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History of football short essay
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History of football
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History Of Football
Sometime around 1050, Englishmen dug up a skull of a dane and started to kick it around in frustration toward the dane. It became known as “Kicking the dane’s head” .The skull began to hurt the boy’s feet, so a boy came up with the idea of using an inflated cow bladder to help their feet(Tuttle, 13).
In 1189, King Henry banned the game, because people were too involved in the game to practice archery and fighting for war(Tuttle, 13). During the 1500’s the game shifted to Ireland where people invented the Irish rules that made the game tougher. As the game progressed it turned into soccer and rugby(Tuttle, 14).
On November 6, 1869, Princeton and Rutgers played the first college soccer game(Tuttle, 14). During the spring of 1871 a group of people at Harvard University made a game called the “Boston Game”, which was similar to rugby rules(Tuttle, 14).
On May 15, 1874, Harvard played McGill University, which was from Montreal. They played with an egg-shaped ball instead of a round ball(Tuttle, 14). They played with 11 men instead of 15, because 4 could not make the game.
In 1880, Walter Camp, Yale’s rugby captain, created the line of scrimmage and other modern football attributes to improve the game because it was too low scoring (Tuttle, 13). He also changed the scoring system to: safety-1 point, touchdown-2, Point after touchdown-4, and a field goal-3. He then changed the yards kneeded to gain a first down to 5 and used 3 downs(Tuttle, 16). Later coaches changed Camps’ rules to rules we use now.
In 1919 the American Professional Football Association was made in Canton, Ohio(Treat, 23). It started out with 5 teams (Akron, Canton, Columbus, Dayton, and Rochester) (Treat, 23).
It cost twenty-five dollars to open a franchise(Treat, 23). The Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packers joined the League in 1921 to make one of football’s greatest rivalries. The American Professional Football Association changed its name to the National Football League (NFL) in 1922(Tuttle, 61). By 1923, there were 20 teams in the NFL(Treat, 34). During the 1920’s, mostly due to the depression, the NFL began to drop to only 12 teams(Treat, 35).
In order to make the scoring increase, the NFL made it legal to throw a forward pass in 1933(Encarta). The defense rushing the quarterback made it difficult to complete passes...
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...ta), where it stopped, but started back up again in 1999.
In 1992 the National Football League started making major changes toward the future. It created Free Agency, because of a lawsuit(Encarta). Free Agency allows players freedom to move around from teams after their contract. The NFL also invented the Salary Cap, which allowed NFL teams only a certain amount of money to spend on players’ contracts(Encarta). Both Free Agency and the Salary Cap have made it easier for teams to have the same amount of talent, and have made tremendous strides into football’s future.
The demand for football has become so popular, that during televised games companies will pay millions of dollars for thirty seconds of commercial advertisement space. Stadiums now hold tens of thousands of people. At the University of Michigan, their stadium seats more than 100,000 people. Stadiums are now built with retractable roofs and instant replay at each seat.
Several indoor football leagues have started all over the country, where they play with walls and 50 yards. The owner of the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) is expected to open a tough football league in 2001 called the XFL.
The National Football League is a professional American football league consisting of 32 teams, divided equally between the National Football Conference and the American Football Conference. The NFL was founded in 1920s and ever since then has been a representative of the "All-American, Family Entertainment, Sport". Football is played from kids starting at age five to adulthood and is very popular throughout different races and social classes. With the increase of people playing football, came the increase of the sports related injuries.
America’s newfound favorite pastime, football, came from a bizarre chain of events. Football started when a soccer player got fed up with just kicking the ball, so he picked up the ball and ran to the goal. His actions of picking up the ball and running with it fathered a new European sport, rugby, which was soon brought over to American shores, and was altered slightly, the shape of the ball and a few other small rules. The sport became organized into a league and produced the NFL(National Football League). The NFL had a slow beginning, but has picked up popularity, currently having a $9 billion yearly revenue.
Flag football was created in 1933, and was played by many military officers by the 1940s. The soldiers could not play tackle football due to the risk of injure. The officers needed to be uninjured for battles. When the officers went back home to their families they brought flag football home with them. Early leagues began in the 1960s and the first flag football association was formed. The National Touch Football League changed the rules to touching being the way to “tackle” a player instead of the grabbing the flag. Flag football infiltrated colleges and championships started to be held by various universities. Flag football went pro in 1997 and the Professional Flag Football League, Inc. was formed.
When the discussion about how the United States is different from other countries comes up people are quick to say football, the American way, but more specifically the NFL. The NFL, which stands for National Football League, was birthed in 1922 after changing its name from the American Professional Football Association (NFL 2013). Since the birth of American football, fans and players raised the NFL to become the most popular sport worldwide. According to Isidore (2013), the NFL had a profit of $9.5 billion, the highest of all American professional sports. The profit, however, barely comes from sales produced by women merchandise.
The National Football League was formed on August 20, 1920. Players wore pads, not quite as protective as the ones today, helmets and legs pads. Even though their protective gear wasn 't all that protective they still made contact with the players of the opposing teams. As the years progressed the league made many changes to the rules due to player safety. They invented better protective gear for the players and they also made more strict rules regarding playing guidelines. The main goal of those rules, like the targeting rule that is so controversial today, is to protect the players. The targeting rule itself states that no player shall target and initiate contact against an opponent with the crown of his helmet, when in
Football can be traced by rugby and soccer. Walter Camp is the “Father of Football” (Bennett).The first American football game played in the 1860’s (Bennett). Football has a lot of history in the game. The rules are important to the game. The beginning of the National Football League is still going strong today. Strategies and formations of the game are important to study. Football is an aggressive sport and is one of the most played sports in the United States.
Players added many rules that changed the game, and each school interpreted them differently. In 1848, a group of school representatives met at Trinity College in Cambridge and drew up the first set of soccer rules (Brooks Clark, 1993). In 1863, representatives of English soccer clubs founded the English football clubs found the English Football Association.
Next, on November 12, 1892 came the first professional level game played between the Allegheny Athletic Association and the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. Finally, in 1920, the American Professional Football Association became the country’s first organized football league. Back then, the game resembled rugby more than the current game of football. Over time, the rules have been constantly changing in order to boost the excitement level and increase the game’s safety. The first of safety rules came in 1938 when they established roughing the passer, which prevented the defense from hitting the passer after he threw the ball. This was directly to protect the quarterback. Next, in 1943, helmets became mandatory for all players on the field. This was the first step to helping protect the wellness of the players’ heads, even though they were unaware of the seriousness of hits to the head and any long term
Games similar to soccer were played in China as early as 400 BC. In about 200 AD the Romans played a game in which two teams tried to score by advancing a ball across a line on the field. The Romans passed the ball to one another but they never kicked it. London children in about 1100 played a form of soccer in the streets. During the 1800’s the people of England played a game similar to soccer. Many rules changed and each person interpreted the rules differently. In 1848 a group of school representatives met at Trinity College in Cambridge and drew up the first of soccer rules. In 1863 English soccer clubs founded the Football Association. By the late 1800’s soccer began to spread to the rest of the world. The Canadian Soccer Association was established in 1912 while the United States Soccer Federation was set up in 1913.
Part of the first season of college football ever played, the game took place on November 6, 1869, at College Field (now the site of the College Avenue Gymnasium at Rutgers University) in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Because the game was played at a Rutgers field, it was also played under Rutgers' rules. As the first of the 10 games began, two players from each of the teams positioned themselves near the opponent's goal. This was presumably because the participants were hoping to easily score when the ball reached their territory on the field of play. On each team, there were eleven so-called "fielders" who were assigned to defend their own territorial area. There were 12 participants on each team that they named "bulldogs" who were the ones playing in the other team's territory.
In the modern day United States the sport American football has become not only entertainment but also a tradition whether it’s watching the BCS college championship or watching the super bowl with the family. The sport of American football is unique to the United States and has grown and became iconic over the years and has become a part of many Americans lives. American Football was made in 1869 and was modeled after the sport of rugby. They took the basics of rugby and changed it to make it fit better for them. The game has changed over the years but it also affected many Americans as the tradition of Monday Night football has begun. The game has had problems with the United States government as it was said to be too dangerous to play, this lead to an upgrade in the equipment and they tried very hard to make the equipment well ensuring player safety throughout the sport.
Eventually in 1895 it was called soccer (Helmer and Owens, 9). By the late 1700s and 1800s, soccer was played in many universities, but the rules were not specific until 1846 when players at Cambridge University made up the first set of rules.... ... middle of paper ... ... Works Cited Buckley, James.
In the middle part of the 18th century the game was taken up by public
12. No Christian End! The Beginnings of Football in America. Professional Football Researchers Association, 2012.
It was played in the way desired by the group of persons playing the game. “Many American colleges played soccer, but there was no intercollegiate competition. Rules were casual and changed often” (“U.S. soccer timeline”). The game was still played with hands and although small rules were in place it was far from the soccer we see today. The game was not regarded as a set game till 1863 when the game’s set of rules were finally created and accepted by London situated schools. 11 schools came together to form the football association, widely known as FA (in this situation football refers to soccer). “Firmly establishing the foundation of soccer in 1869, the Football Association strictly banned any kind of handling of the ball.” (History of Soccer”). This marked the progress towards the game of soccer we witness today. The banning of hands were not in the set rules and the banning of hands from soccer made soccer extremely different and made it stand as a sport for the feet. The only one allowed to touch the ball was the goal keeper because the ball needed to be returned after it flew into the goal post. In 1886, the International Football Association Board (IFAB) was formed to govern the set of rules for soccer. “In 1871, England saw its first FA Cup, a competition between various football clubs and 15 clubs participated in the first tourney” (“Soccer Origins, Growth and