Arguing a Position
English 111
March 2, 2012
Offense Wins “Offense sells tickets, defense wins championships.” “The best offense is a great defense.” Many have heard these popular phrases in the sports world. It’s a popular theory that spreads throughout almost all sports and is constantly embedded into the players’ minds. Could these phrases be wrong? What if it’s actually the other way around? I believe so; I think that great offenses are the best philosophy in any sport. From the time athletes can begin to be held accountable for their actions in sports their coaches stress to them the importance of defense. Coaches spend more time in their practice focused on how to stop other teams from scoring and less on how to improve their own scoring output. In their mind of reasoning even if you have a bad offensive game, with good defense, a win is never out of hand. Who’s to say that it doesn’t work out the other way in the offense’s favor? Realistically, at the end of every game, people look at the score board and see one thing to determine the winner, the final score. Points are the only thing that affects the final score, the number of defensive stops your team has does not add to your score. The numbers of turnovers steals do not add to a team’s score nor directly subtract from an opposing team’s score. In the end, the only way to ensure a win is to place more points on the score board that the opposing team, whether it is 101-100 or 1-0 Teams have been successful using the defense first strategy in the old days but in recent years, high powered offenses are beginning to win championships in all levels from high school to college up the National Football League. Prime examples of this are the Super Bowl champions from years 2001, 2006, 2007, 2009. In 2001, the New England Patriots won the Super Bowl with their overall team defense being ranked 24th out of 32 teams. The Indianapolis Colts pulled off a similar feat five years later winning the Super Bowl with a defense
March 2, 2012
Offense Wins “Offense sells tickets, defense wins championships.” “The best offense is a great defense.” Many have heard these popular phrases in the sports world. It’s a popular theory that spreads throughout almost all sports and is constantly embedded into the players’ minds. Could these phrases be wrong? What if it’s actually the other way around? I believe so; I think that great offenses are the best philosophy in any sport. From the time athletes can begin to be held accountable for their actions in sports their coaches stress to them the importance of defense. Coaches spend more time in their practice focused on how to stop other teams from scoring and less on how to improve their own scoring output. In their mind of reasoning even if you have a bad offensive game, with good defense, a win is never out of hand. Who’s to say that it doesn’t work out the other way in the offense’s favor? Realistically, at the end of every game, people look at the score board and see one thing to determine the winner, the final score. Points are the only thing that affects the final score, the number of defensive stops your team has does not add to your score. The numbers of turnovers steals do not add to a team’s score nor directly subtract from an opposing team’s score. In the end, the only way to ensure a win is to place more points on the score board that the opposing team, whether it is 101-100 or 1-0 Teams have been successful using the defense first strategy in the old days but in recent years, high powered offenses are beginning to win championships in all levels from high school to college up the National Football League. Prime examples of this are the Super Bowl champions from years 2001, 2006, 2007, 2009. In 2001, the New England Patriots won the Super Bowl with their overall team defense being ranked 24th out of 32 teams. The Indianapolis Colts pulled off a similar feat five years later winning the Super Bowl with a defense