Disclaimer: For the purpose of this article, football will be called American football as most of The Update’s readers are European and will confuse football with the sport commonly known as soccer.
Ahhh, Sundays. The day to sit comfortably in front of my TV for three and a half hours and watch giant men run into piles of other giant men. This is what American football is to the world of non-Americans. However, what football really is, is 4 downs (A.K.A. tries) of adrenaline packed action to travel 10 yards (which for the rest of the world is 9 meters… metres) down the field… Pitch?
American football is all about, as mentioned above, the action. Well not quite… Recently a study showed that there are actually just 11 total minutes of gameplay during the three and a half hours you’re slouching in front of your TV (eating). The study showed that in fact 63 minutes – yes 63 minutes – of your time is being used to watch ads. Advertisements. An hour and 3 minutes of ads. Awesome right? Right! Even with these monstrous 63 minutes of ads, football is still referred to as “America’s Sport”. Did I forget to mention that those 63 minutes aren’t even the thing you are watching the most? The most? 67 minutes of your favorite players standing around on the sideline. How great is it to watch your team’s favorite player just standing there on the sideline rather than actually watching him play?
Games start at 7pm swiss time, which is the perfect time for a tv dinner.
Awesome? Yeah not so much.. As much as I would love to call it a tv dinner it’s more of an ad-dinner. Getting your nice big plate of food and sitting in front of your tv for the opening kickoff is great… Except that right after the kickoff, yep you guessed it, an ad. By the time the opening drive actually gets started, you’ve already scarfed down half your plate of food and are finally ready for your action packed 30 seconds. After that? Another ad which means more eating. A study showed that during the regular season of football, the average American gains 10 pounds (4.5kg) *cue obese American jokes*. When I saw that, it kinda hit me like this…
By halftime you could probably find yourself holding an empty plate of buffalo wings with sauce all over your fingers, and if you were in the mood – a nice big bowl of ice cream with all the whipped cream your heart could desire.
When players aren’t killing their “friends”, driving under the influence, getting arrested for drugs or allegedly deflating footballs, football is a great sport to watch. Especially if you love ads! It’s been a pleasure writing for the The Update, but I really need to start making my wings, it’s almost game time! Peace out guys.
The Update 