I had originally planned to publish this essay on the website/blog in fall of 2016, but ended up posting something else in its place. It did get posted in 2015, and I’ve decided to put it on the BLOG for all you sports fans out there. The start of this latest football season has sort of snuck up on me, and I’m more or less indifferent. Then again, once the season really kicks in, I might get more excited.

Word Count: 1052

Game Descriptions for

Uninitiated Cave Dwellers

What red blooded American male (doesn’t love to watch football more than life itself?). A large percentage of the females in the good ‘ole U. S. of A. for that matter too. Rough and tumble controlled mayhem where the players on the field cloth themselves in over-sized shoulder guards and put on these gigantic T-shirts. They wear weird helmets complete with face guards that stick out five or six inches beyond the actual helmet. These gridlike facial protectors are just right for being grabbed onto by opposing players.

No, I’m not describing the type of game where a ball can only be touched by a player’s foot and often referred to by the other three quarters of the planet as futbol. I mean American football; you know, where the offensive players line up in a straight line directly facing their opponent. An oval shaped ball is passed between one player’s legs (some sort of bizarre pseudo-sexual physical act?) into the hands of another player.

This player then steps back a few feet and attempts to do one of three things. 1. Run directly into the backside of a fellow teammate. 2. Hand the oval shaped ball to another one of his teammates who then tries to advance the object further down the field. Or 3. The first player attempts to toss the oval shaped ball great distances further down the pitch into the arms of another co-worker. This all sounds pretty basic and incredibly simple doesn’t it? Good thing we here in America have introduced a business aspect into the mix. This has enhanced, and therefore complicated the game. It’s the American way.

August is referred to by a large percentage of American football fans as the “Golden Time”. Summer with its myriad of outdoor activities, over-consumption of barbequed meats, and lounging in a pool of one’s own sweat is on the wane. Training camps in preparation for another exciting season of football have begun, and soon every sports channel on basic cable will be broadcasting matches.

Many television channels if they aren’t broadcasting the match, frequently refer to those individuals not watching the event as low-life scum. This is a justifiable assessment of a person’s character. After all, if you aren’t watching your team while they’re competing on that particular day, then you must have morals lower than the underside of a common cockroach. Only stands to reason, right?

There are basically three types of football in America. The first two happen to be training grounds for professional gridiron, the most advanced form of the organized violence we are attempting to describe.

Form #1 is called high school football. This basic level of the game is extremely popular in many areas of America, particularly Texas and other similar environments. Friday nights when matches are conducted, is considered a religious undertaking where the faithful attend games in fanatical-like fervor. Other attendees have an almost psychotic look in their eyes, but this is due to a massive consumption of alcoholic beverages more than anything else.

The next level of the game referred to as college football, is played by athletes at a slightly higher level of physical intensity. Even though they aren’t paid for their efforts, college football players are considered important emissaries for their institutions of higher learning and treated as such. This despite the fact that many of these college football athletes are usually just barely above functional illiteracy.

The ultimate level of the game is of course professional football. Here we’ve reached a form of the sport where the intensity level has been ratcheted up its highest point. The game is now played at an extremely high level with the athletes being very serious about their efforts. The plays are more complicated, hits that much harder, and the outcome of matches very apocalyptic. Business practices related to the team and the game itself are considered extremely cataclysmic as well.

Professional teams compete throughout the fall months to qualify for the season ending playoffs. As some fatalistic coach once said, “Winning ain’t everything, it’s the only thing.”On a professional level this maxim is very true for those individual coaches in organizations that qualify for these playoffs. They can usually avoid being fired for their efforts if the team makes the playoffs. If the team fails to qualify, the coach is fired, and this is followed by them moving themselves and their entire family to an isolated tropical island in the South Pacific. Team management refuses to pay for moving costs of course.

Firing after the team fails to make the play-offs doesn’t always happen. Sometimes even though the team has qualified for the playoffs, coaches are still unceremoniously released. This action by the team’s management can be somewhat perplexing, but do not fear. Quite often coaches move onto rewarding secondary careers. A good example is a former professional mentor who progressed into a satisfying vocation as a salesman of standup refrigerators inFrostbite Falls, Minnesota.

For teams that have fought and succeeded their way through every step of the playoffs the ultimate football contest is of course the Super Bowl.The ending battle and often referred to by individuals who spend a great deal of time criticizing anything and everything as, “A mediocre contest surrounded by a festival of Bacchanalian Excess”. This criticism is often justified since the parties surrounding the big match are quite often more exciting than the actual game.

Another aspect of this Super Bowl contest that should never be overlooked is the business entities that advertise their product during the big game. Tremendous amounts of money are paid for advertising time during the television broadcast of the game. It’s not uncommon for many people to watch the Super Bowlfor its commercials as opposed to the game itself.

The team that wins this Super Bowl contest quickly achieves demi-God status. Their MVP, or most valuable player is rapidly booked to appear on every other late-night television program. They then progress into making multiple commercials, followed by a mandatory visit to Disney World. Soon these MVP’s are signing new contracts to play another few years for the winning Super Bowl team. New compacts often end up paying the individual the equivalent of many third world countries’ GDP.

We hope that this brief description of some of the nuanced aspects of American gridiron has cleared up some of your more perplexing queries concerning the game. Football can be a very exciting sporting event to watch, and many people plan their entire weekend around viewing their favorite team’s latest match. Their entire earthly existence actually.