Nov 17 2008
Not Every Game Demands a Victor
If you’re looking for the one thing that separates American sports from sports in other countries, it’s this — in America, someone has to win every single game.
Is that baseball game tied after 9 innings? Play another inning. Is that basketball game tied at the end of regulation? Play another five minutes. Still not decided? Keep playing until we have a winner. Even hockey games, which used to end in draws all the time, now have overtime and shootouts in the regular season. We demand winners in this country, dammit.
It’s the same with football. Yesterday, when the Philadelphia Eagles and the Cincinnati Bengals got to the end of the sudden death overtime period and it was still tied at 13-13 — the first tie game in the NFL in 6 years — everyone dragged out the old kissing-your-sister analogy. Draws are that unsatisfying to the American sports psyche. Hell, Donovan McNabb didn’t even think it was possible for an NFL game to end in a tie.
A question for all you Premier League fans out there — were you so unsatisfied by the outcome of the Hull City v. Manchester City match yesterday? Yes, it ended in a 2-2 draw, and at times, it was an instructional video on how not to play defense, but ultimately, it was a fine result. Both teams got a point, and perhaps that point will decide whether Hull and Man City maintain their league status at the end of the season.
Of course, league status is not a concern in the NFL. The Cincinnati Bengals aren’t going to get relegated to a lower league, much as some of us would love to see it happen. The idea that every game must have a winner, though, is unique here. Rugby matches end in draws. We usually get a draw or two in the AFL every year. Do they keep playing until someone wins? No, they accept the outcome and move on with their lives. If it were a playoff game or a cup tie, then sure, you have to play until there’s a winner. A regular season game? Nah, screw it. We’ll just split the points and move on.
Ah, but there are no points on offer in American football. There are only wins and losses. Perhaps that’s why the NCAA abolished ties and introduced its overtime system in 1996. That system eliminates all possibility of a tie. The NFL sudden-death OT system? Close, but not quite.
Perhaps if the NFL created a points system like the AFL has — 4 points for a win, 2 points for a draw — we wouldn’t worry about whether OT is necessary in a regular season game. We’ll just look at the points and determine who goes to the playoffs from that, and if certain teams have the same number of points, we’ll give them a extra point for a tiebreaker and move on.
This sort of system comes with a side benefit — the ability to dock teams points if they break the rules. What’s that? More than three of your players have been popped for using performance-enhancing drugs? WHAM! 5-point deduction. Oh, what’s this? You’ve been illegally videotaping your opponents for the last 5 years? WHAM! 25-point deduction. Now you have to go 16-0 just to get a Wild Card spot. Suddenly, the Hammer of Goodell doesn’t seem quite so Nerf-like, is it?
Will the NFL ever go in this direction? Don’t hold your breath. If anything, that Bengals-Eagles game will be an excuse for the NFL to reconsider the college overtime policy and ensure that there will never be a draw in the NFL ever again. Americans demand victors. It’s just how we are.
10 Responses to “Not Every Game Demands a Victor”
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Draws happen all the time in American sports. But they demand a victor and why?!
If two teams are exactly even at the end of 60 minutes they were equal.
Am I supposed to believe the Jets are better than the Patriots because they drove down the field close enough for a field goal?
What’s next, penalty shootouts with fieldgoals?
Peter: Isn’t the college football OT rule sort of a shootout in itself?
I think the relative ease of scoring at least 2-3 points in basketball and football (and the accomanying rareness of tied scores after regulation) help inform the American unease with ties. It’s almost a case of, “Why not play a little longer?” No clue on baseball, except that maybe the low cardiovascular demands of the sport made them decide to keep playing.
My thoughts on football OT are that each team would get at least one possession, but be very literal about what constitutes a possession: you have the ball kicked off to you but you fumble? There went your one possession. It would feel ess “tacked-on” than college OT and fairer than NFL OT.
It would slightly(?) increase the number of ties in the NFL, but whatever. Of course, I’m a soccer fan .
I’ve never understood the argument that since soccer allows ties, American Football should to. Since all of Europe is fine with ties, American fans should be comfortable with them as well. Personally, I think it comes down to a scheduling thing.
The NFL season is 16 games long then playoffs. The English Premier League is 38 matches long and there is no playoffs afterwards. There is European Competition, but Man U didn’t have to win three or four more games to get the trophy at the end of the season.
In a way, if you don’t get a win, but manage a draw, it doesn’t hurt you as much in the EPL as it would in the NFL. I know the soccer fans on this site might take offense to that, but the way I see it, in a 16 game slate, a draw is more damaging than in a 38-game season.
As I understand it, one of the reasons soccer, rugby, et al. allow ties is that playing extra time would seriously hurt a team’s competitiveness at the next game. I wonder, then, what the records of teams in American college and pro football are the week after playing an overtime game, and if they’re significantly below average…
Jeff: We might see that theory in action this week. After playing five quarters on Sunday, the Bengals face the Steelers on Thursday night.
The GAA loves a good draw. Dublin V Meath 4 in a row saga is probably the most famous, the game end level 3 times before a winner was found but multiple replays are not that uncommon Wexford and Louth needed 3 games last year .
True, but the Bengals could be the most well-rested team ever and they’d still get killed by the Steelers.
Alan, your reasoning makes absolutely no sense. Sure, there are “only” 16 games per side in the NFL whereas there are 38 in the EPL. However, the odds of any particular NFL game ending in a tie after 60 minutes are very small, whereas the odds of an EPL match ending in a tie after 90 minutes are fairly high. Therefore, the chance that tie games are going to “damage” an NFL teams season is ridiculously small, considering they have few tie games; and the EPL has many tie games, and it doesn’t damage the an EPL team’s season in the slightest.
What possible “damage” could a tie game do to an NFL team? Just give the teams two points for a win, none of a loss, and split the points (one point each) when teams tie each other. Simple. No “damage” to the season at all. Don’t want “damage”? Then win the damn game next time! Stop making excuses!
Oh, and your father says “STFU and kiss your sister already, or I’ll beat you to within an inch of your life”. Got it?