HOW WELL DO YOU ACTUALLY KNOW FOOTBALL?

about the “nickel being a stupid defense” or that the “I-formation is crap” then who really cares.

But I do like the writers who either let their own negative opinions be known of the program, without being die-hard critics or homers, and the ones that try to get people to understand something schematic when they try to make a point in their article.

But that’s also a function of time/budget/role: the beatwriter doesn’t really have time, inclination, or incentive to watch film.

I would also say this: much of my understanding of football came from long days in high school ditching 7th period government class (yes, I have two degrees in political science now, it’s a show) to hang out in the arcade playing Cyberball. Yes, it’s basicallyl 8-bit backyard football, but as I started paying more and more attention to the real game, things like the West Coast Offense and the zone blitz made much more sense for all those hours of throwing straight into the flat to the running back and blitzing the corners EVERY. SINGLE. DOWN.

I don’t know what the current generation’s overly-simple entry-level video football is – I could probably land a space shuttle on an aircraft carrier in a hurricane before I could figure out Madden 10 – but just a tiny bit of time spent watching the game and controlling it (thank you Murray Head) will go a long way toward making sense of what you see.

(And I say this as the former sports editor of the campus paper for a tiny conservative-arts college with no football team, so it’s not like it did me a damn bit of good…)

Know the difference between an end around and a reverse, which it seems 99% of broadcasters do not.

Please do pay attention to the rules eligibility for receivers. Good offensive playcallers can do some nifty stuff with them.

People want to read something that is entertaining, but since life is one large optimization problem, people don’t have time to be a great writer and have in-depth knowledge of said topic. For the last, say for 25 years, in the sciences I can think of only Stephen Hawking that has really been both. Sure, others have come along with PhD’s, but they haven’t performed in-depth research for decades and/or their research wasn’t really that great to begin with. And even those books tend to be more philosophy than actual science.

is a relative understanding of what makes a football team good. Here’s a hint: recruiting, player development, and preparation. Not play-calling. It matters, but over the long run it is miniscule in comparison to the above.

In other words, STOP BLAMING ALL YOUR TEAMS FAILURES ON YOUR OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR’S PLAYCALLING.

This would eliminate 80% of all fan criticism and 95% of its bullshit criticism.

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that playing EA/Madden has become a Cliffs Notes version of film study. There are 12-year-olds who have a better sense of when to use timeouts and challenges than do some head coaches.

Smart Football is a must for any fan, by the way.

I prefer my football without all the brainy “knowledge” stuff. Give me big, fast, aggressive men violently crashing into each other and I’m happy. (NOHOMO)

That I am entering the 2033 season in my NCAA 2010 dynasty mode running a 222 consecutive game winning streak at Oklahoma. It’s scary how I’ve developed the ability to recognize coverages, and essentially call 5 hot routes before the play to set up a gain. Also, just like in real life, recruiting is essential to success, my recruiting classes consist of 10-15 5stars and then a bunch of other shits that I immediately cut.
Plus, having a team comprised of mostly 5 stars allows you to just fuck around and do whatever you want. I put my freshman rb at qb and ran west virginia’s playbook for shits and giggles an entire season and went undefeated. My first game of one season was against #4 Notre dame, I took a 70-0 lead in at half. However, I also had a string of something like 13 consecutive national championships go down the drain after I went undefeated and was voted 3rd, now I can say i know how auburn fans feel.

it, but it can help. I’ll tell you this, when I was playing at Alabama I would often talk to fans, friends, and relatives and they’d offer their opinions on schemes, player motivation, conditioning, the cause of problems, and other things they could not have possibly known without being on the inside of the machine. Most of their analysis was way, way off. They were certain that we were playing a style of defense that we didn’t play. They would criticize the coach when he made a perfect call (or the call we’d practiced for that very situation all week) even though one of the player’s missed a block or didn’t run a good route. They never saw that stuff.

So yeah, you can know about football without playing. But none of us, not me and not you, will ever really know some things unless we are right there on the ground level when it happens. We can talk about how some play worked very well, but we can’t know all the details. Maybe the defense had it covered perfectly and the quarterback made a once in a lifetime throw. You can’t blame any coach or player for that. You just have to tip your hat to the quarterback and say, “Heck of a throw, kid.”

fans, writers or media members reporting on the game, or coaches like [name redacted]? Or is it all 3?

“Cultural literacy”, if you will: other terms with which every college football writer and fan should be familiar (I understand my list is skewed and contains but a few examples).

Beamer Ball
Bear
Between the Hedges
Da U
Death Valley
Four Horsemen
Granddaddy Of Them All
Happy Valley
Herschel
Little Brown Jug
Smurf Turf
Sweatervest
Third Saturday in October
WLOCP