Balance between Sport and Entertainment

[Wilgrove]

Most of us watch sports, whether it be Baseball, American Football, Soccer (or Football), etc. However, how many times has the governing body tried to make things more competitive?

I'll be honest, NASCAR governing body is starting to annoy me. They throw phantom debris caution that forces the pack to tighten up. They also have a lucky dog where the first driver to be lapped down before a caution can make the lap back up. The double restart doesn't bother me as much. The Car of Tomorrow doesn't bother me either, it forces the team and drivers to rely more on skill than the set up of a car.

So what has been done to your sport of choice to make it more interesting and more entertaining? Also, has the sport side of it suffered?

[Tsa-la-gi Nation]

A few years ago, in hockey, they took away they goalie's ability to skate up ice & play the puck. They also put in a shoot off at the end of a regulation tied game. I like the old, low scoring games better. Back then, the penalty shot was the only time you saw anything like a shoot off. It seems the old rules got the team to focus more on defense. I think any real fan of any team sport loves to watch good defense. I wished they would have left it alone.

[New Kereptica]

A while ago, they made the rule saying that you couldn't decapitate people in fencing. What the hell, man? That takes all the fun out of it. They're just pandering to those goddamn prudes who can't stand the sight of blood.

[Brewdomia]

Well The NFL (No Fun League) has decided to fine people for doing the simplest of things, and call penalties for pushing people. Bunch of sissies...

[Fenure]

A while ago, they made the rule saying that you couldn't decapitate people in fencing. What the hell, man? That takes all the fun out of it. They're just pandering to those goddamn prudes who can't stand the sight of blood.

I think you are looking at this wrong. Decapitation was ending matches to quickly. I for one think that watching people stabbed in multiple places cling to life while they keep fighting is much more entertaining.

[New Kereptica]

A while ago, they made the rule saying that you couldn't decapitate people in fencing. What the hell, man? That takes all the fun out of it. They're just pandering to those goddamn prudes who can't stand the sight of blood.

I think you are looking at this wrong. Decapitation was ending matches to quickly. I for one think that watching people stabbed in multiple places cling to life while they keep fighting is much more entertaining.

That's just the point! Decapitation is a legitimate tactic, and it's been banned, if not to pander to the prudes, to make the matches more entertaining! It's an outrage!

[Barringtonia]

Well The NFL (No Fun League) has decided to fine people for doing the simplest of things, and call penalties for pushing people. Bunch of sissies...

Is NFL similar to dog-fighting?

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009 ... t_gladwell

Professional football players, too, are selected for gameness. When Kyle Turley was knocked unconscious, in that game against the Packers, he returned to practice four days later because, he said, “I didn’t want to miss a game.” Once, in the years when he was still playing, he woke up and fell into a wall as he got out of bed. “I start puking all over,” he recalled. “So I said to my wife, ‘Take me to practice.’ I didn’t want to miss practice.” The same season that he was knocked unconscious, he began to have pain in his hips. He received three cortisone shots, and kept playing. At the end of the season, he discovered that he had a herniated disk. He underwent surgery, and four months later was back at training camp. “They put me in full-contact practice from day one,” he said. “After the first day, I knew I wasn’t right. They told me, ‘You’ve had the surgery. You’re fine. You should just fight through it.’ It’s like you’re programmed. You’ve got to go without question—I’m a warrior. I can block that out of my mind. I go out, two days later. Full contact. Two-a-days. My back locks up again. I had re-herniated the same disk that got operated on four months ago, and bulged the disk above it.” As one of Turley’s old coaches once said, “He plays the game as it should be played, all out,” which is to say that he put the game above his own well-being.

[Brewdomia]

A while ago, they made the rule saying that you couldn't decapitate people in fencing. What the hell, man? That takes all the fun out of it. They're just pandering to those goddamn prudes who can't stand the sight of blood.

I think you are looking at this wrong. Decapitation was ending matches to quickly. I for one think that watching people stabbed in multiple places cling to life while they keep fighting is much more entertaining.

That's just the point! Decapitation is a legitimate tactic, and it's been banned, if not to pander to the prudes, to make the matches more entertaining! It's an outrage!

Fencing sounds interesting.

[Tsa-la-gi Nation]

A while ago, they made the rule saying that you couldn't decapitate people in fencing. What the hell, man? That takes all the fun out of it. They're just pandering to those goddamn prudes who can't stand the sight of blood.

You know, they have the same rule in hockey. What's the world coming to?

[Cannot think of a name]

The debris caution is bullshit. It all but turns the race up until that point into a lengthy qualifying session. Then you get crap like you got today, where cautions breed cautions and you have twenty minutes of the cars sitting on the banking waiting for them to clean up actual debris from the wreck that was facilitated by the previous caution. It's stupid. It's a race, you race to the end.

The 'lucky dog' was a safety thing. Cars were racing to the line on yellows to get their laps back, meaning while there was a danger on the track cars started racing harder. It was unsafe, so they created the 'lucky dog.'

Parity is a hard thing to maintain, but when it becomes spec racing it's not as interesting. Le Mans GT2 (soon to be just regular GT) manages to even up Porsches, Corvettes, Ferraris, Panoz', a Ford GT, Lamborghinis (alright, the Lambo never finishes...), BMWs, and Jaguar into a field that's still pretty close despite being a combination of rear engine, mid-engine, front-engine, and six to twelve cylinders. In fact, at the finale today the race was so close the Flying Lizards Porsche drove the Corvette into the wall on the way to the finish line (I really wish that hadn't happened. Flying Lizards is my favorite team, but that move was jacked) SPEED GT and KONI Challenge do the same, the latter adding Mustangs, Challengers, and Camaros (it's like old school Trans Am!) It can be done without making the cars clones. Okay, I just wanted to pimp sports cars again and I had to talk to someone about todays GT2 finish because that was fucking nuts.

Of course, it can be done entirely wrong as well. When F1 wanted to slow the cars up and encourage passing the cars came out faster and the driving line narrower with the grooved tire and smaller wing (thankfully the tire is gone now).

[Wilgrove]

The debris caution is bullshit. It all but turns the race up until that point into a lengthy qualifying session. Then you get crap like you got today, where cautions breed cautions and you have twenty minutes of the cars sitting on the banking waiting for them to clean up actual debris from the wreck that was facilitated by the previous caution. It's stupid. It's a race, you race to the end.

The 'lucky dog' was a safety thing. Cars were racing to the line on yellows to get their laps back, meaning while there was a danger on the track cars started racing harder. It was unsafe, so they created the 'lucky dog.'

I wonder how many accidents were caused by the double file restart oppose to single file restart. Hell when was the last time the Sprint Cup had a single file restart?

[Ryadn]

A few years ago, in hockey, they took away they goalie's ability to skate up ice & play the puck. They also put in a shoot off at the end of a regulation tied game. I like the old, low scoring games better. Back then, the penalty shot was the only time you saw anything like a shoot off. It seems the old rules got the team to focus more on defense. I think any real fan of any team sport loves to watch good defense. I wished they would have left it alone.

Er, what? D'you mean goalies can't pass the blue line to play the puck? They can still skate quite a ways, if they're so inclined (I prefer it when mine stays in the goddamn crease, thank you very much). I agree with the shootout being suck. I don't see what the huge problem was with ties. I like the elimination of the red line, myself, because it speeds the game up without sacrificing defense.

[Maurepas]

Id actually like at least one change to NCAA Football, I think a playoff system is most definitely due...

[Zombie PotatoHeads]

All sport has become manipulated in order to drag as much revenue out of it as possible. The classic is cricket. How many forms of it does there need to be, and how many 'championship' trophies need to be played each year in order to satisfy the ruling body's need for cash?
I'm waiting for the day that there's an Ashes test series every 6 months. Once a year in the NH, once a year in the SH. Alternate Summers.

Rugby's almost as bad. Most of the rule changes over the past decade or two have been to make games higher scoring, and thus more marketable and viewer-friendly. No-one, other than purists, want to watch an entire 80 minute game that ends in 3-0 (which is one shot at goal to nowt, for you non-rugby playing ppls out there). That's what soccer is there for.