(S44) PT #1 - Football is for Everyone

[MMAJAKE710]

There I was , minding my own business , in the heart of Salem, New Hampshire. A startling noise came Abruptly from the trees near the river. A thunderous crash and silky trails of smoke followed, trembling, I start to approach the scene. I follow the smoke trail up until I finally see where it’s coming from. A ship! I say out loud. Distraught and confused I’m Interrupted By a Giant light beaming out the ship, in the shape of a door. A figure steps out, wait no, figures ! This must be what NASA sent me out here to do! You see I’m an ex military Vet, and recently NASA asked me to check out this area for their sightings and reports. Never did I imagine actually having a physical encounter with E.T.’s.  I count 6 very Tall, Slender, skinny, and down right creepy figures coming out the light from the ships door. They appear to be holding a football strangely enough. Scared and shaking in my boots, one of them sees me and raises both  his arms in the air  , as if a referee was calling a touchdown. Another one throws the football at me from the ship , I’m standing nearly 200 yards away and this thing just threw a bullet straight to my chest. I catch the ball just barely. Impressed with myself , my celebration is short lived when I see that hall has a note that reads. “Dear Human, Teach Us Game” Befuddled by the whole thing, I approach the E.T.s , Too my surprise they’re very friendly and seem to have their own language but also understand mine. They tell me they’ve come to learn sports of other planets and have an interest in football. I take the ball they threw at me and tell 3 of them to stay on one side and 3 others on the other. I teach them 1 person throws, 1 blocks, the other catches and the defense has to stop them from doing so. I teach them the scoring system, but these guys have like super strength compared to us humans so I encourage them to make a 500 yard field as apposed to a 100 yard one hear in earth. I explain usually there’s more people obviously  but this little back yard type game should give them the hang of it. Hey I’m just glad they wanted to learn football and not take over the world ! The E.T.s look like they’re having so much fun. I know NASA is going to love to hear this !

[Arkz]

The only way to do this video is from the perspective of showing aliens exactly how crazy humanity is. If they are going to come down here and make contact, they need to know what they are in for and there's no better way of getting a handle on that than looking at the sport of American football. First of all, in terms of positives, you get a little bit of everything. You can see a diverse set of how humans can present themselves in terms of size and overall appearance. Football helps show the absolutely breathtaking athletic feats that humans are capable of, as well as our complex and involved strategies and theorems when it comes to how the game is played. Unfortunately, you can also see some of the negative ways that humans choose to express themselves, namely hurling each other at maximum speed and regularly damaging themselves and others, sometimes permanently. What better way to show extraterrestrials both the highs and lows of humanity than to show them American football?

[lock180]

What would my main message be to these aliens? To put it nicely, I will destroy you in this sport and you will have no chance against me. To demonstrate why they should never play this sport I would have them watch a game played by NOLA and explain to them that this is the worst team in the league and that even they wouldn't be able to defeat them. However I understand expanding the league so what I will talk about is how to properly celebrate a touchdown and more importantly how to celebrate a good punt or field goal. So my video will be very instructional just not in how to actually play football. It is important to understand the intangibles and fine details of the game like celebrations and how to properly trash talk your opponent. Another big aspect of the league is not getting suspended for a wide variety of reasons. And seeing first hand how problematic that can be I will be giving them a classroom-eque talking to on how to properly act amongst other rookies and veterans but more importantly HO.

[J0EB]

To satisfy NASA’s request, a representative from each ISFL team was elected to take part. This was done to avoid any formation of bias from the extraterrestrials. Who knows what kind of unfair advantage an ISFL team would gain if they were favored by the E.T.’s. Each team would teach about a portion of football that they excel in, such as Sarasota about passing, Orange County about Kicking, and CTC about pick sixes. To provide examples, game tape would be played and commentated over by the main host and former commissioner Swanty. Of course the ex-commissioner would have to take part in a request from NASA! Towards the end of the video, once the major rules are all described, the league would leave an open invitation (and challenge) to any extraterrestrial life which is able to view and comprehend the video. This invitation of course would be to play a real game of football, man vs alien. Putting the I in ISFL, we would become the Intergalactic Simulation Football League.

[ctots]

I think the best way to get the essence of football across to a group of aliens would be to try as much as possible to simulate the diehard fan experience. More than the actual sport itself, the cultural impact is highly nuanced and offers a version of human conflict on a low-stakes, micro scale.

When it comes to the business of actually teaching the mechanics and rules of the sport, I can’t think of anyone better than the network TV play callers and analysts. Get the best of those dudes in a room to put together an instructive presentation to explain the rules of the game through game highlights or freeze frames with markers written on it.

Overall, offering a complete view of the play on the field as well as the excitement for the millions of viewers is the approach I would suggest. Focusing on only one or the other would leave a gaping hole in understanding.

For bonus points, teach a single alien the rules of football and have them explain it to their comrades in a way that makes the most sense, right? Of course.

[FootballIsCool]

SHL Affiliate

Different forum Username: hockeyiscool

[Philliesphan96]

Hello everyone and welcome back to how to football with Fin-Jeremy Har-Dur! The very first thing we need to cover is that you do not ever hit the ball with your foot. Unless, of course, your job on the team is to hit the ball with your foot. Then you do hit the ball with your foot. Most of our sport is using your hands to hold the ball, pass the ball, catch the ball, hug the player with the ball, or stop people from hugging the player with the ball. That last one is my job. In particular my job is to stop people from hugging our quarterback. The quarterback stands a quarter of the way between the line of scrimmage and the fullback. Between the fullback and the quarterback stands the halfback, also known as the running back. Their job is to run with the ball. The overall goal of the game is to get the ball into the designated score section. Now that I have cleared up the confusion about the game, let's play that football!

[sburbine]

SHL Affiliate

[dogwoodmaple]

I think the only way to do the video is to be incredibly serious, instructional, and informative.  It doesn't have to be dry or boring, but I think the goal has to be to teach the aliens the fundamentals of football so they know exactly what they're doing.  I would also use basic graphs and diagrams to explain formations, personnel, and the foundational information pieces.  I'd also include some highlights of some of Earth's best players and the plays that made them famous. And of course, football is not football without the fans, which is why there has to be an entire segment all about tailgating and the wild fanbases that travel hundreds of miles every week to see their teams play.  All of this might not be able to explain everything to the aliens, but this would be a tremendous start to teaching them about football itself, as well as the secondary pieces of both college and professional football - the fans.  Because as we all know, football is not played in a vacuum.

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[TomHanks]

As a former prison guard who co-founded a football league, Paul Edgecomb is no stranger to teaching others to play the sport. The first and main focus to explain to our intergalactic friends is the various positions on a football field. This way, they can assess what abilities they have that will help them to excel in the sport. Are they immovable forces who cannot be pushed around? You guys are going to kill it at offensive line. Do they have many limbs that give them an incredible catch radius? Put them at receiver, chuck the ball up to them downfield and watch the magic happen. Perhaps this is a single alien in a ship with infrared vision and pinpoint accuracy like the predator, get them in at quarterback. Once we've established which position(s) they'll be stronger at and which position(s) they'll be weaker at, the aliens will also possess a decent understanding of the game as they will have knowledge of the roles of every positons. From there, it's just a factor of using those elite alien skills correctly and winning championships.