NFL101

When I was in Austin, Texas studying for my master's degree I decided to watch one whole season of NFL, the American style of football. I went to my Uni library to borrow a thin book that would help me understand NFL. Obviously without understanding the rules of the game I could not enjoy watching the games as I would be lost. To help me understand the season also I bought a magazine that explain a bit about each team, the schedule etc.

After watching a couple games I found that I loved a particular Quarterback named Warren Moon. Admittedly he was not the best quarterback in that season but I loved his style. Moon typically would throw a long pass. Houston Oilers, his club at that time, held records on Total yards gained and Yards passing. Moon Oilers did not make it to the super bowl. In Super Bowl XXV New York Giants beat Buffalo Bills, too bad. I would prefer Bills to win as I thought  their Quarterback looked nicer. Haha

American football is pretty similar to a war as basically each team is trying to push the ball toward the opponent's end zone, just like in war each army is aiming to conquer the capital of the opponent country. When the capital is under the opposite army the war ends. Team could rush (run with the ball) and pass (throw the ball to a running team member). Each team has four opportunities to gain 10 years. The defensive team would try to steal the ball or at least prevent the offensive team in making progress. When the ball reached the end zone six point is awarded. One extra point could be gained if the kicker could pass the ball in between the parallel bars. Pretty simple isn't it

Unlike Basket Ball -another popular sport in the US- which is played all over the world I would doubt that American Football is played regularly in other country. I believe such game is played only in the US and Canada. Understandably it is not easy to play the game without proper gears. Soccer could be played anywhere as all you need is a ball. You do not need anything special equipment. The game is very physical and one would need proper gears like helmet, etc.  According to 2017 study on brains of deceased gridiron football players, 99% of tested brains of NFL players had various stages of CTE (Chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE) is a neurodegenerative disease linked to repeated blows to the head).