Springtime Football

Recently a lot of hype has been brought up by the Arena Football League. At first, I didn’t understand why, all of a sudden, everyone is talking about the AFL. I mean, it was established over twenty years ago and was basically a development league for the NFL. Then I found out that ESPN partnered with the AFL to show their games on their network. To boost up ratings, they bring up the sport on Sportscenter, have special programs analyzing arena football, and built up a section for the AFL on their homepage. When ESPN gets involved with a sport, they’re not messing around, so I decided that I won’t mess with ESPN and go ahead and pay close attention.

Not only is arena football going to be televised on ESPN this year, but also, ESPN NFL analysts are going to be commentating the games. This is what really brightened my eyes. I watch NFL Live (the ESPN show that analyzes the NFL) all the time and I know Ron Jaworski, Merril Hoge, Sean Salisbury, and Mike Golic. These guys are great; they can take one play and sum up the entire season of that team’s strengths and weaknesses. So when these guys were announced to be the commentators of the games, my interest grew rapidly. Then, I found out that Mike Golic would be teaming up with his ESPN Radio partner, Mike Greenberg. Their radio show, Mike and Mike in the Morning, is just phenomenal; its comedy and sports wrapped together with a dysfunctional yet hilarious relationship. What more can you ask for? To able to listen to these guys one more day out of the week, is just an opportunity I can’t give up.

So onto the sport… I did a lot of homework and found out that this game has huge differences from the NFL. The three biggest differences are the fact that its played indoors on a much smaller field (half the size of an NFL field); the fact that there are walls located inbounds so the only way to run out of bounds is to be viciously tackled over a four foot wall (think hockey without the glass); and that there is a huge net on either side of the endzone, anytime the ball touches the net, it is considered in-play. So basically if you completely overthrow your receiver (e.g. Eli Manning) and the ball bounces off the net, if the receiver catches it, it’s a touchdown.

I think these differences are very appealing. I would love to see guys get smashed into the walls. I hate it in the NFL, when a guy who has no balls runs out of bounds because they don’t want to take on a hungry Ray Lewis sprinting towards them. In the AFL, you close your eyes, pray to God, and open them while sitting on a fans lap with a giant bruise in your chest. That’s a manly sport my friends.

Big hits are also complemented by big offensive production. In the NFL, if you score 35 points in a game, chances are, you’ll win (unless you’re the Cincinnati Bengals). In the AFL, you need to score at least 35 points in the first half to stay on pace to victory. The leading passing quarterback in the AFL last year, Clint Dolezel of the Dallas Desperados, threw 105 touchdown passes, that’s more than half of the NFL single season all-time record. Since the field is only 50 yards long, you’ll see a lot of action; a huge plus for the sport.

Another reason to get excited about the AFL is simply because it’s five more months of football! Why not get excited? Everyone is always depressed after the Super Bowl because we’re all going to have to wait until September to kick off the season again. Well, the AFL makes the wait so much less. The great part about it is the rivalries are still alive. A lot of NFL fans can root for the same team in the AFL and still hate teams in other cities. Take my Dallas Desperados for example; they’re in the same division as the New York Dragons and the Philadelphia Soul. Who do Cowboys fans hate most these days? The New York Giants and the Philadelphia Eagles. Other NFL rivalries in the AFL are the New Orleans Voodoo, Tampa Bay Storm, and the Georgia Force in the Southern Division. Also, all you Los Angeles and Las Vegas residents can finally cheer for a football team since you probably will never end up with an NFL team again…

Perhaps the greatest thing about Arena Football, the prices. Tickets go from $5 in the crappy seats to $80 near the inbound walls. If you’re an NFL fan with an $80 budget, you better bring your binoculars to the game because you won’t be able to tell if ants are building a colony or if Donovan McNabb just tore his ACL eating a donut.

With the season underway, do yourself a favor, go watch a few games this season. The fourth sport of America’s “Big Four” has been vacant ever since hockey went on strike two years ago so it’s now a race between hockey, the AFL, and soccer (golf doesn’t count because no one watches it unless Tiger is teeing up). The AFL seems to be leading the race right now and that means the sport can only get better with time.

Source: ESPN.com

Photo: ArenaFootball.com

Sports Moment of the Week

The Dallas Mavericks performance has been remarkable of late. Last week they won all of their games against the Atlanta Hawks, Minnesota Timberwolves, Cleveland Cavaliers, and Orlando Magic. Doing so, they became the first team in NBA history to have three 12-game winning streaks in their season. They are also on a franchise-best 15-game winning streak right now. Their record after an 0-4 start in the beginning of the season is now 50-5. They are only the second team in ANY sport to win 50 of 55 games (The Chicago Bulls did it in their 1996 championship season when they won a record 72 games). I personally don't see how anyone can stop the Mavericks from becoming champions this year.