where his bus is parked but he never know who is going to win the super bowl. Things change, players get better or worse, people get hurt, so you just have to battle it out on the field. That is why football is such a great game. Whoever wants it more usually
wins. Football is a game like no other. As Joe Paterno says "Football is a great game. It demands a young man's total commitment--emotionally, mentally, and physically." (qtd. in Hyman & White viv). Football is better than baseball, basketball, or hockey. Sam Deluca says " It is a fact that baseball, with its slow deliberate pace, is pretty much predictable as far as strategy goes. Hockey and basketball, with their continuos action, don't lend themselves to be detailed, advanced planning, relying often on spontaneous variation of a few standard plays."(vi) He goes on to say that it's these to factors that make football great. It has pauses for strategy and the intellectual part of the game and then it has the hard hitting action. If you are an athlete in the game of football then you have to be physically fit. Even the blockers have to be fit. They can be big but they have to be able to move around. Not only is football about being physically fit but being aware of your surroundings. When your running you have to run fast but still be aware of where you are because you will need to stray from defenders when they try to take you down. Not only do you have to be aware of your opponents but also of your teammates so you do not clash and cause a injury for two players of your team. That takes hard work. Even though football has all these aspects where you have to work hard, take time to think and analyze plays, and get hurt; it is still a fun sport. Some coaches believe in taking all the fun out of the sport. They feel as if they want to keep their jobs they have to produce results. That is correct but the way some go about providing results is a wrong way. They feel as if they have to work the players endlessly but do not give them time to have fun. Other coaches take other approaches to the strategy game of football. Joe Paterno was a coach who motivated his players.
He inspired them. That is the strategy he used ( White 32). Joe Paterno talks about football as being a fun game (21). Joe Paterno was a outstanding coach in his time but there were also great players to grace the football field. Jim Thorpe or also known as Wa-Tho-Huck to his family was football's first superstar. Jim Thorpe was a secret weapon on the Carlisle team. Jim Thorpe was great in track and field and baseball so he was pretty athletic. In those days they players played both offense and defense and so did Thorpe. Jim Thorpe played on the Carlisle one day against the powerful Harvard team. Harvard thought they could beat this team easily but because of Jim Thorpe, Carlisle secret weapon, Harvard was wrong (Buckley 6). Football is a great game which involves many different aspects. The two aspects of football that were mentioned already are the intellectual and physical aspects. We also mentioned great players and great coaches but some teams even went to bring a spiritual aspect into the game. They bring in preachers as motivational speakers saying that God is the great coach and that he will win the game for them (Admur 16-18). I don't think that God gets in the game to the extent that he determines who wins. I think that God watches over them so that they don't always get seriously
hurt. As recently stated, football is a great game. All these aspects make football a great game. So many great qualities of football are coming into play. Football is like a game of chess. It takes a lot of strategy and wit. You have to try to outsmart your defender. If they think your going to run then pass, and if they think your going to pass then run. If you see the defense committing tight to the run then you should go with a play action pass, which is faking the run to force the defense to commit then pass the bass. To be able to notice all these things it takes commitment, time, and knowledge. To see all these factors come into play makes the game that more exciting. "Football doesn't make men, men make football. - Don Russell, Wesleyan University (qtd. in Admur 39) Now that all of that was mentioned I will mention a great game. This game was known by many as "The Immaculate Reception". From 1933 to 1971, the Steelers were one of the worst teams in the NFL. The steelers were in the play-offs and were playing the raiders. They were a bunch of young players on the team. The defense Steelers defense were stopping the raiders from scoring. The steelers scored two field goals. Then the backup quaterback from the raiders scored for Oakland and made the game 7-6 in the raiders favor. Then a miracle happened with only twenty two seconds left in the game. Bradshaw dropped back to pass from his 40 yard line. He was aiming for Frenchy Fuqua, his running back, but his running back and the corner back met at the same instant. The football bounced of someone's helmet and went back to the scrimmage line and Harris saw it caught it and ran it back for a touchdown. The referee decided what the call would be and then decided it was legal and a touchdown. The steelers had one the game. This is one of the many great games of football. Football has great player, great coaches, and great games. It also has is very strategical and physical. All these aspects put into one game, and that's why football is America's Favorite Sport!