FOOTBALL RECAP:  PART THREE

The previous two articles of this series touched upon football basics and personnel. This concluding article offers brief notes on equipment used in the sport, and miscellaneous facts of interest.

Equipment

Players use various pieces of equipment according to the positions they play. As the team’s leader, the quarterback wears an earpiece in his helmet, through which he can receive play plans from his coach. Helmets are made of hard plastic and are lined with absorbent materials.

Attached to the helmet is a removable face mask (also known as a face guard) to protect a player’s face.

Other protective items include: hip pads, thigh pads, knee pads, neck pads, shoulder pads, rib pads, lumbar pads (for the small of the back), forearm pads and tooth guards.

The ball

A football is made of leather and has laces. Differentiating a Canadian football from an American one are two white stripes on the former, to make it more visible. It also measures between 27.5 and 28.5 inches, whereas an American football is 28 to 28.5 inches in circumference. Each weighs 14 ounces.

Miscellaneous

A little-known fact about footballs is that home teams have to provide league officials with 36 regulation balls before games start in open-air stadiums and 24 balls in domed stadiums (with a pump in each case). This enables officials to make necessary on-field adjustments.

The first American football to have its present shape was patented in 1867. Before then, players had found that the round ball was difficult to inflate and they had to take turns doing so. With the egg-shaped ball, however, players realized that it gave them a more secure grip as they ran with it, and also that it made retrieval more challenging for opponents.

Body types

In general, football players have physiques to match the positions they usually play. Quarterbacks are 6 feet 3 inches tall and weigh 220 pounds. Offensive line players are even more stalwart; they are 6 feet 5 inches tall and weigh 300 pounds. By contrast, cornerbacks are 5 feet 11 inches in height and weigh 190 pounds. Of similar size are the strong safeties; they are 5 feet 11 inches in height and weigh 200 pounds.

Football today bears little resemblance to the game from which it originated. This is generally thought to have been harpaston, which was played by the ancient Greeks. Its objective was to run, throw or kick a ball across a goal line. It didn’t matter how the ball got there and the number of players was limitless. The modern game, however, despite its sometimes appearance of chaos to the uninitiated, is actually very well regulated and, on the whole, much safer.

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