Thursday, January 13, 2011

Football help

Football really doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. There are a lot of rules, and there's a lot of jargon used to explain those rules. Jargon leaves the layman (or woman) out in the cold. As an example:

Post Route - pass route in which the receiver cuts inside at a 45-degree or smaller angle after a stem of typically eight yards; so-called because the change of direction puts the receiver on a path toward the goal post; common route for the middle of three deep receivers against cover two. 

That probably makes sense to you, right? To me, it sounds like this would sound to you:

Liquor Liability - Bodily injury or property damage liability for which the insured may be held liable due to causing or contributing to the intoxication of a person, furnishing alcoholic beverages to persons under the influence of alcohol or under the legal drinking age or a law relating to the sale, gift, distribution or use of alcoholic beverages is excluded. This exclusion applies only if the insured's business is manufacturing, distributing, selling, serving or furnishing alcoholic beverages. 

Like a lot of legalese. If I'm ever going to understand this game, first I'm going to need help deciphering the terminology. I have found some helpful resources to get me started; I may eventually just assemble my own, football-to-sue dictionary. 

About Football 101 is a pretty comprehensive site. It even includes a glossary. Very helpful. Especially when people keep using terms in everyday conversation that make no sense to me at all. Computer code is easier to understand.

Football for Dummies: Understanding Downs, Yardage and Stuff includes excerpts from a book written by John Czarnecki and Howie Long (Did you know he played football? I thought he just did commercials with Teri Hatcher and movies with John Travolta? *shrugs*)

Hub Pages: Football for Dummies is a helpful synopsis. My friend @cincool shared it with me - thank you again!

My favorite is this post. It was written by Jaci. Jaci wrote this to help a few of us out who were attending a football-related meetup in the fall - but who knew nothing of the sport. It's basic, and speaks down to me - which is what I need. Because when it comes to football - I'm dumb. (By the way, in addition to blogging here, Jaci also blogs here. Check her out - she's fun to read.)


With all this help, I'm well on my way. I'm sure I'll figure this out...by Super Bowl 46.

7 comments:

  1. I miss Jaci's football post the first time around! I think she pretty much covered everything. Football can be complicated, it's true, but as long as you know the basics you can follow along. You'll do fine - getting by with a little help from your football-lovin' friends. :)

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  2. *missed, I mean. I *missed* Jaci's football post the first time around. Ugh, I hate typos that I can't fix ... LOL!

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  3. I love her post! I need a way to shrink it down to credit card size so it can fit in my purse.

    Yes, thank goodness for you ladies. I know you'll steer me right. :)

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  4. I miss the first 1/3 of the season every year because of a self-imposed rule: no football until the World Series is over! Also, I think I must be getting soft because every time I hear about concussions and what-not I wonder why we sanction violence in the name of sport.

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  5. Randy - I don't get the whole violence thing at all. I can't even watch it. Plus I have bad knees, so when I guy injures his leg, I actually feel the pain. *shudders*

    Also, I don't think I'll be able to care about football before the World Series is over, either. I mean, let's face it - baseball is the sport all the other sports only hope to be. :)

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  6. I am so with you on not understanding that game. But why are you going to a football meetup if you don't watch football? I hate Super Bowl Sunday because there is always some party I have to go to and pretend to watch the game when really I'd rather be home reading or blogging or reading other people's blogs. But then, everyone's blog would just be about the Super Bowl anyway so I might as well follow the liquor and go watch the game.

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  7. The football meetup was just to hang out with some local bloggers. It was more of a social event than anything else. It got me thinking that maybe learning the sport, at least enough to follow and chat with others, might not be such a bad idea. :)

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