Tag: nfl

AN ENGLISHMAN ABROAD SEEKS NFL ALLEGIANCE

Two years into the journey it’s time I selected an American football team to support.  But it’s really very difficult without the personal or cultural signposts that lead to lifelong fandom.  Neither do I have the guidance of a father for who the Munich Air Disaster meant that it was Manchester United or nothing.

For the first time I find myself trying to answer the question I put whenever I see an American soccer fan in a bar wearing a Leeds shirt.  Why?  I usually don’t ask them that question until I’ve run through the plot of the Damned United and excoriated Don Revie for forsaking the England manager’s job to take the Saudi shekels. Then I explain that Billy Bremner and Johnny Giles may have looked like the Krankies but were actually spawn of the devil.

Unless you were a Loiner it was impossible to be brought up in the 1970s and support Leeds United.  The old Elland Road ground was reminiscent of the Coliseum with every visitor an object of venom and bile – and that was just on the pitch.  Fans vied with those of Millwall for exclusive rights to embody the chant of ‘nobody likes us and we don’t care’.

In my search for advice I have found that passions and partisan feelings run deep with close friends suggesting that the Dallas Cowboys and the New England Patriots are irredeemable.  Their respective crimes of declaring themselves ‘America’s team’ and being serial cheats/winners (depending on your view) mitigate against them.  And there is an assertion that the Ravens are wholly unacceptable because of ‘crimes against the Steelers’.   

A long chat with a friend’s son gave me a quick rundown of other no-go areas and counts as my Gen Z research.  Washington Redskins are pariahs for not dealing with the offensive symbology of their name and logo. The newer franchises don’t have enough history, so the Houston Texans are gone.  For similar reasons I discarded the Jacksonville Jaguars and the Carolina Panthers – although to be fair their franchises date back to 1995.

For someone born in the UK and used to clubs with very long traditions and a real dislike of the way Wimbledon were shunted up the M1 to become the MK Dons it’s also difficult to be serious about clubs which have changed city and name.  The Indianapolis Colts were once in Baltimore, the Tennessee Titans were previously the Houston Oilers, the LA Chargers used to be in San Diego, the Oakland Raiders were in LA for 12 years then came back, and the LA Rams spent 20 years as the St Louis Rams.  It’s bewildering.

It’s a luxury and selfish but I was too scarred by Manchester United’s year in the old Second Division to adopt a team that is not very good. So I have rejected the Cleveland Browns, Tampa Bay Buccaneers and New York Jets for serial underperformance.  The Arizona Cardinals and Cincinnati Bengals failed at that hurdle as have the Detroit Lions who haven’t ever been to a SuperBowl.

To narrow the field I eventually decided most teams in the south of the country were out – partly because I’ve only ever supported a team in the north of the country.  But also, I think that a team should play most of its home games with the possibility of snow, ice and freezing temperatures.  It’s the way professional sports with a ball should test a home team and after watching Game of Thrones I’m always reminded that ‘winter is coming’ is a good way to think of life.

Continuing on that basis I can’t really love any team that plays in a dome which is a shame because the Minnesota Vikings could have secured my allegiance.  There is something inherently wrong about professional sportspeople being shielded from the elements and fans being deprived of the wonders of sitting for three hours in pouring rain to demonstrate their allegiance.  I may be alone in my thinking, but it would be so much better if basketball was played outside, on a bumpy pitch, in the rain with the possibility of a strong gust of wind making a three-point effort look ridiculous.

Assem Allam’s attempt to rename Hull City AFC as Hull Tigers is a reminder that it’s OK to have an animal nickname – bonus point to anyone who can remember which UK team is the ‘throstles’ – but City, United and Rovers are sufficient for most purposes.  So I had to dispense with the Bears (Chicago), Buffalo (Bills), and the Eagles (Philadelphia). Anthropomorphism is cute but not acceptable in my pursuit of a logical answer.

For those who have followed this far it may be obvious that I have come down to the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers as the contenders. Uniquely, the Packers are the only non-profit and ‘owned’ by their fans team in the NFL and will remain so after the 1960 Constitution of the League came into force.   The ownership of the Steelers has remained within the Rooney family since the organization’s founding.  The Packers are the third oldest NFL franchise and the Steelers are the oldest franchise in the AFC. 

Both are sufficiently embedded in tradition and location to be secure for the long term.  While they each have a history of success they are currently trying to find their way back to former glories.  It’s a tough choice but I have time.    

Image by Keith Johnston from Pixabay 

AN ENGLISHMAN ABROAD WANTS TO CHANGE THE RULES

Challenging the norms of another country’s national sports is always asking for trouble.  But the weekend’s Patriots versus Chiefs championship game ended on such a note of anti-climax that it cannot go unremarked.  The way in which tied matches are decided in over-time does no justice to the talent in the game.

The stakes were heightened by the star quarterbacks on each side.  Legendary, multiple Super Bowl ring winner Tom Brady against young gun, superstar Patrick Mahomes.  The sherrif was in town and the kid was itching for a fight.

It was an attritional game with flashes of brilliance on all sides which is everything you could hope for.  The two slugged it out toe to toe for four quarters and with just ten seconds left in the game the Chiefs tied the scores.  High drama to be followed by total disatisfaction that left a new observer of the game cold.

The method of settling the game is that each side gets a possession and the chance to score unless a touchdown is scored by the team with first possession.  If the scores are equal after a possession each it becomes ‘sudden death’ with the next score winning the game.  And the first possession is determined by the toss of a coin. 

The Patriots won the coin toss and marched down the field to score a touchdown.  There was no opportunity for the Chiefs or their quarterback to respond with their own touchdown.  And that is where the problem lies.

Imagine a world heavyweight boxing match where the scores are tied at the end of the allotted twelve rounds.  To decide the fight a coin is tossed and the loser is not allowed to throw a punch for the next three rounds.  If he is knocked down he loses.

Or a tied game in a World Cup Final between Portugal and Argentina.  On the flip of a piece of metal, it is decided that Messi can’t play in the first half of extra-time and if Portugal score the game is over.  As Ronaldo wheels to celebrate his success the sight of the world’s other greatest player on the sidelines would be heartbreaking.

Defence may win championships but most fans clamour for the thrill of creative players doing amazing things.  They want the joy of enterprise and the jubilation of scoring.  To have a system where one side can be deprived of that makes little sense.

It’s even worse in a game which is a series of set-pieces and where first-mover advantage is in favour of the team in possession.  Alex Lalas noted that a free-kick in soccer is ‘probably the closest thing we have to American football’.  An increasing number of goals in soccer are coming from set-plays as coaches understand the advantage it gives them in a game which is otherwise almost entirely random.   

This advantage in American Football is borne out by the statistics.  According to Football Outsiders statistics Drive Success Rate (DSR), which measures the percentage of down series that result in a first down or touchdown, no team is successful less than 60% of the time.   In 2018 the Patriots had a season DSR of 73.9% and the Chiefs a DSR of 80%.

In short, you would expect the Patriots to complete a first down most of the time they are in possession.   And some excellent statistical work by Brian Burke indicates that, wherever on the field a drive starts it is more likely to end in a touchdown than a field goal.  None of this takes away from the quality of the Patriots’ execution in a pressure situation but it shows how the balance of probability adds up.

But the point is that the Chiefs did not get a chance to respond which short-changed the paying public.  I am told that before a rule change it was even worse, with only a field goal being needed to win in overtime. It’s a version of the dreaded ‘golden goal’ tried in soccer until being dropped in 2004 – I like to think because rule-makers realised it was dumb.

In every sport I can think of, where a definitive result is necessary, the teams battle it out on a blow for blow basis until the end.  Baseball can go on for hours and hours and innings after innings.  Football has resorted to penalty shoot-outs which at least equalises the pressures and skill levels of the teams.

And that is probably where American Football should go.  Maybe they give each side two ‘mini-quarters’ of, say, three minutes, with no time-outs, to score.  Once they score, a field goal or touchdown, or lose possession they hand the ball over to the opposition.  If the scores are level at the end of that, the game goes to field goal kicking of increasing lengths until one misses while the other scores.

Or they could simply move to the NCAA college rules where each team is, in succession and with no time limit, given the ball on the 25 yard line. After the first team completes its drive with a score or turnover, the opposing team has the same opportunity. If the teams are still tied after the second team’s possession, they must play another period until a winner emerges.

Neither is perfect but both mean that each side has an equal chance to win.  The game is eventually settled on a test of skill rather than fortune.  And the tension would be unbearable to the very end.  Perfect.