four interesting articles about football
I recently read a few interesting articles about football and I thought I’d share.
Chuck Klosterman writes about how football has succeeding by being the most liberal sport but winning over America by appearing to be conservative. I don’t know if he’s right but he is pretty entertaining.
My wife is awesome, but she hates football (as wives are wont to do). Every game seems the same to her. I will be watching a contest between Kent State and Eastern Michigan on a random Thursday night, and she will say, “Go ahead and watch that game. I will just sit here and read this magazine featuring a plus-sized black female TV personality from Chicago.” Two days later, Georgia will be playing LSU for the SEC championship. Now she will want to rent Scenes from a Marriage.
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Michael Lewis writes about how the place kicker has no upsides, with even one big miss ruining a career.
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The same author also writes about Coach Mike Leach and his crazy pass-heavy Texas Tech offense. Michael Lewis is the sort that likes finding people breaking the ‘rules’ and still winning and here’s another example.
To prepare his receivers’ ankles and knees for the unusual punishment of his nonstop-running offense, Leach has installed a 40-yard-long sand pit on his practice field; slogging through the sand, he says, strengthens the receivers’ joints. And when they finish sprinting, they move to Leach’s tennis-ball bazookas. A year of catching tiny fuzzy balls fired at their chests at 60 m.p.h. has turned many young men who got to Texas Tech with hands of stone into glue-fingered receivers.
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Finally, there’s an old Sports Illustrated article about a beareded, long-haired barefoot punter in the 1970s. It’s a pretty entertaining read just for the player talking about the Establishment, man.
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In other football news, the Steelers seem to have played a little better after starting out 1-2. They still don’t seem as solid as they did last year (particularly defensively), but I’m liking that the offensive line looks decent for once and that Mendenhall is getting some carries. I also like the irony that is our kick returner getting credited for tackles on opposing kick returners. That’s fun.