Why is football so popular?
I just don’t understand it. Baseball is supposed to be our national pastime, but I don’t hear about that weekly. I mean, if baseball passes time, then football destroys it. Just decimates it, tears it apart like Godzilla tears apart the city of Tokyo. Not only is there the sport, but you got fantasy football leagues that you can’t walk through a single neighborhood without tripping over, college, national, and school leagues, and a video game series that has more iterations than the entire Final Fantasy Franchise. I learned about the Super Bowl before I learned about the World Cup, the most viewed Sports tournament in the world! There are even spin-offs of the Super Bowl, such as the Puppy Bowl (Cute as Hell, by the by).
But what’s so interesting about it? It has got to be nearly the slowest sport ever, second only to Golf in games I actually consider sports (So don’t bring up Billiards or any of that crap). They set up in lines, stand there for a couple of seconds, hand someone a ball and run forward, get tackled, and then spend another 5 minutes setting back up. More than half this game has got to be not played, for the love of God! Games like soccer only stop for the kickoff, and the time’s still running then. Every time I’ve watched football, all I could think about was how I wanted the time to start rolling so I could actually watch the Simpsons! And honestly, I don’t see the huge difference from game to game. The plans seem pretty straight forward when they’re not throwing the ball halfway up the field only to be intercepted, fumble it before t hey throw, don’t reach the distance, miss their guy, have their guy miss it, or have their guy fumble it. Simple set: Give the guy the ball, he runs forward, trying to avoid the other team’s players while the rest of them run forward, trying to not avoid the other team’s players.
Now how about playing it? I’m sure it’s fun. I mean, what’s not fun about ramming into everyone trying to knock the m to the hard ground? What’s not fun about running at your top speed, avoiding people trying to do just that to you? What irritates me is that people try to pump this up as a tough man’s game. Sure, you need to be strong and athletic, but that goes for plenty of sports. My beef is that if I were going to go skateboarding, it’s admittedly dangerous, but if I show up in full padding all over my body, I’m going to be called a wuss. Hell, there’s some people that would call me a wuss just for wearing knee and elbow pads and a helmet. But that’s what they do in football. Soccer (Sorry I keep coming back to soccer, it is the sport I know most about, but still don’t obsess over it like most do over football) is a surprisingly dangerous sport and, despite what some may say, is really a contact sport (Parents really don’t like to believe this) and all you wear are shinguards, most of which you could probably snap over your knee. All in all, I’m not going to fault anyone for playing it, but it certainly isn’t any better or more difficult to play than… well, not going to say any game, but I’m sure even golf is just as difficult if not more, even if it doesn’t seem as fun (IMHO).
The fanaticism is last on the chopping block. I saved this one for last because this is where I put distance between me and more groups. This is because I simply don’t understand spectator sports. No, that’s not quite right, I believe I don’t understand being a fan of a team. I mean what’s there to base on? Colors? Mascots? The obvious choice would be whether they’re good, but if that were true everyone would be a fan of the winner of the Super Bowl, all differences would end, and we’d be on out merry, skipping way to world peace, or ending poverty… or something. And even if that weren’t true, I have heard people criticized for only liking a team because they’re doing good often enough to know the winning can’t be right. Hometown’s another obvious choice. But I hear far too many people in Maryland who hate the Ravens to even begin believing that one. Maybe that’s just because our hometown sucks, but I am not entirely sure. So, you pick a team with the color scheme that least resembles a circus clown when combined onto their uniform and the team with the mascot that least resembles Big Bird and then doodle a quick fight scene depicting the two of them with tommy guns, and begin to support the winner. That’s at least how I would do it. It might also explain why Ravens aren’t so widely liked, though I don’t know what the hell kind of circus you’re going to… Now, onto the almost dogmatic following of the team. No talking smack about my team or I smack you. No having my team lose to your team or I smack you. No gloating about your team winning when mine did not or I smack you. There have been fights over the teams. Not to mention fevered debates about who’s going to win this game or the next. How do you even decide that? Again, statistics are the obvious way, they’re 3 and 0 so are likely to beat the team that’s 1 and 2. But when I hear these conversations, they bring up single players. One player does not a team make! Saying that the Ravens will win because of [Insert name here] is like saying football is best because it’s got a ball. Other games have balls, too, and other teams have good players! I also hear about mentions of previous year’s performance. This would make sense to me if my understanding wasn’t that people get older and the team line ups change. It’s as if you say I had bronchitis last year, so I’ll probably still have it this year. Okay, not really, but I couldn’t think of a good example. Nevertheless, it’s silly. The entire team fanaticism and breakdown of everything is silly. I just don’t understand why we can’t enjoy the game without rooting for one team or the other or analyzing it to its barest components.
Now if you’ll excuse me, that tommy gun idea sounds like fun…
KelpMonger Community Member 
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