Football: Why Is It So Popular Today?

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Understanding football is the main course into knowing why it is so popular. Many other sports do not compare to the impact football has on players and on the fans of its kind. We live in a world that is so diverse and any entertainment comes to us natural. Gambling seems to be the most entertainment is our human society today. We long for Gladiator type sports and games for public entertainment.
To get a better understanding on why football is popular today, we must first look back on the history of the sport.
The first vestiges of what would become American football are found in the 19th century in the games played by students at the elite schools and universities of the United States. A particularly violent running game was played at Princeton University circa 1820, and around this time a kicking game was also being played by students of Dartmouth College. Rules for the Dartmouth game, known as “Old Division Football”, were published in 1871. The first running game to codify its rules was the popular English sport, rugby, and it did so in 1845 (“A Brief History of Football” para.2). Today the NFL has the highest attendance of any other sport in America. Over the years it has grown to astronomical proportions and keeps growing every day. According to the Encyclopedia of International Sports Studies, the overall annual attendance increased from three million at the beginning of former Commissioners Pete Roselle’s term 1960, to seventeen million by the end of his tenure in 1989, and 400 million viewers watched 1989’s Super Bowl XXIII (pp. 932–933). Crazy right? Yes, I thought so to. But, if it wasn’t for Pete, I really do not think the NFL would be as popular today.
According to one news reporter, “Unlike most professional spor...

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...he gets paid $6 million annually by the state of Louisiana as an inducement not to move his team. Now that was something I didn’t know, makes you think of where your tax dollars are going to. The NFL’s salary cap makes it so that every team, no matter where they are from, are put on an equal playing field (K.,Jack, par.10). Football’s 16-game season is crucial to the success of its business. The one game a week format has made the want for football more prevalent. In business terms its supply and demand. Since the sport has less of a supply of football games, the demand for them goes up (k.par.4) No matter how great one person is if the rest of his team does not make the grade he will never win. SO many different teams and so many different play styles make sure no game is ever the same. All around just an amazing thing to watch. It's the ultimate Team Sport really.

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