A Harmless Obsession

August 5, 2006 4:35 PM

American Football. A montage of rousing moments of football action, a heartfelt soundtrack, and gratuitous special effects combine to produce a surrealistic portrayal of America's greatest sport. Discovery sequence: Ronaldinho: Touch of Gold, Best soccer goals FIFA, Ronaldinho vs Zidane, hockey.
posted by five fresh fish (16 comments total)

That Ronaldinho vs Zidane video is a thing of athletic beauty. Wow.
posted by caddis at 4:59 PM on August 5, 2006

I simply couldn't finish the football one.

IMO soccer is easily the most telegenic of those sports, and hockey by far the least. I couldn't find an American-style football link that had anything particularly super, but I suspect there could be some great lacrosse and rugby stuff.

Soccer seems to strike an excellent balance between fine and gross motor skills. Is there anything else as good as it?
posted by five fresh fish at 5:28 PM on August 5, 2006

Would rather see the old NFL films from the 60's and early 70's with that great soundtrack
posted by wfc123 at 5:38 PM on August 5, 2006

Is there anything else as good as it?

Basketball.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 6:18 PM on August 5, 2006

I simply couldn't finish the football one.

IMO soccer is easily the most telegenic of those sports, and hockey by far the least. I couldn't find an American-style football link that had anything particularly super, but I suspect there could be some great lacrosse and rugby stuff.

Soccer seems to strike an excellent balance between fine and gross motor skills. Is there anything else as good as it?

Absolutely. College football. Enjoy snarking at these.
posted by dw at 6:23 PM on August 5, 2006

I could not find any films online of Lynn Swann's awesome catches, and the NFL film here was hard to watch so I could have missed him. He was as ballet like like as Michael Jordan but in the art of catching a football rather than dunking a basketball. His performances were the most beautiful of all times in the NFL. Joe Montana and Jerry Rice were the most effective duo in NFL football, but Swann was the most graceful, IMHO.
posted by caddis at 6:30 PM on August 5, 2006

Soccer seems to strike an excellent balance between fine and gross motor skills. Is there anything else as good as it?
posted by five fresh fish at 5:28 PM PST on August 5 [+] [!]

Oh man, many sports. Baseball even has it, just at a leisurely pace. But if we're going on what sport pushes coordination, footwork, speed, stamina, and reflexes to the maximum, I'd say tennis has soccer beat by a longshot, and basketball has it beat by a significant amount.
posted by fleacircus at 10:30 PM on August 5, 2006

I simply couldn't finish the football one.

So you made a post with a video that you didn't even watch all the way through? Just to point out how much american football sucks or what?
posted by bob sarabia at 10:35 PM on August 5, 2006

Would rather see the old NFL films from the 60's and early 70's with that great soundtrack

Oh! And the voice! The voice.

"The frooozen tundra of Lammmbeauuu fieeellld..."
posted by fusinski at 12:37 AM on August 6, 2006

I've searched long and hard in my soul for many years to find a reason in my heart of hearts to accept football as something that has the right to co-exist in my reality. I've come up with only one good reason. It gave George Carlin another great opportunity to be funny.
posted by ZachsMind at 12:54 AM on August 6, 2006

Terrible post. The football video was so pixelated as to be unwatchable. From what I could tell it wasn't anything special anyway.
posted by sic at 1:33 AM on August 6, 2006

Watching sportsvideos like this on Youtube really takes 80% of the fun out of it - it's mostly an exercise in pattern recognition. With some of those A-football clips the level of detail on the ball is about as good as in Pong.
posted by thijsk at 2:53 AM on August 6, 2006

So you made a post with a video that you didn't even watch all the way through? Just to point out how much american football sucks or what?

No. The main link is the A/V equivalent of Time Cube guy's mostly harmless lunacy. It is to laugh at, not to take seriously. One of those web offerings that's so horribly bad, it's almost good.

I mean, come on, "Knights in White Satin" and nausea-inducing special video effects? It is to laugh. Did you not read the freakin' descriptive sentence? "...a surrealistic portrayal of America's greatest sport."

Get with the program, sports. Unclench your arsehole and enjoy.
posted by five fresh fish at 10:27 AM on August 6, 2006

BTW, if anyone has links to actual great video of "Best Moments/Goals" in any sport, I'm eager to watch them. The soccer ones really were very enjoyable, and I should think there are equally good ones for other sports.

I'm gonna hunt for the tennis and basketball. I can certainly see bball have some fantastic moves and tricks.
posted by five fresh fish at 1:56 PM on August 6, 2006

Love it. That's football.
posted by Ironmouth at 5:15 PM on August 6, 2006

The limits of youtube show here where you really want higher resolution. Sports have sold more high def tvs than anything else (of course that statistic comes straight out of my ***). A youtube for sports clips which had higher resolution would be a hit. The leagues themselves could do it and probably even charge subscription.

You can't handle my game! (the last play is really fun)
posted by caddis at 5:30 PM on August 6, 2006