10.) It is violent, but not deadly
And this goes hand in hand to why football fan’s tolerate steroids in the NFL, because the sport is based on hitting. The essential act in football is a tackle, and when it is at its most violent perfect best (think Ray Lewis slamming Darren Sproles on that 4th-down last season) there is nothing more beautiful in sports. We love violence, but more exactly, we love violence that involves others through the protection of a glass screen in a box. Every time Ray Lewis lines up a running back, or Jared Allen spins down a quarter back, we all subconsciously (or in some cases consciously) imagine that being us, and the pitiable offensive player being some enemy, or co-worker that is getting their ass kicked. There is a reason that “Jacked Up” used to be the best part of ESPN’s Monday Night Countdown. If they took the hitting out of football, it would turn into basketball, and turn into a joke.
9.) It is short and sweet
I used to hate the fact that the NFL was only 16 games long (plus postseason), and that games would only take place on at most three days of the week. It was like a parent withholding chocolate from a five-year old. I wanted football, I wanted it now, but I had to wait six more days for it to come. Well, now I realize just how brilliant that idea was. Waiting for football, having those days in-between to discuss it, break it down, review and relive games, and just emotionally get over the previous game and get ready for the upcoming one makes the week fly by. It also makes me savor every single Sunday for 5 months. The NFL is really akin to a 10 hour TV show. It comes on once-a-week, it is packed with drama, and at the end of the season, leaves you wanting, needing, crying for more. This is my biggest reason to oppose whatever expanded schedule plans Roger “Owner’s Lackey” Goodell has for the league.
8.) The NFL Red Zone Channel
Really, this makes the NFL so much better. Of course, when those rare mid-day Sunday games come about that deserve special treatment (like this year’s Week 10 Pats-Colts game on CBS), that game will get exclusive viewing rights, but if not, the Red Zone Channel is just another way the NFL can flaunt its own brilliance. No other sport can have this channel, because no other sport has the pauses in between the action where it can switch seamlessly through games, run games simultaneously, and give updates. The Red Zone Channel is really the NFL’s gift to the world. The NFL is always accused of being cheap when it comes to giving the fans what they want, but making the Red Zone Channel available to non-Direct TV costumers is just what the NFL needed to do to get back in the good graces of the fans.
7.) It has an uncomparable ability to flaunt its offseason
Now that baseball teams are smarter at locking up their young stars, which has in turn cooled off the MLB-Hot Stove considerably, the NFL now has the best offseason, and much through self-promotion. The NFL has been able to pump-up its own draft by making it televised at an early stage, allowing fans free tickets to the event to create a fun atmosphere. NFL Free-Agency is mostly a dud, but creating the Restricted-Free Agent rule and making it much more easily understandable and widely used than the similar entity in all the other sports, makes so many more people “free agents.” It allows media to dwell on if Jared Gaither will get traded. The NFL has now made its offseason the best offseason in sports, which is a feat. That used to be the last domain that baseball had an edge, but no longer.
6.) Instant Replay
Sure, the other sports have it now, at least in some forms (except, of course, for the biggest sport in the world), and granted, hockey might do it better than football, but no sport has been so positively impacted by instant replay than football. The NFL has milked its challenge system to create even more drama. It has also helped highlight the referees. Now, instead of just the old questions of “How did the official call holding there?” or whatnot, there is a new question, “How did the referee overturn that call?” like every non-New Englander asked when Walt Coleman overturned Brady’s fumble because of the tuck rule. Instant Replay also goes hand-in-hand with the NFL’s ability to admit that their referees makes mistakes, and make them quite often. Even the NFL Referees are the biggest referees in any sport, and unlike in basketball where referees have ruined the game to some, the referees never are blamed for losses, are never the centerpieces of a game, but a very interesting sideshow.
(And no, I did not forget about Super Bowl XL, where the referees did screw over that game, but I like to forget that that game ever happened.)
5.) It is so easy to play at a Grassroots Pick-Up level
Sure, to play a game with lineman and the like might be difficult, but who plays pick-up football with offensive lineman? Football is one sport where all you need is a ball and an open area. That is it. One ball and one space to throw that ball. 3-3, 5-5, 11-11, it doesn’t matter as long as you have the one ball. I started playing pick-up tackle football weekly 5 years ago. It started with just about 10 of us, and it grew to about 30 within a couple weeks. There was no discriminating, no qualifications that were necessary. Just come clothed and ready to work, and you were fine. The biggest problem with baseball, and especially hockey, is that it is not easy to just set up in play. Baseball needs bats, gloves, and a legitimate amount of people (4 or more, and 4-6 is stretching it). Hockey needs a goal, sticks. Even basketball needs a court, a basket. Football? Again, a ball and a field is all that it requires.
4.) They have NFL Films
NFL Films is probably only a success because attaching anything to the NFL is probably a good recipe for just that, but the NFL Films folks have definitely helped the NFL grow. A lot of NFL moments are best known not in their TV broadcast form, but in the NFL films form, which is a marked difference than most other sports. If you think about the biggest moments in baseball, like Kirk Gibson hitting the home run off Eckersley, or even more recently, Luis Gonzalez hitting the bloop single to win the 2001 World Series, the highlights caught in time are off their TV broadcast. In football, moments from the old (the Immaculate Reception), to the new (Kevin Dyson being tackled at the 1-yard line by Mike Jones) are all captured in time forever by NFL Films, and set to the most beautiful orchestral music you can imagine. Think about that, the NFL is so big, they can align their sport with Orchestral music, and have it do well (unlike the NBA, whose highlight’s often run along rap, and is faltering).
3.) They have the biggest stars
LeBron can dispute this all he wants, but the stars in the NFL still lord over the rest of the sports landscape. This wasn’t so in the last century, as Jordan was bigger than any NFL player, but the roles are definitely reversed now. After LeBron’s decision pulled down a 9.4 rating or whatever, media members went gaga, saying how “he was the only athlete that could command that audience for a decision.” Pure Shit. He’s the only athlete so in love himself that he would do that. If Peyton Manning decided to not sign any contract extension this year, and then the Colts somehow don’t franchise him, he’s a free-agent, just like LeBronious. If he then decides to hold a one-hour special, it would be one of the top-10 veiwed programs of the year, even if it was on a 5 AM. Hell, two years ago ESPN and the NFL Network set up a remote location in Hattiesburg for two solid months to see if Favre was coming back, and that is not even a contrived scenario. The NFL coverage is so much more than any other sport. The coverage about a NFL Player who shot himself (Plax – if you don’t remember) outshined the coverage given to the NBA for a very real refereeing scandal with a ref taking bribes from mobsters. Yeah, I think the NFL has the media star portion of the sports’ world covered.
2.) The Super Bowl
Speaking of media, there is the Super Bowl, which makes the World Series look like a Sunday Morning bass-fishing competition. What’s here to say that hasn’t already been shown. For two whole weeks, it really is a media-sports tryst. It is the greatest and most neauseating even in the world. From the commercials, to the anthem, to halftime, to the lingerie bowl, to the supermarkets making trillions on Guacamole and Doritos, to the gambling, to the prop-bets, to the real-bets, to the six-hour pregame, to NFL Networks’ 10 Hour live Total Acess’ for the entire two weeks in between, to everything else, nothing is a greater spectacle than the two weeks following the Conference Title Games and leading up to the Lombardi Trophy presentation. Honestly, not even the World Cup Final comes close to the sheer build up of the Super Bowl. If there is anything the NFL has over the other sports is that it can make its Championship Game into an entertainment and mainstream weeklong celebration. The NFL shouldn’t be prouder of itself for anything, except its….
1.) Parity
Baseball likes to think it has parity (because only one team has won multiple times in the last 10 years, and other mindless driveling facts Bud likes to throw out), but no sport has the parity in the truest sense like football. Sure, there are teams that win a lot seemingly every year, like the Colts, Pats, Steelers and Eagles now, the four best teams of the 2000s. But those teams are constantly changing. The 49ers won at least 10 games for 17 straight seasons, making eight NFC Titale Games in that span and making and winning five Super Bowls. Well, five years after that streak ended, they went 2-14, and now haven’t made the playoffs in eight years. The Saints were absolutely horrible for decades, now they have made the NFC Title Game twice in four years and won a Super Bowl. Sure, there are NFL fans today who have no recollection of the Raiders being a juggernaut (since I wouldn’t count the 99-02 Raiders as a juggernaut, I would be included in this), but from 1966-1986 they were probably the most consistently great franchise in the league. Most NFL fans today haven’t seen the Browns be good. However, that is compared to the NBA, in which no NBA fans have seen the Clippers be good. The league really is cyclical. The Colts have won 12 games for seven straight years, but before Manning came, they won 12 games one time since Unitas left. The NFL will never have a money imbalance like the MLB, even if they stop revuenue sharing, because the difference between the highest revenue team (Cowboys) and the lowest (Jaguars) isn’t even as big as the difference between the Yankees and the Red Sox (#2 in baseball). Also, no NFL stars would ever be able to pull the shit LeBron just did and ruin the competitiveness of the league. For each of the last 13 seasons, one NFL playoff team lost at least 10 games the previous year. That would be like if each year a MLB playoff team lost 90 games the year before, or there was always one NBA playoff team lost at least 50 the year before. No sport offers the hope the the NFL does. They used to say that Hope Springs Eternal in baseball each and every spring. Now, it does each and every August, when the NFL TV Show is finally back, ready to surprise us, taunt us, humor us and haunt us.
