Few things in life get me as amped up as intramural flag football games. When I buckle those ratty flags around my waist, I experience the kind of rush I haven’t felt since high school volleyball, before I destroyed my knee.
I step out onto that fun-sized intramural field with my team and the spirit of competition comes rushing back to me. Sure, I know the guys that ref our games show up for pure entertainment, but that’s fine with me – I’m not under any delusions of greatness.
You may think that being a sports writer, I know all there is to know about football. You would be sadly mistaken.
Sure, I know everything you need to know as a spectator, and I’ll always be a die-hard Browns fan, even if they never figure out that calling 2-yard plays on third and long doesn’t usually work out so well.
But you can’t truly grasp everything there is to know about a sport until you play it. I yell and curse at the Browns on my TV, certain I could run faster and catch more passes than Brian Slo-biskie.
Then I tried playing football and realized I had no idea what I was doing.
The first five minutes of my illustrious career consisted of running aimlessly downfield with no idea that I was in no position to be of help to anyone.
Things haven’t gotten much better. I’ve snagged a couple passes here and there, but in my most recent game I learned something extremely important.
Running in mud is kind of like driving in it. If you try to go immediately from 0 to 60, you will fall flat on your face.
But at least the team pulled out the W.
Some might not even qualify what we do as “playing,” but everyone’s a critic. These same people might ask, how can you possibly get so into FLAG football? It’s not even tackle. To these people I would ask, have you even seen me?
Though it wouldn’t be from a lack of pure swagger and enthusiasm, I would not physically survive a game of tackle football. But I can guarantee you, I rip flags off like a sniper with no remorse.
My team subscribes to the age-old philosophy: keep it simple, stupid. Our offense consists of two plays: running and passing. Ninety-five percent of the time we go with the former.
We definitely keep it pretty simple. We have no need for all those X’s and O’s and squiggly lines going in 80 different directions.
But even without the crazy trick plays, we have still managed to secure a place in the championship game today at 6 p.m.
I’m expecting to see a pretty good turnout, so get there early if you want a seat close to all the action.
When all is said and done, it’s just an intramural sport. But I feel like we should still be given the same opportunities to chalk up wins as any other team.
Three games ago, we were forced to end in an extremely unsatisfying tie.
Really?
Who ends games in ties anymore? This isn’t amateur hour.
Well, I guess maybe it kind of is.
