I just watched American Football

[morreant]

been living in the US for quite a while and handegg just bores me. especially with the frequent timeouts.

[Jackmoves]

Here is a video of some hits from last season. Sorry bout the somewhat vulgar music.

Ouch.

Some of the worst injuries I've seen has been in football, Like Eduardo da Silva, Henrik Larsson, Djibril Cisse and Gregory Coupet, some gut wrenching stuff.

Like this Henrik Larsson injury, not sure how he managed to come back from that.

[Albert the fish]

A hit that's three times as hard sounds about right for American Football. Because there's no padding, hits in Rugby are far more "wrap up" with tackling angles more suited for that rather than full-tilt ramming (because that would probably kill more people than already die already).

see? offensives weapons you can wear!
wearing all that trash really just serves the purpose of allowing them to hit as hard as humanly possible without killing anyone.
rugby took another route, repeated small injury.

both games are about bashing the shit out of people. and a ball.

[Goretex]

I was about to watch a soccer game the other day just cuz I was bored. At the start I didn't know wtf they were doing everyone clapping 2 teams standing idle in the middle of the field and some song everyone was singing. Maybe it was a national anthem or something. So I tried to watch a little more, seen the faceoff then a couple guys kicked the ball to each other this happened like 5x before advancing down the field. Next thing I know I open my eyes it's 2hrs later and sportscenter or espn is running lol. I ended up falling asleep, not bashing soccer but imo I can't stand it.

[Deleted]

I'm from Europe, where soccer, tennis and bicycle races seem to be the Walhalla of sport (wich i hate btw).
And while zapping trough the channels on TV i bumped into the last quarter of an American Footbal game.
Now, i didn't understand a thing of what was going on but i loved it! Some guy pushed a dude who had the ball out of the field O_o european soccer players cry for allot less!

Is there any place where i can read a Tl:dr version of the game's rules?

Oh for the people interested it was Wisconsin VS Michigan and afaik it was college football O_o, there were more people there then on an international game of soccer in europe...
Oh yeah, Wisconsin won... :-p

You are from europe and still you say soccer, fail is fail!

[Natureza]

To be honest, try watching Rugby.

That's where the american football came from, but it's so much better.

Think of it this way:
In rugby you have to be intelligent, think on your feet, make good judgements, be strong and fast. Your overall balance of strength, mental quickness and tactics have to be spot-on.
In AFootball... all you have to be is a semi-intelligent brute who knows who his teammates are and where to run.

I am not hating on the american football, but I used to watch both and frankly - the american clone is boring after 5 games. There's no tactic involved and the only skillful plays you see are max-violent tackles. Pass.

[Goretex]

You should watch rugby instead, like american football without the pads and no pauses every 20 sec

Ehh not exactly true I watched some rugby has hard hits every once in awhile, but lets see if they can pass the football instead. Most the time there in a huddle moving forward 2-3 feet. Most collisions in rugby are from 2-3 feet. Then they kick the ball every 10 sec forward instead of passing. I will say it's most entertaining out of the european sports. But still lacks in big time hits and overall entertainement.

---------- Post added 2011-12-12 at 06:04 AM ----------

I've been really getting into this sport Overral this is a true contact sport and really fun to watch I hope this sport returns from the medieval times and goes big!

[eldaveo]

Wow, that jousting is insane! o_o

It's pretty cool, but I suspect in it's current state it wouldn't fly very well with safety regulators and whatnot. Just look at all the new rules being added to hockey constantly!

[Natureza]

http://www.rugbyworldcup.com/video/index.html
Just watch either the final match of NZL vs France or even better NZL v JPN or TNG. While the two are mis-matched games, they show how interesting Rugby can be.

[Goretex]

http://www.rugbyworldcup.com/video/index.html
Just watch either the final match of NZL vs France or even better NZL v JPN or TNG. While the two are mis-matched games, they show how interesting Rugby can be.

Yea like I said in a post above most entertaining out of the european sports. Idk I just don't like the rules of rugby I guess. Wish they would just have american football without pads lol. Although sometimes that helmet can hurt lol.

---------- Post added 2011-12-12 at 06:42 AM ----------

Wow, that jousting is insane! o_o

It's pretty cool, but I suspect in it's current state it wouldn't fly very well with safety regulators and whatnot. Just look at all the new rules being added to hockey constantly!

Yea probably thats what I hate about us americans too afraid to get punched in the mouth in professional sports. Unless it's like UFC which is entertaining just have to pay a ton to watch it or wait a year for the re run

[Snorkle]

im from Portugal, theres no such channel here im affraid.

Sporttv 3 has the top chosen monday and sunday NFL games, and you can watch several games (both college and NFL) on EPSN America which is on any payed TV subscription. It's the best you can get. Also, the commentators on SportTV are two of the guys responsible for the existence of the sport in Portugal. You might want to watch, they are very thorough in explaining the rules and interactions too.

EDIT: Also, I'm appalled at so many misconceptions in this thread. Being from Europe and a fan of American football living in a country where our football (soccer, if you will) and rugby are much bigger sports, I can tell you a few things wrong with people's opinions on the games.

First, no, American football isn't just rugby with protection and stops. The big difference in the games is the pre-game planning, scouting and tactical depth. American football is all about preset plays and execution, much less about improvisation, while rugby is mostly the opposite. And guess what? There's nothing wrong with either. They can cater to different targets and both have their merits.

Second, the amount of specialization needed for American football greatly outweighs that of almost any other sport (physically speaking, that is). Each position has a different set of requirements, from acceleration, capacity for turning, jumping, reaction time, balance and knowledge of your center of gravity, etc. And in terms of the aforementioned preset plays, the only sport that comes close is basketball. While there are some of those in our European football (read soccer if you're from the US), those are much less common, and improvisation and individual value are what we have here, over the planning, execution and teamplay of American football.

Third, if the contact and violence is what you're interested in, why don't you just go watch boxing, instead of focusing on a small detail of a very rich game? That's like just enjoying rugby for the scrums, or European football (soccer) for the penalties. There's much more to each sport than that.

Fourth, and to answer the OP, learning the rules in-depth isn't really a requirement to enjoy the sport. After you learn the basics of how teams score points, and what determines who has a ball at any given circumstance you should be set to have enough fun with it, and frankly, if any of the corner case scenarios come up, you'll understand as they usually broadcast the referee's explanation of it. Don't worry about learning what a touchback is, or a safety (not the position), or any of that. Get the basics and watch a couple of games

[Radux]

Alright, at this point the thread has hit every potential talking point and plenty others that aren't on topic. So I'm just going to go ahead and bring it to a close.