AFL and NFL things

[BobbyMorri]

FFS. Talk about moving the goal posts we were talking AVERAGE ATENDANCES and FOOTBALL.

raw doesnt mean average. unless you say "raw average".

Keep saying the to yourself and maybe you'll believe it.

I don't. I posted facts. anything per capita/average related can be read "wrong" if one doesn't understand the context.

Yes, it is single city based and the NFL is not even in every large city whereas AFL is almost suburban.

America is x10 bigger than Aus. What do you expect from its biggest league. And AFL is very much not a suburban comp anymore. All the teams play out of the same large stadiums

FFS. Different SEASONS and different CODES.
NFL like AFL goes up against soccer and smashes the "world" game.
Why don't you stick to soccer and stop the trolling ?

NFL overlaps with all of them. MLB is really the only summer sport.

And there is no difference between a code or sport. they are all ball/puck sports. they are all entertainment. they are all going for the sporting dollar.

I don't post on the soccer forum. Just because I have a different opinion, doesn't make me a troll or trolling in my response, especially as I have provided reasons for it. This is a discussion forum.

 

[RedV3x]

raw doesnt mean average.

As you yourself said

raw doesnt mean average. unless you say "raw average".

anything per capita/average related can be read "wrong" if one doesn't understand the context.

and the context was CLEARLY average.

America is x10 bigger than Aus.

FFS. The U.S.A. approximately equal in size with Australia but with 13 times the population.

What do you expect from its biggest league.

I expect the NFL to be pretty much what it is.

And AFL is very much not a suburban comp anymore. All the teams play out of the same large stadiums.

Many AFL teams share stadiums, not all and that is an economic advantage.

NFL overlaps with all of them. .

You're clutching straws here. "All" not being any football or remotely similar code and "overlapping" isn't direct competition.

And there is no difference between a code or sport. they are all ball/puck sports. they are all entertainment. they are all going for the sporting dollar.

I don't post on the soccer forum. Just because I have a different opinion, doesn't make me a troll or trolling in my response, especially as I have provided reasons for it. This is a discussion forum.

And there is no difference between a code or sport. they are all ball/puck sports. they are all entertainment. they are all going for the sporting dollar.

I'm glad you follow soccer with that simplistic thinking.

I don't post on the soccer forum.

Surprise surprise.

doesn't make me a troll or trolling in my response.

IMO you're continual hijacking of threads away from the main discussion is trolling.
You took an AFL advance into NSW and Qld to an AFL vs NFL thread.

 

[BobbyMorri]

IMO you're continual hijacking of threads away from the main discussion is trolling.
You took an AFL advance into NSW and Qld to an AFL vs NFL thread.

oh please. You the one who first made the comparison, with, and I quote

Well on a per head of population basis the AFL has the highest attendances and outperforms the NFL.

And I said that is a stupid stat that means nothing.

And instead of moving on, you attack and attack. Ya could have let it go..

ohh. and Brisbane loves the AFL more than Melbourne, on your per capita average rating thingy. But lets compare 2 different sports in 2 different leagues in 2 different countries using this very flawed stat because it makes the AFL go on top.

ps that is my last post on the issue

 

[Professor Knowall]

This is a weird thread - I don't know why it exists (probably better not to know), but hey, being a very frequent American traveller (until covid came along) - and not just the usual big cities but also following the roads and away from the beaten tourist tracks, through the cities, town and rural areas of the mid-west and especially the south - aka fly-over country (and if you don't believe me, just check out all the pages of stuff I've posted on the Country Music thread in the Music subforum) I can add a little bit. Along the way I've learnt a few things about the American Footbal. This'll be just a real quick summary, otherwise I'll go on for too long -
1. The code doesn't have community based clubs like all the codes have here (a few for soccer and rugby, most other countries). There's historical reasons for this I won't go into here - but that's the way it is.
2. Instead, apart from the pro-level NFL (which only really took off as a major thing after WW2) all the sport, apart from the kiddies level is basically only played at school and college - and that's it. There's probably more American Football community clubs in Australia than the US - where in all my travels I've never encountered one.
3. The sport, or code, itself is popular right across the country, but not so much the NFL - in fact where the sport is at it's most popular, being the mid-west and South, College and High School level is far more popular and followed than the big city NFL franchises.
4. Far more people watch college (NCAA) ball, both live and on TV, than the NFL.
5. In smaller cities (especially in Texas, places like Lubbock and Abilene etc), high school football is huge.
6. Many avid Football fans I've met in the US will only watch the Super Bowl because it's an "event" with extra entertainment, but apart from that, it's only College or High School ball they'll attend or view on TV, not NFL.
7. For the vast majority of players - all those not good enough to be invited by a college - the last game of American Football they'll ever play is their last high school game at age 17 or 18. Even for very good players who just miss out
on a college career, that's it - it's all over.
8. Ditto for college players who aren't drafted into the NFL (again the vast majority). Once their 3-4 years of college is done, so is their football playing days - they can go from playing in front of crowds of over 100,000 and a massive TV audience to being all over for them at age 21 or 22 with hopefully a useful college degree and that's it.

From the above, one can deduce it's very different from our community club based sport here. One interesting thing I found is that so many I met prefer to watch college ball as they find it far more entertaining - because they aren't full time professional NFL trained, drilled and skilled athletes that rarely make mistakes - and hence the NFL tends to be very predictable in what happens, whereas in college ball, the unexpected and unpredictable often occurs, which makes it more exciting to watch. Having seen both, I agree.

But to compare the US and Australian codes is rather pointless. The whole set-up over their is altogether too different from the experience here to make meaningful comparisons.

 

[NoobPie]

oh please. You the one who first made the comparison, with, and I quote

And I said that is a stupid stat that means nothing.

And instead of moving on, you attack and attack. Ya could have let it go..

So let me get this straight. You tell someone that the "stat" they just posted "is a stupid stat that means nothing" and they are meant to "move on" and "let it go"? But because they responded, and kept responding to your subsequent responses you are then accusing them of "attacking and attacking" you? You genuinely feel like you are being "attacked" in an exchange where the other person is responding to you in the same manner in an exchange you instigated when you derided his post?

The lack of self-awareness is remarkable.

Now that we have ok'd the use of the word, by far the "stupidest" contribution to the exchange was the idea that, because the AFL plays games in big stadiums, you would expect them to have big average crowds.

I mean, what does that say about the A League? I've seen A League soccer games in near empty big stadiums on the telly with the only dense bit a group of young males bunched up close at one end jumping around with their tops off. Why aren't all those other seats magically filling up with people?

The AFL is massively global outlier in terms of the attendances it gets relative to population and the revenue it pulls in. This is undeniable. There is simply no other league in any comparable country that is anything like it.

Surely this is something to be proud of. I can't imagine living in this country if, rather than being proud like RedV3x you would actually get so bitter and twisted in knots trying to deny it. It's kinda sad when you think about it

 

[Lip Gallagher]

This is a weird thread - I don't know why it exists (probably better not to know), but hey, being a very frequent American traveller (until covid came along) - and not just the usual big cities but also following the roads and away from the beaten tourist tracks, through the cities, town and rural areas of the mid-west and especially the south - aka fly-over country (and if you don't believe me, just check out all the pages of stuff I've posted on the Country Music thread in the Music subforum). Along the way I've learnt a few things about the American Football along the way. This'll be just a real quick summary, otherwise I'll go on for too long -
1. The code doesn't have community based clubs like all the codes have here (a few for soccer and rugby, most other countries). There's historical reasons for this I won't go into here - but that's the way it is.
2. Instead, apart from the pro-level NFL (which only really took off as a major thing after WW2) all the sport, apart from the kiddies level is basically only played at school and college - and that's it. There's probably more American Football community clubs in Australia than the US - where in all my travels I've never encountered one.
3. The sport, or code, itself is popular right across the country, but not so much the NFL - in fact where the sport is at it's most popular, being the mid-west and South, College and High School level is far more popular and followed than the big city NFL franchises.
4. Far more people watch college (NCAA) ball, both live and on TV, than the NFL.
5. In smaller cities (especially in Texas, places like Lubbock and Abilene etc), high school football is huge.
6. Many avid Football fans I've met in the US will only watch the Super Bowl because it's an "event" with extra entertainment, but apart from that, it's only College or High School ball they'll attend or view on TV, not NFL.
7. For the vast majority of players - all those not good enough to be invited by a college - the last game of American Football they'll ever play is their last high school game at age 17 or 18. Even for very good players who just miss out
on a college career, that's it - it's all over.
8. Ditto for college players who aren't drafted into the NFL (again the vast majority). Once their 3-4 years of college is done, so is their football playing days - they can go from playing in front of crowds of over 100,000 and a massive TV audience to being all over for them at age 21 or 22 with hopefully a useful college degree and that's it.

From the above, one can deduce it's very different from our community club based sport here. One interesting thing I found is that so many I met prefer to watch college ball as they find it far more entertaining - because they aren't full time professional NFL trained, drilled and skilled athletes that rarely make mistakes - and hence the NFL tends to be very predictable in what happens, whereas in college ball, the unexpected and unpredictable often occurs, which makes it more exciting to watch. Having seen both, I agree.

But to compare the US and Australian codes is rather pointless. The whole set-up over their is altogether too different from the experience here to make meaningful comparisons.

Don’t many become prison guards and play against other prison guards

 

[RedV3x]

oh please. You the one who first made the comparison, with, and I quote

And I said that is a stupid stat that means nothing.

And instead of moving on, you attack and attack. Ya could have let it go..

ohh. and Brisbane loves the AFL more than Melbourne, on your per capita average rating thingy. But lets compare 2 different sports in 2 different leagues in 2 different countries using this very flawed stat because it makes the AFL go on top.

ps that is my last post on the issue

 

[RedV3x]

You the one who first made the comparison, with, and I quote "Well on a per head of population basis the AFL has the highest attendances and outperforms the NFL."

As well as having the fourth highest raw average attendances.
These are often quoted statistics and i quoted them in the context that the AFL has done exceptionally well
and is well positioned to increase it's presence in NSW and Queensland.
You're logic is seriously flawed if you cannot recognise the strength of those statistics.
It's those statistics and other statistics that show the strength of the Australian game in Australia
which can only improve with more involvement from NSW and Queensland.

The posting of the statistics was in no way an attempt at a pissing contest.
I quite like watching American Football (highlights anyway) and are actually concerned with it's current problems.
I hope there will always be American Football to watch as well as RU and RL but that doesn't
clash with my hope of Australian Football continuing to be more popular in Australia and around the world.

 

[RedV3x]

From the above, one can deduce it's very different from our community club based sport here. One interesting thing I found is that so many I met prefer to watch college ball as they find it far more entertaining - because they aren't full time professional NFL trained, drilled and skilled athletes that rarely make mistakes - and hence the NFL tends to be very predictable in what happens, whereas in college ball, the unexpected and unpredictable often occurs, which makes it more exciting to watch. Having seen both, I agree.

I agree with all your points which could easily be expanded on
which are more about American Football community compared to Australian Football community.
I also agree with amateur sports sometimes being more interesting because they are indeed not perfect and predictable.

But to compare the USA and Australian codes is rather pointless. The whole set-up over their is altogether too different from the experience here to make meaningful comparisons.

I think it is interesting to make comparisons as per some of your points and not so much the statistics etc.
Australian Football, despite it's lack of exposure is growing (albeit slowly) in the USA.
and one attraction of the game is that it is community football for adult ages with camaraderie.
Across the border in Canada, Australian Football is doing extremely well but despite some
superficial similarities there are also distinct differences.

 

[BobbyMorri]

As well as having the fourth highest raw average attendances.
These are often quoted statistics and i quoted them in the context that the AFL has done exceptionally well
and is well positioned to increase it's presence in NSW and Queensland.
You're logic is seriously flawed if you cannot recognise the strength of those statistics.
It's those statistics and other statistics that show the strength of the Australian game in Australia
which can only improve with more involvement from NSW and Queensland.

The posting of the statistics was in no way an attempt at a pissing contest.
I quite like watching American Football (highlights anyway) and are actually concerned with it's current problems.
I hope there will always be American Football to watch as well as RU and RL but that doesn't
clash with my hope of Australian Football continuing to be more popular in Australia and around the world.

huh?????

read this post again

thats the issue. that doesnt mean anything.

stadiums are capped. You can not get more than 100K to a game in modern times and you can only sell what your stadium holds. A lot of NFL matches are sell-outs and at a lower capacity than the MCG. For the NFL to "match" the AFL in average attended sport per population, it would have to do something which is physically impossible.

AFL would have one of the largest average capacity for its season. It should be high on average attendance and to its credit it is.

seriously, instead of calling me a troll(tiresome btw), maybe try and see the point I was making in the first place.

that is, attendance/population in most contexts has no meaning for all the reasons above. The fact that Brisbane has a higher average attendance per capita AFL crowds than Melbourne is a testament to that. Even you admit it in the post above by saying that Queensland can only grow. Well, if we use average attendance per capita crowds, Brisbane is already loved AFL more than Melbourne.

 

[NoobPie]

huh?????

read this post again



seriously, instead of calling me a troll(tiresome btw), maybe try and see the point I was making in the first place.

that is, attendance/population in most contexts has no meaning for all the reasons above. The fact that Brisbane has a higher average attendance per capita AFL crowds than Melbourne is a testament to that. Even you admit it in the post above by saying that Queensland can only grow. Well, if we use average attendance per capita crowds, Brisbane is already loved AFL more than Melbourne.

Huh?????

read this post again

So let me get this straight. You tell someone that the "stat" they just posted "is a stupid stat that means nothing" and they are meant to "move on" and "let it go"? But because they responded, and kept responding to your subsequent responses you are then accusing them of "attacking and attacking" you? You genuinely feel like you are being "attacked" in an exchange where the other person is responding to you in the same manner in an exchange you instigated when you derided his post?

The lack of self-awareness is remarkable.

Now that we have ok'd the use of the word, by far the "stupidest" contribution to the exchange was the idea that, because the AFL plays games in big stadiums, you would expect them to have big average crowds.

I mean, what does that say about the A League? I've seen A League soccer games in near empty big stadiums on the telly with the only dense bit a group of young males bunched up close at one end jumping around with their tops off. Why aren't all those other seats magically filling up with people?

The AFL is massively global outlier in terms of the attendances it gets relative to population and the revenue it pulls in. This is undeniable. There is simply no other league in any comparable country that is anything like it.

Surely this is something to be proud of. I can't imagine living in this country if, rather than being proud like RedV3x you would actually get so bitter and twisted in knots trying to deny it. It's kinda sad when you think about it

 

[RedV3x]

attendance/population in most contexts has no meaning

Attendance and population is PIVOTAL.
Any adult who has any understanding of Australian Football knows that Attendance and population is PIVOTAL.
Attendance and population has been PIVOTAL in the history of Australian Football through to modern day and into the future.
How is Attendance and population not PIVOTAL.
People are talking about Tasmania, Canberra, NT, WA3, NZ and other options.
The whole discussion centres around attendance through population.

 

[RedV3x]

The fact that Brisbane has a higher average attendance per capita AFL crowds than Melbourne is a testament to that.

Testament to what exactly ?
The fact that the AFL decided to go with an AFL side in Brisbane is a testament to the AFL's projection of success in Brisbane.
Any continuing improvement in AFL statistics for Queensland will be a bonus for the Lions, help the position of the Suns
and even advance other options like Northern Queensland or West Brisbane.

 

[RedV3x]

Brisbane is already loved AFL more than Melbourne.

So I guess you're implying that AFL is simply the best in Queensland.

 

[HomokHarcos]

This is a weird thread - I don't know why it exists (probably better not to know), but hey, being a very frequent American traveller (until covid came along) - and not just the usual big cities but also following the roads and away from the beaten tourist tracks, through the cities, town and rural areas of the mid-west and especially the south - aka fly-over country (and if you don't believe me, just check out all the pages of stuff I've posted on the Country Music thread in the Music subforum) I can add a little bit. Along the way I've learnt a few things about the American Footbal. This'll be just a real quick summary, otherwise I'll go on for too long -
1. The code doesn't have community based clubs like all the codes have here (a few for soccer and rugby, most other countries). There's historical reasons for this I won't go into here - but that's the way it is.
2. Instead, apart from the pro-level NFL (which only really took off as a major thing after WW2) all the sport, apart from the kiddies level is basically only played at school and college - and that's it. There's probably more American Football community clubs in Australia than the US - where in all my travels I've never encountered one.
3. The sport, or code, itself is popular right across the country, but not so much the NFL - in fact where the sport is at it's most popular, being the mid-west and South, College and High School level is far more popular and followed than the big city NFL franchises.
4. Far more people watch college (NCAA) ball, both live and on TV, than the NFL.
5. In smaller cities (especially in Texas, places like Lubbock and Abilene etc), high school football is huge.
6. Many avid Football fans I've met in the US will only watch the Super Bowl because it's an "event" with extra entertainment, but apart from that, it's only College or High School ball they'll attend or view on TV, not NFL.
7. For the vast majority of players - all those not good enough to be invited by a college - the last game of American Football they'll ever play is their last high school game at age 17 or 18. Even for very good players who just miss out
on a college career, that's it - it's all over.
8. Ditto for college players who aren't drafted into the NFL (again the vast majority). Once their 3-4 years of college is done, so is their football playing days - they can go from playing in front of crowds of over 100,000 and a massive TV audience to being all over for them at age 21 or 22 with hopefully a useful college degree and that's it.

From the above, one can deduce it's very different from our community club based sport here. One interesting thing I found is that so many I met prefer to watch college ball as they find it far more entertaining - because they aren't full time professional NFL trained, drilled and skilled athletes that rarely make mistakes - and hence the NFL tends to be very predictable in what happens, whereas in college ball, the unexpected and unpredictable often occurs, which makes it more exciting to watch. Having seen both, I agree.

But to compare the US and Australian codes is rather pointless. The whole set-up over their is altogether too different from the experience here to make meaningful comparisons.

I assume that's partly because for a long time the South didn't have any major professional sports teams, so people gravitated to watching the colllege football team. I've noticed something similar in Canada in terms of participation with ice hockey. Although it is very popular as a spectator sport I don't know any adult that plays it.

 

[RedV3x]

I've noticed something similar in Canada in terms of participation with ice hockey. Although it is very popular as a spectator sport I don't know any adult that plays it.

Even more pronounced with Canadian Football. I've never met anyone interested in the sport yet they must be out there somewhere.
Ice Hockey does have lower/state divisions that are also popular, but again for younger types.
Australian Football is doing extremely well in Canada - it's now an official sport.
It's played in some schools now. This is a big difference. If you have a patch of grass, then you can play football.
You don't need an ice rink or a hard court and ring or a field marked out in grids with a lot of infrastructure.

 

[Angus Young]

NFL is the biggest sport in the states played in the states.

AFL is the biggest sport in Australia played in Australia.

Both get huge crowds and have huge memberships.

America has approximately 13 x the population of Australia.
AFL crowds and membership numbers are exceptional considering the population.

Both are completely different, with different skill sets.

Close thread.

 

[Professor Knowall]

I assume that's partly because for a long time the South didn't have any major professional sports teams, so people gravitated to watching the colllege football team...

Sorry for the tardy reply ... actually it's more the other way around - college football has always been there (originating in the latter 19th century), and by the 1920's was already attracting huge crowds, up to 120,000 in some cases, whereas pro football only started in the 1930's and really only started being 'a thing' in the 1950's. The first Super Bowl wasn't until 1967. Thus college football has always had more support.

One more thing to add to my previous post - the big-city privately owned NFL franchises tend to have lots of fair-weather fans who view it more as just another form of entertainment rather than a passion (Green Bay the big exception, being a community owned club and not a big city). College fans however are usually far more passionate - e.g. Ole Miss, Nebraska Cornhuskers etc. I found college football to be one of the ultimate unique "American experiences" - much more so than the often cheesy, manufactured "NFL experience" (likewise, atending an Australian Football match here should be promoted to tourists as one of the ultimate, unique, genuine Australian experiences).

 

[Carringbush2010]

Well this is an interesting thread, I dropped by as it caught my eye and thought wtf could this possibly be?

Having read the thread I'm inclined to agree that as far as 'engagement' to professional sport, the AFL is in heady territory.

4th on AVG attendances worldwide is some sort of feat, especially when you consider:

• The populations in those countries of those top 4 competitions
• The amount of games in the AFL competition, IIRC it's 307, that's far less than the other competitions

My suspicion is that footy is just not well enough known, if and when it gains exposure it may prove to be very popular world wide. Who knows.

 

[joop]

Well this is an interesting thread, I dropped by as it caught my eye and thought wtf could this possibly be?

Having read the thread I'm inclined to agree that as far as 'engagement' to professional sport, the AFL is in heady territory.

4th on AVG attendances worldwide is some sort of feat, especially when you consider:

• The populations in those countries of those top 4 competitions
• The amount of games in the AFL competition, IIRC it's 307, that's far less than the other competitions

My suspicion is that footy is just not well enough known, if and when it gains exposure it may prove to be very popular world wide. Who knows.

The NFL has about 250 games per season.

 

[Carringbush2010]

The NFL has about 250 games per season.

Yeah looked it up, 272 plus finals. Still my point stands.

 

[le dominateur]

The amount of games in the AFL competition, IIRC it's 307, that's far less than the other competitions

It’s 207.

 

[RedV3x]

Well this is an interesting thread, I dropped by as it caught my eye and thought wtf could this possibly be?

Well it's stems from an off-the-cuff statement by me stating that the AFL was the most professional football league or words to that effect.
That was from the fact that the AFL, in percentage terms, is the most attended domestic league in the world,
that in percentage terms the AFL produces more than the NFL and in raw terms has the fourth highest attendances (third until the expansion teams and diverse locations lowered the average).

Somebody just wouldn't let it go and some mod made a thread out of a troll's persistence. Go figure.

 

[Pippen94]

no it doesnt. doesnt even get in the top 10. MLB smashes all in total attendance because they play 2000 games a season.
average, yes.
raw. no.
per head, means nothing at all. for example, AFL is well away from the top.
Scotland has a population of 5.5 Mil. Its top soccer league averages 16K. For the AFL to match its per head/average attendance, it would need to be nearly 60K. Gaelic Football is another, bigger example. 20K average for a population of 7mil

Thats is not even counting "one team" leagues from the Microstates. Monaco, FC Vaduz.

In Australia. Yes, overseas...... Hard to qualify.


what!!!

All bar 3 teams in the 32 team league average over 90%. That is as close as you can get.

As discussed earlier, American football is not like our culture.


NFL has little opposition....

NBA, MLB, NHL.

Just to expand on that the NFL main competitors are probably the premier league, formula 1, IPL etc.

Afl is just a pimple on the ass in terms of world sport

 

[Pippen94]

NFL is the biggest sport in the states played in the states.

AFL is the biggest sport in Australia played in Australia.

Both get huge crowds and have huge memberships.

America has approximately 13 x the population of Australia.
AFL crowds and membership numbers are exceptional considering the population.

Both are completely different, with different skill sets.

Close thread.

NFL is the undisputed national football code in the USA.

Whereas in Australia the No.1 in participation is soccer.
In over half of Australia Rugby League dwarfs all other codes in following.