AHC: Make football a popular sport worldwide.

I don't want to get all basebally on this, but I think the barrier for entry in the immediate post war era would just be a ball.
But American football with "just a ball" comes awfully close to Rugby.
As in, if you pardon my computer-translated French to imitate the then-recently liberated French,
"Pourquoi ne jouons-nous pas au rugby?"

Or am I misunderstanding what you mean?

If we're going to talk about exporting North American sports we'd have to look at baseball, where at least it's significantly different from it's competitors to find a niche in random places like Italy, the Netherlands, and all over East Asia.
I think we would need to look at basketball, which is a North American sport and has done more
than "find a niche in random places".

Come to think of it, basketball comes close to football when one considers the arguments of "Why
football and not American football?". Things like:
It has a low entry cost. Not quite as low as football, but all you need is a ball that behaves correctly and
something to mark the goal with. The semi-traditional two schoolbags don't exactly match a proper football goal in effect on the game and my argument here is that you can play something recognisable as basket without the hoop. It just takes a little more effort, which is part of the argument.
It is deceptively simple.
It does NOT have to be violent, which despite the argumentio ad masculinity is a selling point.
One can practise it by oneself, with just the ball, and it would still be recognisable as "practising football/basketball".

I was trying to think of a scenario where America was more internationally-engaged early on in its history leading to a kind of analogue to the British commercial expat clubs phenomenon you got with football in South America and Europe.
There is also the hard to dispute fact that American football developed from football, and by the time
it had diverged enough from rugby that someone said "Maybe I should wear a helmet.", football had
already begun spreading across the world.

But then I remembered that when natives actually got control of those clubs IOTL, like with Genoa CFC, they thought 'Fuck cricket, we're playing football from now on'. So it's hardly any guarantee of perpetuating things.
On the other hand it sort of points towards the key matter, doesn't it?
 
This is slightly off topic, but if you want to expand baseball than you’re going to come up against cricket, which already has associations in the countries you’re targeting. The ICC has associations in most countries the n the world.

The Netherlands national side for instance plays in UK one day competitions.

Even in the USA there’s a very healthy grassroots cricket scene. There’s a Test Standard ground in Miami, more people play cricket in New York State than in England, the NYPD run a cricket league to attempt to rehabilitate criminals of Caribbean and South Asian heritage. There’s even a cricket club in Compton (Straight Outta) for the same purpose and for the homeless.

Actually, I mentioned the Netherlands and Italy since they're two of the European countries with what passes as active baseball communities. They're microscopic compared to the North American, Latin American, and East Asian scenes, but they have sent a few players to Major League Baseball. Otherwise I by and large agree. At the end of the day sports are competing over the same thing: leisure time and talent pool. If a sport fills roughly the same niche as another sport with similarities (ie "bat and ball" or "run/kick a ball across a large field of roughly 100 meters") then the sport that is already established will have a rough time.


But American football with "just a ball" comes awfully close to Rugby.
As in, if you pardon my computer-translated French to imitate the then-recently liberated French,
"Pourquoi ne jouons-nous pas au rugby?"

Or am I misunderstanding what you mean?

In that context I was referring more to the fact that the only protective gear used at the time was a leather helmet that I imagine didn't proliferate in things like pick up games that Americans would mostly be playing in Europe Post-War. But broadly speaking I think most of the changes you'd have to make come down to make football more like rugby.


I think we would need to look at basketball, which is a North American sport and has done more
than "find a niche in random places".

Come to think of it, basketball comes close to football when one considers the arguments of "Why
football and not American football?". Things like:
It has a low entry cost. Not quite as low as football, but all you need is a ball that behaves correctly and
something to mark the goal with. The semi-traditional two schoolbags don't exactly match a proper football goal in effect on the game and my argument here is that you can play something recognisable as basket without the hoop. It just takes a little more effort, which is part of the argument.
It is deceptively simple.
It does NOT have to be violent, which despite the argumentio ad masculinity is a selling point.
One can practise it by oneself, with just the ball, and it would still be recognisable as "practising football/basketball".


There is also the hard to dispute fact that American football developed from football, and by the time
it had diverged enough from rugby that someone said "Maybe I should wear a helmet.", football had
already begun spreading across the world.


On the other hand it sort of points towards the key matter, doesn't it?

I think you've hit the nail on the head by bringing up basketball. It has the lowest barrier to entry of any sport developed in North America, and it's beginning to proliferate world wide. I think that it even has some benefits over soccer. For example, once the hoops are installed it's easier to set up organized play. In that I mean the proper regulation playing area is much smaller than a soccer pitch.

Overall though, I think your remark about the divergence with helmets really brings the whole thing home. I suppose technically that would be a post-1900 POD, but that also presumes that football would be a big enough sport that it's the one that Americans export at the time of the Great War. If Americans are looking to export a sport at that time it's baseball, and if we'd change football enough that people don't think they'd need the helmet it would be a form of rugby.

This is the problem when too many sports are too closely related ;)
 
But why is it called a 'tough-down' when they don't? It seems to be that the receiver of the long forward pass does a quick sprint crosses the line then that's it he's do it, he throw the ball to the ground but he doesn't - ball in hand touch-down on to the ground!

By contrast, in Rugby the defence is trying as much as possible to prevent the person crossing the line from grounding the ball in hand to qualify for scoring a 'try'! Ideally the 'grounding will be between the posts as that effects where the conversion kick is taken from. And, in Rugby, while some positions make it more likely to score from, a player at any position could be a 'try' scorer.
 
I think we've thrashed this out for long enough to make a pros and cons list.

Mine would be 2 CONS.

  1. The requirement for so many players limiting the population pool able to field regulation teams; small towns don't have enough suitable people to maker a regulation team.
  2. The lack of ball handling as a pre requisite skill that can be built organically, without more people and equipment.
Any others? Any PROS why it should/could gain more support?

My point of contention against your argument is that:
1. 8-man football is a big thing in rural areas, especially high schools with small student bodies--many 8-man football teams have players who play both offense and defense. This can scale up to a regulation team when needed.
2. American football isn't as flexible as other football codes in that regard, but if you have maybe half a dozen people, it shouldn't be hard to develop the skills needed for American football success.
 
American football isn't as flexible as other football codes in that regard, but if you have maybe half a dozen people, it shouldn't be hard to develop the skills needed for American football success.

Does that imply it's a simple sport not needing a great deal of skill? Unlike Association Football, where being able to control the ball, have the vision of what to do when you have, and what space to run into when you don't have it.
 
Does that imply it's a simple sport not needing a great deal of skill? Unlike Association Football, where being able to control the ball, have the vision of what to do when you have, and what space to run into when you don't have it.

Basically. Think of this scenario. You and your friends join some older kids in the neighbourhood for some casual games of football after school everyday (or once a week, whenever). The older kids learned from their older brothers or other older kids and have learned how to play all the positions, that's why the older kids are usually the quarterbacks. In a few years, you end up learning all the skills, and combined with exposure to pro football (either on TV, the radio, being taken to football games by your parents, etc.) you become pretty good at it yourself.

So yes, there's plenty of opportunities for youth to organically develop their skills at the game from basically nothing.
 
My point of contention against your argument is that:
1. 8-man football is a big thing in rural areas, especially high schools with small student bodies--many 8-man football teams have players who play both offense and defense. This can scale up to a regulation team when needed.
2. American football isn't as flexible as other football codes in that regard, but if you have maybe half a dozen people, it shouldn't be hard to develop the skills needed for American football success.

8 man football is an offshoot, real football played to the rules needs a lot of people. If we're talking about stuff that's a bit like proper American football then we're talking about Rugby, but we're not.

How does someone who needs skills other than ball handling develop those skills as a kid by themself? What is the American football equivalent of the soccer players kicking the ball up and catching it with their chest and all that other fancy footwork they do?
 
How does someone who needs skills other than ball handling develop those skills as a kid by themself? What is the American football equivalent of the soccer players kicking the ball up and catching it with their chest and all that other fancy footwork they do?

The closest would be a game of catch. Typically with two people one will snap the ball to the other and then run out for the pass. If there's a third then one will play "defense" and attempt to block the pass, intercept it, or try to block the receivers route.
 
Can't. Most countries don't have enough free land for lots of standard size football fields outside the US. Only Canada, and that's the only country American Football has taken root. Maybe Australia?

Also, AF runs into the same problems as Basketball in the international scene. Americans are bigger then most of the people in the world. Football is good for the big and tall type, while soccer is more universal for body shapes.

Also, I've spoken to foreigners about AF. They didn't understand why Americans would waste 3 hours watching a game. That's ok if you have a lot of free time. Also, football is boring. I say that as a football fan and player. The average game is 3 hours but only have 11 minutes of actual game time. People who aren't familiar with the game would quickly lose patience.

Um, what? Have you ever been out of the US?
 
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