FOOTBALL HANDOUT
Football is an exciting, fast-paced, unpredictable game and you can be part of it. Anyone can play football if you’re big and maybe not so quick, you can be a lineman. If you’re small and can run pretty fast, you can be a receiver, running back, or defensive back. If you like to throw, play quarterback. If you like to kick, you can be a punter or kicker.
There is a position for everybody. Every skill you need can be learned just by playing. How do you play? Any way you want! Get some people together, choose up sides, and then kick off. Now you’re playing football.
How many people do you need? Three against three, four against four, eleven against eleven - it really doesn’t matter. If there’s an odd number of people - say, five- you can play two against two and have a permanent quarterback, or you can substitute. Whatever you want. The game is yours, and the only thing that really matters is having fun. But, hey! Don’t get the idea I think football is only a terrific sport for players. Fans have twenty-two people on the field in a pro or college football game. That’s twenty -two different things to watch. You don’t have to keep your eyes on the quarterback. You can watch any position on the field and find excitement everywhere.
All sports involve the same basic skills: hand-eye coordination, balance, concentration, positioning your body. But team sports can teach you an important skill for life: how to get along with people.
As part of a team, you always have to be thinking about your teammates. You can’t just do your own thing. People don’t get many chances to run around “doing their own thing.” mostly you have to do the best job you can within a group, whether it’s school, society, or a team.
Individual sports can help you do your best. But if you only play individual sports, you’re missing out on the friendships a team sport can give you.
When you’re young, there’s really no need to choose between sports to play. The best athletes are the ones who are good at everything. You should play basketball, football, soccer, stickball, tennis, baseball, anything you can. Actually, I always thought that your favorite sport should be whatever’s in season. If you only want to play football and it’s March, there won’t be anyone to play with. Everyone will be playing baseball and basketball. If you want to play baseball in November, it’s hard to get up a game. I know because 1 was the kid who got people together.
How to get started
Until you have the proper equipment and the proper kind of supervision, touch football, not tackle, is the only game to play. Even guys in the NFL play touch football. Aside from some scrimmages, that’s how the pros practice.
The team with the ball is the offense and they’re trying to score. The team trying to stop them from scoring is the defense.
Offense is orderly, the offense has assignments. They know the play. They know when the center is going to snap the ball. (The center is the snapper. He or She snaps the ball to the quarterback on the count, and the action starts.) They know when the center is going to snap the ball. They know who they have to block. Every play the offense runs is an organized attack. Coaches design hundreds and hundreds of plays that are hundreds and hundreds of ways to get the ball down field.
A play is called a down. The offense has four downs to score or to get a first down. If they don’t score or make a first down (and they don’t punt or go for a field goal), the ball goes to the team on defense.
In most tackle football games you get a first down by moving the ball ten yards. But you can change that in your game. A first down could be making it past midfield, or by making two or three complete passes, or whatever suits your situation.
The offense lines up just behind the ball An imaginary line from the tip of the ball straight across the field is called a line of scrimmage, neither team can cross it until the ball is snapped, and the quarterback can’t pass it if he/she runs beyond it.
Wherever you play should have goal lines on both ends, the width of the boundaries. Most high school, pro, and college teams play on a level area 120 yards long and 53 and a third yards wide. Their goal lines are 100 yards apart. A football field is marked with white lines. Any player who touches or crosses a sideline is ruled out of bounds. Yard lines cross the field every 5 yards.
The offense moves the ball down field toward the other team’s goal line. When they make it across the goal line, into what’s called the end zone, it’s a touchdown, and that’s worth six points. If the offense gets caught behind their own goal line, that’s called a safety - and the team on defense gets two points.
On fourth down, a kick through the goal posts, a field goal, is worth three points. After a touchdown, & kick through the goal post is one point, an extra point.
When you start a game, flip a coin or something to see who kicks off. It’s an advantage to get the ball, so you want to receive.
Any time a team scores, they kick off to the other team. The only exception is when the defense gets a safety, the offense kicks off That’s why safeties are so valuable. You get two points, and then you get the ball and a chance to score again.
When I played as a kid, we tried not to worry about penalties too much. When somebody did something wrong, we’d say, “Don’t do that!” you’re not allowed to hold on to another player, that’s called holding. You’re also not supposed to do something called pass interference, interfering with a player catching a pass. About the only penalty we had, though, was offsides. That’s when somebody jumps past the line of scrimmage before the ball is snapped. Hey, you were offsides, “someone would say.
When you watch football, it’ll be played on a complicated level. But when you play a game with friends, it shouldn’t be complicated. You don’t want to complicate your game with rules. Rules aren’t always important when your trying to have fun, the more you worry about rules in your game the more the game will stop and the less you’ll play. Run, throw, catch, kick, and chase. That’s football.
QUESTIONS
1. How many people do you need to play your own game of football?
2. What are you missing by only playing individual sports?
3. As a team, What do you always have to be thinking about?
4. What starts the action before each play or down?
5. Who kicks or punts the ball after a safety has occurred?
6. List some ways you can get a first down in a game of football you have
made up. Make sure you explain your answer.
7. What is pass interference?
8. What complicates a game?
9. What is the difference between a field goal and an extra point?
10. Who can play football?