OT - Football. Olympic Sport?
Seems like a somewhat slow news day, so just to create a little discussion...
"A vote on American football becoming a full-fledged Olympic sport could take place as early as 2017, according to the USA Football youth development program."
Two questions immediately come to my mind...
1. How many Olympics would (you expect) the United States to dominate?
2. Which country would give the US the best game?
Discuss.
December 11th, 2013 at 1:28 PM ^
I would imagine it would be mostly below D-IA guys or "retired' D-IA guys who didn't make professional teams. Think for instance all of the major NCAA program players who didn't make it or cut it in the NFL, CFL, Arena or some non-North American league, which at Michigan alone we know of plenty. As someone else pointed out before, the depth of football talent in the US is astounding.
December 11th, 2013 at 12:46 PM ^
December 11th, 2013 at 12:46 PM ^
While we're debating things I would like to propose that all "sports" that involve judges and not a clock or a scoreboard be moved to separate category. Events like ice dancing, rythmic gymnastics and other performances are more art than sport and should be treated as such.
December 11th, 2013 at 1:16 PM ^
What would the ramnifications of this move be? A rousing, yet irrelevant, argument from the head cheerleaders at local high schools? That's about all it would change.
December 11th, 2013 at 12:51 PM ^
The US wouldn't even compete. With our pros and even our "amateurs" (college), there is too much money on the line for them to risk their career in a competition they will handedly win when only pride is on the line.
December 11th, 2013 at 12:58 PM ^
December 11th, 2013 at 1:06 PM ^
December 11th, 2013 at 1:14 PM ^
1. USA
......
2a. Canada
2b. Germany
4. Japan
The Germans actually have a pretty decent football base compared to almost every other country. But they are still miles behind USA. This would be an awful Olympic sport and would only be implemented to add to America's win total. As far as an Olympics sport, which is to look at world sports in general, this is about as bad as it would get compared to many of the other proposed sports.
December 11th, 2013 at 1:23 PM ^
The Olympics should be for the very best in the world. Not a cheesy knockoff just to get a popular sport into the competition. That is why Olympic basketball and hockey are awesome now, while baseball (before it got the boot) and soccer suck. Seeing Lebron and Kobe go up against legit international stars, or the great competition on the ice from US/Canada/Czechs/Fins/Swedes/Russians is a lot more interesting than a 2nd tier youth soccer tourney or watching American college kids play the one legit/organized baseball team participating (Cuba).
Since the top guys in the world wouldn't be interested in playing, there shouldn't be a football competition.
December 11th, 2013 at 1:22 PM ^
would you conduct a tournament in the 2 1/2 weeks of the Olympics?
December 11th, 2013 at 1:37 PM ^
It'll never happen.
But it's not because of the time constraint - if a gold medal winning soccer team plays 6 games during the Olympics, then why can't an American football team do the same thing? Because we're used to having only one game a week? How about you man up and play games with only 2 full days of rest between games.
December 11th, 2013 at 4:04 PM ^
You are comparing apples and oranges. In soccer, it's normal to do that. Soccer tournaments always ask teams to play every few days, and club teams are regularly playing mid-week cup tournaments (or European competitions) in addition to their regular league games on the weekend.
Football never, ever does that. It's far harder on your body than soccer. You simply cannot ask football players to play every 3-4 days (outside of extreme, once-a-season kinds of things like playing on Thanksgiving).
December 11th, 2013 at 6:33 PM ^
I wish Football would become an olympic sport but I dont really see it happening. As far as who would be our greatest competition I guess it would have to be Canada but I think our boys would take care of business.