Dallas Cowboys get slaughtered by the New Orleans Saints

[snooch]

That's the way Americans feel about cricket. Baffling. I will start posting more NFL stuff up here since a few of you have expressed interest. Football is really the only sport I get into. I'll watch any game live, but the NFL is the only one I like on tv. I can't follow soccer well. It seems boring to me in the same sense that the NFL is boring to people who aren't exposed to it regularly. If it was shown here more(besides the spanish channels) I would watch it. I do watch the world cup and the rest of the championship cups when they are on at a decent hour though.

[Esox Lucius]

pool is an american sport isnt it?

defo the best one if so, any sport that can be played in a pub is a good sport in my books. cant beat snooker, pool or darts!

[LittleMinx]

Ive watched American footy on Sky few times, altho i dont understand the rules, but its good to watch!!

[Richierush]

ive played it on the ps2 but i couldnt understand the game plays :cheese:

[SlavikSvensk]

I remember watching a bit of the superbowl a couple of years back and thought it was deathly boring, the build up was more interesting and in football the build up to big games seems interminable. I remember Samuel L Jackson saying there was something wrong with a game where they don't score after watching a Liverpool game (back in the days of Houllier, so I can understand him not being that impressed!), but they didn't score for ages in that superbowl either.

I mean I'm used to end to end football, a sport where they move a few yards forward at a time just doesn't do it for me. And I heard they made the game less defensive too to make it more interesting, I can't imagine what it must have been like before...

Hollywood films gave me the impression american sports were interesting, but then when I actually watched them I didn't really like any of them and American football seems the worst of the bunch.

We did come up with the word soccer, but we don't use it though! Idiots aside.

well, it's insanely complicated. the story is funny though. football, american football and rugby were all the same sport up until the mid 19th century, when they started differentiation from each other. when you look at old american football film (i mean black and white from the early part of 10th century), it's MUCH more like rugby. then it slowly changes, bit by bit, into the game it is today.

a typical game might have 6 scores in total, and action moves in one-direction at a time, though it can switch on a dime. the basics are simple, move the ball down the field and score. you have 4 chances to go 10 yards, and if you don't, you lose the ball. every 10 yards you get a fresh set of 4 chances (or downs). the defense tries to stop you, or get the ball away from you, so their team can take over. positions are highly specialized in a way they are not in football. the game is super violent, but not in a bloody, ears-come-off way like rugby, in a more car collision, broken bone sort of way.

[snooch]

ive played it on the ps2 but i couldnt understand the game plays :cheese:

OK some hints. I'll start with defence. The plays are organized by formation. 4-3, 3-4, nickel, dime, quarter. There are more, but just concern yourself with these for the time being. You can get buy quite well with just these. 4-3 refers to 4 linemen(huge guys up front-runstoppers and quarterback manglers) and 3 linebackers(blitzers, runstoppers, qb sackers and short pass defenders). This formation is made for run defence and is quite poor against the midrange to long pass. 3-4 is three linemen and 4 linebackers. This is a bit more versatile since the linebackers can be a bit more tricky in their presentaion of their formation. Does it look like they are blitzing when they are actually in a disguised pass coverage formation? Or vice versa. Alot of teams are finding current success with this. It was in vogue in the 80's, fell out of favor and recently came back in favor. Nickel formation. 3 or 4 linemen, 3 or four linebackers and more purely pass oriented defenders(safeties-middle of the field pass defenders. they tend to be a bit bigger than defensive backs. DBs are built for speed). Nickel derives it's name from the extra "nickel back" (usually a safety) that is brought in for more speed. This formation is a good mix between run and pass defence. I use a variation of it when playing video games. Dime formation is made for pass defence. There are only two linebackers with another DB added to the field in it's place. Not good for run defence as the blockers will knock the DBs on their ass and the formations tend to be too spread out for any run defence usage. The last is quarter. Only 1 lb and all about stopping the long pass. This is usually used in situations where there's only 2 or 3 seconds left and the other team is down by a score or less. Pull the quarter formation out. It's all about stopping the long bomb.

I'll write more on offence later as I have errands I have to run.

[SlavikSvensk]

should read 20th century not 10th above...

[Will]

well, it's insanely complicated. the story is funny though. football, american football and rugby were all the same sport up until the mid 19th century, when they started differentiation from each other. when you look at old american football film (i mean black and white from the early part of 10th century), it's MUCH more like rugby. then it slowly changes, bit by bit, into the game it is today.

a typical game might have 6 scores in total, and action moves in one-direction at a time, though it can switch on a dime. the basics are simple, move the ball down the field and score. you have 4 chances to go 10 yards, and if you don't, you lose the ball. every 10 yards you get a fresh set of 4 chances (or downs). the defense tries to stop you, or get the ball away from you, so their team can take over. positions are highly specialized in a way they are not in football. the game is super violent, but not in a bloody, ears-come-off way like rugby, in a more car collision, broken bone sort of way.

Wow, they make it seem much more interesting in films and stuff, like someone makes a run, the QB picks him out and he hopefully scores a touchdown, none of this slowly shuffle up the field nonsense and having to stop the opposition moving a mere 10 yards 4 times to get to 'attack'... Surely it's pure patriotism americans actually enjoying that!

[kev]

just got round to watching this game(aint had much time this week) shiit the saints were on fire!!!!!
that onside kick was Abit cheeky prob one of my fav non colts games this season(am still bitter about the colts streak being broken)

[SlavikSvensk]

Wow, they make it seem much more interesting in films and stuff, like someone makes a run, the QB picks him out and he hopefully scores a touchdown, none of this slowly shuffle up the field nonsense and having to stop the opposition moving a mere 10 yards 4 times to get to 'attack'... Surely it's pure patriotism americans actually enjoying that!

nah mate, it IS exciting. any play can get a TD, it's just that you NEED 10 yards (at least). the start-stop thing = tension and release. it's like with football...people who can't see the excitement just fundamentally don't understand the game.

[snooch]

just got round to watching this game(aint had much time this week) shiit the saints were on fire!!!!!
that onside kick was Abit cheeky prob one of my fav non colts games this season(am still bitter about the colts streak being broken)

The problem with the Colts is the fact that they can't stop the run. They are dead last in the league against the run. Incredible offence, but that won't do you any good if the other team is making slow and steady progress on purpose to take up time and keep said offence off the field. I forget who recently said after beating them "Payton Manning can throw for 500 yards a game and they will still have the same problems. Look at tonight." (he had just thrown for 300+ yards and 3 touchdowns- no easy feat against anyone)

The Saints are the team to beat in the NFC conference right now.

[dan the acid man]

used to watch it alot when i was a kid, even bought a book so i could understand the rules better.

I don't watch it as much these days though, think i might start catching the odd game when i can.

[Will]

nah mate, it IS exciting. any play can get a TD, it's just that you NEED 10 yards (at least). the start-stop thing = tension and release. it's like with football...people who can't see the excitement just fundamentally don't understand the game.

But there's no chance of the defending team scoring 'til they've stopped the opposition moving 10 yards 4 times? Or 'til after the attacking team has scored presumably, which ever happens first?

[SlavikSvensk]

But there's no chance of the defending team scoring 'til they've stopped the opposition moving 10 yards 4 times? Or 'til after the attacking team has scored presumably, which ever happens first?

wrong! a defense can indeed score, but in order to do so, they need to take the ball away. that means they either force an offensive player to drop the ball or they intercept a pass. teams with defenses that score at least once a game usually make it really deep into the playoff tournament at the end of the year. some teams live off of this. the chicago bears, for example, have a defense that routinely scores 2 or 3 times a game and once scored 5 times this year.