I've put this off long enough.
To all the coaches, analysts and other talking heads: the overuse of the word “football” is now completely out of hand and if it isn't curbed soon, no other modifier will ever be used when describing the game and its action.
When talking about the sport, it's obvious that the ball used is indeed a football; there's no need to specify. Following that thinking, it's also obvious that the teams are football teams, the field is a football field and that the plays ran are football plays.
We're also aware that the NFL stands for the National Football League and most of us agree that restating which league specifically it is you're referring to only makes you sound redundant, not smarter.
It starts with the coaches; they speak like this. Analysts want to sound as intelligent and contemporary as the coaches, so they speak like this too. Then radio personalities, who are desperate for buzz words and terms of emphasis begin to speak like this, then the callers to these radio shows, then the callers' children who watch the game with Dad on Sunday, and eventually their make-believe friends are talking about the football plays on the football field with the football uprights and football water coolers which carry football water to the hardest working and thirstiest of the players which announcers and coaches affectionately call “football” players.
Do you see what's happening?
I'm not sure when this all started, but it's popularity has grown to alarming levels. As a country who has too many people in college for its own good, certainly we, who make up the “football” universe, can invent and create new ways of talking about the sport without resorting to such an obvious and repetitive term.
I'm not saying we should cut out the use of the word altogether---sometimes it's necessary and can't be avoided---but I'm convinced that we can do better.
Mojokong---if I wanted to hear the word football spoken over and over, I'd buy a parrot.
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2 comments:
Preach on brother.
To me, its a matter of self-importance. Much like the lawyer speaks in his legal jargon, and doctors speak in their overly technical medical jibber-jabber, football professionals (and their hangers-on) need to make themselves feel more special and complex than they really are.
The redundancy is certainly a problem, but I think the underlying problem is that the term "football" has taken a bigger, more complex meaning. It no longer is used simply to describe something that relates to the game, but rather implies something more accomplished, something grander, like the epitome of the sport. It has almost become a synonym for the word "good". For example, Marvin often says, "a football player making a football play". What he's really saying is, "a good player making a good play."
Unfortunately, I see no end to this. Coaches are forced to speak more often than they ought to, answer inane questions with regurgitated nonsense, and essentially, speak without saying anything. Media saturation is the cause, and its such a big industry, its only going to get worse.
You've produced some wining football commentary here, and so-forth.
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