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The history of American football. How and when the game of
football, known originally as soccer and rugby in England, came to America.
Details of both college and pro levels.
HISTORY OF AMERICAN FOOTBALL
Football historians, those who have studied the game and
its origins, place the games beginnings in rugby, an English game played
with many similarities to football. Rugby began in eighteen twenty-three
at the famous Rugby Boys School in England. Another cousin of the game
of football is soccer, sometimes called association football; its beginnings
can also be traced to English origin, being played as early as the eighteen
twenties.COLLEGE FOOTBALL:
ITS BEGINNINGSAt the same time, a group of students, who did not wear
leather football helmets,at Princeton began playing what was then known
as ballown. First using their fists to advance the ball, and then their
feet, this game consisted mainly of one goal: to advance the old watermeoln
football past the opposing team. There were no hard and fast rules applied
to this earliest attempt at the game we now call football.At Harvard,
the freshman and sophomore classes, who also did not at first wear leather
football helmets, competed in a football-type game, played on the first
Monday of each school year; this event came to be known as Bloody Monday
because of the roughness of the game. Pick up games,where there were no
leather football helmets, similar in style to that played on Bloody Monday,
soon became popular on the Boston Common, catching on in popularity around
eighteen sixty.Soon after the end of the American Civil War,still the
leather football helmet had not been invented, around eighteen sixty five,
colleges began organizing football games.None of these early teams wore
leather football helmets. In eighteen sixty seven, Princeton led the way
in establishing some rudimentary rules of the game.But still , leather
football helmets were not used or invented. Players simply tied a bandana
around their heads. Also in that year, the football itself was patented
for the very first time That early ball was a crude watermelon, almost
round shape. But still no way to protect the players from death or concussins
because there were no leather football helmets even thought of during
these early years..Rutgers College also established a set of rules in
eighteen sixty seven, and with the relatively short distance between it
and Princeton, a game was decided upon by both universities. A date was
chosen, November sixth, eighteen sixty nine; Rutgers won by a score of
six goals to four, and thus was played what has become known as the very
first intercollegiate football game No leather football helmets were worn
during this contest. The flying wedge plays injured many because they
had no leather football helmets..In eighteen seventy three, representatives
from Columbia, Rutgers, Princeton, and Yale met in New York City to formulate
the first intercollegiate football rules for the increasingly popular
game, still being played with many of the rules of soccer. These four
teams established the Intercollegiate Football Association, and set as
fifteen the number of players allowed on each team.Walter Camp, the coach
at Yale and a dissenter from the IFA over his desire for an eleven man
team, helped begin the final step in the evolution from rugby-style play
to the modernfootball game of American football. The IFAs rules committee,
led by Camp, soon cut the number of players from fifteen to eleven, and
also instituted the size of the playing field, at one hundred ten yards.
But still no one thought to protect themselves better with a leather footbal
hemet. In eighteen eighty-two Camp also introduced the system of downs.
After first allowing three attempts to advance the ball five yards, in
nineteen six it was changed to ten yards. The fourth down was added in
nineteen twelve. Tackling below the waist had been legalized in eighteen
eighty-eight.Within a decade, concern over the increasing brutality of
the game led to its ban by some colleges.Brutal plays that actually walked
and trampled opposing players were the norm and leather football helmets
still had not been invented to protect the head of the players of early
football. Nearly one hundred eighty players had suffered serious injuries,
and eighteen deaths had been reported from the brutal mass plays that
had become common in practice. The earliest leather football helmets were
invented by a Navy player in 1893. He asked a local blacksmith to improvise
a leather harness hat to protect his head. As his doctor said that if
he continued to play , one more kick to the head would kill or paralyze
himfor life. Thus the first "leather football helmet was born. Soon
other players created additional styles of leather football helmets to
protect their heads and ears. Still the early leather football helmets
provided littl protection. There were such styles as the early beehive
leather football helmet, the flat-top leather football helmets and the
dogear leather football helmt. In nineteen hundred five, President Theodore
Roosevelt called upon Harvard, Princeton, and Yale to help save the sport
from demise.At a meeting between the schools, reform was agreed upon,
and at a second meeting, attended by more than sixty other schools, the
group appointed a seven member Rules Committee and set up what would later
become known as the National Collegiate Athletic Association, or the NCAA.From
this committee came the legalization of the forward pass, which resulted
in a more open style of play on the field. The rough mass plays, which
once caused so many serious injuries, and even deaths, were prohibited
by the committee. Also prohibited was the locking of arms by teammates
in an effort to clear the way for their ball carriers. Still many early
teams wotre no leather football helmets. But eventually the advantages
of the leather football helemt were seen . And soon one could watch a
game and observe half the players with out leather football helmets and
half with leather football helmets to protect their heads.The length of
the game was shortened, from seventy to sixty minutes, and the neutral
zone, which separates the teams by the length of the ball before each
play begins, was also established. The earliest balls wree called watermelon
footballs and they have become almost extinct along with the earliest
leather football helmets . Today these leather football helmets can only
be found in museums or among fine collections of leather foorball helmets.
Today, almost one hundred years since the inception of the NCAA, the sport
of college football flourishes as one of the most popular of collegiate
games. Colleges and universities are placed into three divisions under
NCAA guidelines and each division has many conferences. Seasonal and conference
play leads to post-season bowl games, where the champions of conferences
meet to play in front of a world-wide television audience. Some of these
bowls include the Rose Bowl, played on New Years Day in Pasadena, California,
between the Big Ten and Pacific Ten conference champions. Other bowls
include the Orange Bowl in Miami, Florida, the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans,
Louisiana, the Cotton Bowl in Dallas, Texas, and the Peach Bowl in Atlanta,
Georgia. The leather football helmet evolution follows the great early
college game as lether helmets first showed up in the 1890s and then the
leather helmets gradually develeoped into a stronger and more protective
piece of gear. .PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL: ITS BEGINNINGSProfessional football
was first played soon after the demise of the Intercollegiate Football
Association, around eighteen ninety-five. In nineteen twenty, the American
Professional Football Association was formed; one year later it was reorganized
and in nineteen twenty-two was renamed the National Football League Some
of the great early Pro players who wore leather football helmets were
Red Grange , Jim Thorpe, the early Packer team , the early Bear team ,
the early Giant team , the early Philadelphia team, and the early Pittsburgh
team. Players wore varying style of leather football helmets . And the
colors also began to show up on the early 40s leather football helmet
s. Before that most helmets were plain natural leather either brown, cordovan
, or black. Color leather football helmets allowed the quaterback to better
see the receiver at long distances when he was far down the field. So
more and more teams begab=n to paint their leather football helmets to
put some visibility sizzel into their games. .Unlike the APFA, which handed
out franchises far and wide with little discretion, the NFL, from nineteen
forty-six to forty-nine, was limited to ten teams. Gradually in the late
1940s the leather football helmet began to be replaced by early plastics.
However many of the early plastic football helmets shattered and caused
injury. So. the leather football helme survived thru the World war II
years and lingered into the early 1950s. But gradually the old leather
football helmet was replaced by the plastics and more and more teams began
to add logos and symbols to their helmets . the early leather football
helmets were spared this clutter and reamined unadorned right into the
50s eara. Soon howevre the old leather football helmet faded into history.
many pooreer high school teams and JR high teams still used these old
leather helmets right into the 1960s and 70s . Today the leather football
helmet is practically extinct and can only be found at museums or in fine
collections.The APFA, on the other hand, consisted of twenty three teams
in the year between its inception and the change-over in becoming the
NFL.A merger in nineteen seventy, fifty years after the inception of the
first pro football association, combined sixteen NFL teams with ten AFL
teams to comprise one league with two conferences. In the nineteen eighties,
further expansion was proposed and by the ninety three-ninety four NFL
season, approval was given for a thirty-team league. The next step towards
growth of the league would be to realign the NFL into eight different
divisions, each with four teams.Pro football, like its college counterpart,
was not without its failures. Among the number of competitive leagues
that have folded in failure are the All-American Football conference,
nineteen forty-six to forty-nine, the American Football League, nineteen
sixty to sixty-nine, and the World Football League, nineteen seventy-four
to seventy-five.Arena Football, an indoor league played in the spring
with eight man teams, debuted in nineteen eighty-seven. It is still played,
but does not enjoy the popularity or success that is found in the National
Football League.PROFESSIONAL FOOTBALL TODAY: A BUSINESSFrom its humble
beginnings in eighteen sixty-nine, when the first intercollegiate game
was played between Rutgers and Princeton, football has become a multi-billion
dollar business in its professional form.Once watched by no more than
a handful of loyal sideline enthusiasts, football is now available for
worldwide viewing. With the advent of cable television, dozens of high
school and college games can be watched over Friday and Saturday afternoons.
Pro games are televised on Sunday and Monday nights, with at least half
a dozen games televised each weekend during the season. At the end of
each NFL season, champs from both the National and American conferences
meet in the Super Bowl to determine a national champion. This game, always
played in January, has been called the most watched sporting event of
all time, with a viewing audience from around the entire globe, watching
and listening to the televise in dozens of languages.Although television
commercials foot a very large part of the bill, the competition between
networks for the coverage rights highly inflates the value of NFL franchises.
In nineteen twenty, a franchise cost one hundred dollars. By nineteen
sixty, each was worth approximately two million dollars. In nineteen ninety
three, when the league decided to expand, selling teams to Charlotte,
North Carolina and Jacksonville, Florida, the cost rose to one hundred
forty millions dollars per franchise.In the same year, the NFL signed
a five-network, four year television contract, totaling almost four and
a half billion dollars.Some may say that if cheerleading was truly a sport
then it would have been included with other sports long ago. He will frequently
use the word draw here for lack of a more precise term to refer to the
use of graphics software. All bodies will rotate easiest about their center
of mass. In the year 2000, the popularity of arena football led to the
formation of arena football 2, an expansion league. The ancient egyptians
swam, raced, wrestled, and played games with balls. Pass patterns are
the routes the receivers run downfield after the snap of the ball.The
rare kinds and styles of leather football helmets worn by college and
Pro teams can still be seen at their resoective college campus museums
, at the College football hall of Fame Museum and or the Pro Football
hall of Fame Museum in Canton Ohio. Trap block: when a player is allowed
through the enemy line only to be blocked by surprise from another player
behind the line. Suicide squad: see special teams. Like the offense, the
defense does not want to make its intentions obvious, especially when
the coach calls for an aggressive defense such as a blitz a charge against
the quarterback. So, there are different shoes here, sorted by style and
bottom. Some teams use a 3-4 defense, with three defensive lineman, four
linebackers, and four defensive backs. The officials then place the ball
at the point where the team has ended up. For example, our running back
would have the following momentum p: p = mv = 98 kg9. Many players apply
two-sided carpet tape to their shoulder pads so that the jersey sticks
to the pads! The winner of this game is crowned the national champion.
He also considers the strengths and weaknesses of the defense. Role model
- cheerleaders are looked up to by their peers. Today many sports history
enthusisasts look for old leather football helmets for their collections
or to offer as awards or commemoratives. These olfd battle helmets, the
leather football helmet, will always represent the great history and evolution
of the game itself.
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