I won’t start arguing on whether ties are pathetic or not. That’s more of a preference.

The fact that a coinflip “determines” who wins a game, as so many fans and analysts want you to believe, is ridiculous. Overtime begins the same way it does at the beginning of the game and after any score: a kickoff that puts the return unit and offense in a position where they need to string together a number of reasonably successful plays in order to have a chance to score. In college overtime, any team with a slightly above average kicker is given a good chance at putting up 3 points even if the offense fails to move the ball on 3 downs. It’s similar to the International Baseball Federation’s extra-innings rule:

From the top of the 11th inning on, each batting team will “re-start” its hitting order by beginning the inning with placement of base runners on first and second with no outs. These must be consecutive batters in the order, and it is up to the manager to decide who those runners will be.

That’s bastardized baseball, as is starting football OT on your opponent’s 25-yard line. Football’s a timed game of sixty minutes, and college’s OT rules turns it into a different format. It makes no sense to me. I find it amusing that college football’s OT rules are considered “fair”, when not much else of what determines the champion is.

I agree. But a lot of the negativity about the NBA and the complaints about players showboating is because the players are young, black, wear tatoos, and listen to rap music. That’s why he wrote “hip hop crap.” Of course, that’s not limited to black kids, but the public perception of it is.

Wait a minute — there’s a big difference between being self-centered and celebrating after touchdowns and breaking the law. All self-centered athletes aren’t criminals; in fact, most are not. That’s just stereotyping of the worst form.

Many of these athletes also give money to charity and help out their hometowns. Listen, I don’t like all the celebrating after every play and showboating that goes on either. But you’re taking it way too far if you’re labeling them all as law-breakers. Just because you like bumping your chest doesn’t make you a bad person. And when you call it the “hip hop” culture, and label them all criminals, that sounds very racist. It doesn’t matter if Jim Brown agrees or not.

i don’t know what Jim Brown would say, but i promise you he’d punch you in the mouth if you decried the “hip hop culture” to him. what does that even mean? to me, it’s bullsh*t, 21st century, thinly-veiled racism. i’m NOT calling you a racist…please understand that. nor am i trying to incite a racial argument here. simply making an observation.

celebration and self-aggrandizment has next to nothing to do with a “hip hop culture” and a lot more to do with the age-old plague of ego and self-importance of highly talented people who acquire great sums of money, regardless of culture. you think silicon valley billionaires buying $100mm yachts is any different, at its base level, than TO shaking pompoms after a TD?

How did we get from celebrating to breaking the law? If you don’t like the way Chris Henry acts off the field, I have no quarrel with you. No one would. To equate that to Chad Johnson acting like an idiot after a touchdown is completely unfair.

Celebration is a part of our culture now. From HS to the NFL, people thump their chests and draw attention when they make a good play. They have earned the right, through hard work and dedication, to do that. You have earned the right, by owning a tv, to not watch it. It can be annoying at times, but just because some of the people don’t like it some of the time doesn’t mean it should be outlawed or even that it is wrong.

This respect stuff is garbage. It’s a competition. Frankly, it annoys me to see players helping opposing players up, smiling, and slapping them on the butt. The idea is to beat the person opposite you in any way in which you can. Respect just gets in the way of that. What do you want these guys to do? Shake hands after the game and go out for ice cream? The simple way to avoid being disrespected is to not allow yourself to be beaten by your opponent. If that happens, you run the risk of being humiliated.

Jim Brown is a relic of a past age. He is no more relevant to this conversation than Abe Lincoln is.

There are things about todays game that are positive. I think it’s cool that you can find out easily what’s going on in any game being played, not just your local game (if it wasn’t blacked out) and MAYBE one other game if you were lucky.

Remember back when you were a kid when the Browns would get blacked out occasionally and there would be no game on the other network. Nothing but something awful like ice skating on…. Uggg…. man that sucked.