Soccer is boring...

scar · **Joined:** Sun Jan 10, 2010 6:57 pm **Posts:** 2218

Jesse wrote:

Cloudy wrote:

I've watched many college, Olympic, and professional soccer games on TV. I think it's a good sport, but let's face it, IT's BORING...!

There is way too much just kicking the ball around to teammates without any attempt to move the ball down field to take a shot on goal in soccer. Yeah, I understand there is some strategy going on here, but that strategy seldom results in a goal. I think the game needs to be speeded up, before it will ever catch on in the United States. Watching a soccer game reminds me of Dean Smith's "four corners" boredom years ago in college basketball.

I have some suggestions to make the game of soccer much more fun and interesting to watch. All of these suggestions are taken from basketball. (The time limits I am about to suggest are open to reasonable arguments to change.)

1- After a team gets control of the ball on their side of the field, I would give them a 1 minute time limit to advance it past the midfield line. If they fail to do so, the opposing team will be awarded a free kick from the spot the ball was when time ran out.

2- Once a team advances the ball beyond the midfield line, they will be subject to basketballs' rule of over-and-back. If a team in control of the ball moves it back beyond the midfield line after crossing it, the opposing team will be awarded a free kick from the spot of the infraction.

3- Now for my "shot clock" rule. Once the team on offense moves the ball beyond the midfield line I would only allow them 2 minutes to move the ball under control into the penalty area or to take a shot on goal that transverses the penalty area. If they get the ball into the penalty area and lose it to the defending team, the clock would be reset for them, if they recover possession of the ball before it goes back across the midfield line. A violation would turn the ball over to the opposing team for a free kick from the spot the ball was when time ran out. (Yeah, I know the rules I am proposing need some tweaking, but they are a start to making soccer a much faster game than it is today.)

Not only would these new rules speed the game up, and create more scoring, they would also create a lot of new employment for people with stopwatches. :lol:

(Let's see how much trouble this gets me into with soccer aficionados.)

You think SOCCER is Boring??? What about GOLF???? I think George Carlin put it best....Watching a game of golf is like watching flies f***......

(Patiently waiting for Bo's response... I guess he is too busy watching the US Open).

-BO- · **Joined:** Wed Mar 10, 2010 3:20 pm **Posts:** 2291

scar wrote:

Jesse wrote:

You think SOCCER is Boring??? What about GOLF???? I think George Carlin put it best....Watching a game of golf is like watching flies f***......

(Patiently waiting for Bo's response... I guess he is too busy watching the US Open).

I thought the statement spoke for itself, an ignorant statement made by one ignorant about the sport.

Hey, it's OK to not find watching golf, or any sport for that matter, exciting. And it's OK to not know or understand the sport. But that makes it pretty weak to make a comment about such sport.

You're not going to see me making a derogatory comment about something I know nothing about.

BO

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

Akbar71 wrote:

Cloudy wrote:

p.s. You think the off sides you is simple. Okay, explain it to everyone in 25 words of less.

When someone passes the ball upfield to you, there must be two opponents between you and the goal line. Nineteen words.

AKBAR, my hat is off to you for explaining the soccer off sides rule in nineteen words, but you left a few things out.

Here is what I would consider to be the pretty close to a full explanation of the rule:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiwmR6CC0Bk

(I didn't count the words in the above link, but it took 7 minutes and 32 seconds for the narrator to explain the rule. There is another complicated part to the off sides rule that I believe the video did not address, but I'm not going to get into it at this time.)

p.s. Long ago, after coaching soccer for about 10 years at the YMCA, I took the 3 day FIFA referee course. (I passed it, and could have refereed soccer games, and been paid for it.) The instructors spent nearly half a day going over the off sides rule. I wish you could have been there with me to help me count how many times hands went up to ask the instructors to explain something again, and these were mostly high school kids, who had been playing soccer for years.

Akbar71 · **Posted:** Thu Jun 14, 2012 8:46 pm

Cloudy wrote:

Akbar71 wrote:

Cloudy wrote:

p.s. You think the off sides you is simple. Okay, explain it to everyone in 25 words of less.

When someone passes the ball upfield to you, there must be two opponents between you and the goal line. Nineteen words.

AKBAR, my hat is off to you for explaining the soccer off sides rule in nineteen words, but you left a few things out.

Here is what I would consider to be the pretty close to a full explanation of the rule:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiwmR6CC0Bk

(I didn't count the words in the above link, but it took 7 minutes and 32 seconds for the narrator to explain the rule. There is another complicated part to the off sides rule that I believe the video did not address, but I'm not going to get into it at this time.)

p.s. Long ago, after coaching soccer for about 10 years at the YMCA, I took the 3 day FIFA referee course. (I passed it, and could have refereed soccer games, and been paid for it.) The instructors spent nearly half a day going over the off sides rule. I wish you could have been there with me to help me count how many times hands went up to ask the instructors to explain something again, and these were mostly high school kids, who had been playing soccer for years.

Dude, I sat through that video. It was very long, slow and boring. My nineteen words stand well as an explanation of the offside rule. Specific examples and exceptions are what stretched that video out. If I asked you to exlain golf succinctly, "Hit the ball into the hole in as few strokes as possible," would be a perfectly good answer. I would not be upset that you didn't get into the laws governing the tee box or how penalty strokes work. If I were taking a FIFA referee course, I would expect to spend more time on the rule, as its imortant that all refs understand it and apply it as correctly as possible.

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

scar wrote:

I googled why does the offside rule exist and got :

The offside rule exists to stop goal hanging, where a player stands next to the opposing teams goal keeper in the hope that someone can get the ball to him (probably using a long ball), so he can get it past the goal keeper. Which would make for a very boring game.

So, it would be boring to score...?

SCAR, there are at least three exceptions to the off sides rule. Off sides will not be called when an offensive player directly receives the ball from a corner kick, a goal kick, or a throw in. I also believe that as long as a player is not in the off sides position, when a teammate kicks the ball down field, he may take off towards the goal once it has been kicked, even if the ball has not gone past him yet. (Taking off for the goal, once a teammate has kicked the ball down field, is the exception that the above 7 minute and 32 second video did not mention.)

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

Akbar71 wrote:

Dude, I sat through that video. It was very long, slow and boring. My nineteen words stand well as an explanation of the offside rule. Specific examples and exceptions are what stretched that video out. If I asked you to exlain golf succinctly, "Hit the ball into the hole in as few strokes as possible," would be a perfectly good answer. I would not be upset that you didn't get into the laws governing the tee box or how penalty strokes work. If I were taking a FIFA referee course, I would expect to spend more time on the rule, as its imortant that all refs understand it and apply it as correctly as possible.

Yep, it was "very long, slow, and boring." That makes sense to me, we're talking about soccer. :lol:

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

For those, who think the off sides rule is needed to prevent offensive players camping out in front of the goal, I have a few comments.

1- If a team sends someone down field by himself, they are a player down on defense, if they lose control of the ball.

2- If the defense realizes that there is an opposing team player camped out in front of their goal keeper, nothing would prevent them from sending one of their players back there to guard him.

3- Okay, I'll alter my suggestion to eliminate the off sides rule. I will allow it to remain in effect, with this exception. It will no longer apply to the entire side of the field past the midfield line. However, it will apply to offensive players inside of the penalty area. I think that's a fair compromise. That's kind of like basketball's rule about camping out in the paint in front of the basket.

p.s. FIFA actually changed a rule to speed the game up, while I was coaching. I'm sure you all will remember when the "back pass" rule that was introduced in the early 1990's. It said that players could not pass the ball back to their goal keeper so he could pick it up with his hands, fool around with it for a while, and then punt it down field, when he needed to. Yeah, they can still pass the ball back to the goal keeper, but he can no longer pick it up with his hands and punt it. If a teammate passes the ball back to him, he now has to play the ball with his feet.

zog741 · **Posted:** Fri Jun 15, 2012 1:13 am

I just saw the explanation of soccer's offside rule in Wikipedia, and that explanation makes perfect sense; it was to prevent "kick-through" players from being permenantly stationed near their opponent's goal. When these laws were made 150 years ago, it was recognized that the offside rule improved the game. This explanation can be found here.

Now, I think most people who don't like soccer (or baseball or football, etc.) are apt to not have a strong understanding of that sport. To those who feel that they do have a strong understanding of soccer and still don't like it: nobody is making you watch the game! Go watch something else. :roll:

Personally, I like the game just fine, and soccer rates with hockey as being the sports I most enjoy watching. Soccer may not be perfect (what is?) but I can deal with the imprefections. As stated before, I i wish the game had better tiebreaking procedures and that there were fewer ties in general. But I won't rely on Cloudy to remedy that situation!

-- RWM

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

zog741 wrote:

I just saw the explanation of soccer's offside rule in Wikipedia, and that explanation makes perfect sense; it was to prevent "kick-through" players from being permenantly stationed near their opponent's goal. When these laws were made 150 years ago, it was recognized that the offside rule improved the game. This explanation can be found here.

Now, I think most people who don't like soccer (or baseball or football, etc.) are apt to not have a strong understanding of that sport. To those who feel that they do have a strong understanding of soccer and still don't like it: nobody is making you watch the game! Go watch something else. :roll:

Personally, I like the game just fine, and soccer rates with hockey as being the sports I most enjoy watching. Soccer may not be perfect (what is?) but I can deal with the imprefections. As stated before, I i wish the game had better tiebreaking procedures and that there were fewer ties in general. But I won't rely on Cloudy to remedy that situation!

-- RWM

ZOG, I think my amended off sides rule takes care of your concern about an offensive player "being permanently stationed near their opponent's goal." It would require offensive players to remain outside of the penalty area, and if they didn't, the off sides rule would apply. The penalty area is 44 yards wide, 18 yards deep, and includes an arc of 10 yards from the penalty mark. I think this is far enough away from the goal for a player to receive a pass without a flag going up.

Rules from 150 years ago probably be need to be looked at. I may be wrong, but I've heard that what we call soccer (or football outside of the U.S.) started out not using a ball, but the decapitated heads of defeated enemies. If so, that's one rule that changed.

.........................................................................................

........................................... "Come on guys, you're ahead, and I'm tired of being kicked around. Can't you find someone to go in for me for the next half?"

p.s. To put you all at ease, the gruesome picture above is NOT a real person. It's rubber and paint. If you want it, it's available online from the Horror Dome for a mere $59.99. Heck, go ahead and buy it, who knows when your soccer ball might spring a leak....? :lol:

FrankC · **Posted:** Fri Jun 15, 2012 2:48 am

Cloudy wrote:

zog741 wrote:

I just saw the explanation of soccer's offside rule in Wikipedia, and that explanation makes perfect sense; it was to prevent "kick-through" players from being permenantly stationed near their opponent's goal. When these laws were made 150 years ago, it was recognized that the offside rule improved the game. This explanation can be found here.

Now, I think most people who don't like soccer (or baseball or football, etc.) are apt to not have a strong understanding of that sport. To those who feel that they do have a strong understanding of soccer and still don't like it: nobody is making you watch the game! Go watch something else. :roll:

Personally, I like the game just fine, and soccer rates with hockey as being the sports I most enjoy watching. Soccer may not be perfect (what is?) but I can deal with the imprefections. As stated before, I i wish the game had better tiebreaking procedures and that there were fewer ties in general. But I won't rely on Cloudy to remedy that situation!

-- RWM

ZOG, I think my amended off sides rule takes care of your concern about an offensive player "being permanently stationed near their opponent's goal." It would require offensive players to remain outside of the penalty area, and if they didn't, the off sides rule would apply. The penalty area is 44 yards wide, 18 yards deep, and includes an arc of 10 yards from the penalty mark.

Rules from 150 years ago probably be need to be looked at. I may be wrong, but I've heard that what we call soccer (or football outside of the U.S.) started out not using a ball, but the decapitated heads of defeated enemies. If so, that's one rule that changed.

.........................................................................................

........................................... "Come on guys, you're ahead, and I'm tired of being kicked around. Can't you find someone to go in for me for the next half?"

p.s. To put you all at ease, the gruesome picture above is NOT a real person. It's rubber and paint. If you want it, it's available online from the Horror Dome for a mere $59.99. Heck, go ahead and buy it, who knows when your soccer ball might spring a leak....? :lol:

Cloudy, I never heard about heads being use in soccer, but I have heard and read that heads were used as balls in Polo. I imagine that several heads had to be used in a game. I can't believe one head would last through a game of Polo.

pengwn · **Posted:** Fri Jun 15, 2012 3:41 pm

Anybody who's following Sweden-England right now won't think it's boring. The England we all know and love are in top form, which is to say it's a comedy of errors on par with Shakespeare

Akbar71 · **Posted:** Fri Jun 15, 2012 4:04 pm

pengwn wrote:

Anybody who's following Sweden-England right now won't think it's boring. The England we all know and love are in top form, which is to say it's a comedy of errors on par with Shakespeare

That was a game. Regrettably, I was looking for 3-2 Sweden, not 3-2 England. My bracket is now officially busted.

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

There is one thing I like about soccer rules, that I wish basketball would adopt. In soccer, when a flag goes up, it does not halt play as long as the offended team has an advantage, where they might be on their way to scoring a goal. The referees let the game to continue until the offended team loses control of the ball. The foul and its penalty are not lost. The appropriate penalty is assessed against the offending team, only when the offended team loses control of the ball.

I think this is a great rule. Why allow a foul stop the offended team from scoring? I do not like the idea that fouling a player, who is on his way to a score, should be an acceptable form of defense. Fouling should not be a tactic defensive players use to stop a score. If basketball would adopt this rule, it would greatly reduce fouling, and allow players, who were on their way to score a basket, to get the points they deserved.

p.s. I don't want to move this thread away from soccer, but I will add one more thing about a basketball rule I would change to reduce fouling, especially late in the game. When a team is fouled, and that foul puts them on the line to shoot free throws, I think they should be given the option of just inbounding the ball, if they want to, instead of having to take the free throws.

Dante · **Posted:** Sun Jun 17, 2012 12:19 am

cards wrote:

tiefly wrote:

I just asked the manager @ the BWW I'm playing at to put soccer on. It's the start of my vacation and I like the idle time between action.

Indoor soccer? Rather watch an ant farm at work.

What??? Tiefly has a 1000 posts and no badge??? Time to form a hanging
party for Dante.

Alright, alright. Since you pointed this out, I made some ranking changes.

cards · **Joined:** Mon Jan 11, 2010 8:48 am **Posts:** 553

Dante wrote:

cards wrote:

What??? Tiefly has a 1000 posts and no badge??? Time to form a hanging
party for Dante.

Alright, alright. Since you pointed this out, I made some ranking changes.

Curse you evil Dante. May your cats pee on you while you sleep. :evil:

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

DANTE and CARDS, please bring me up to speed. I have no idea what you guys are talking about with badges and rankings. Is this something on the "ScaRatings" that I don't know about?

Damn, it looks like this thread is moving away from soccer.

To get us back on track, here's some exciting, fast moving soccer footage:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6iEZPysG2Mw

Now that's how I would like the game to be, without the hours of dilly dallying around with the ball, before someone decides it's time TO SCORE! :lol:

Don't you just love it when the announcer screams, "GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAL!" :lol:

cards · **Joined:** Mon Jan 11, 2010 8:48 am **Posts:** 553

Cloudy wrote:

DANTE and CARDS, please bring me up to speed. I have no idea what you guys are talking about with badges and rankings. Is this something on the "ScaRatings" that I don't know about?

Damn, it looks like this thread is moving away from soccer.

CLOUDY you will just have to come and play trivia with us to find out. This thread was about soccer?

Jesse · **Posted:** Mon Jun 18, 2012 5:42 pm

Cloudy wrote:

There is one thing I like about soccer rules, that I wish basketball would adopt. In soccer, when a flag goes up, it does not halt play as long as the offended team has an advantage, where they might be on their way to scoring a goal. The referees let the game to continue until the offended team loses control of the ball. The foul and its penalty are not lost. The appropriate penalty is assessed against the offending team, only when the offended team loses control of the ball.

I think this is a great rule. Why allow a foul stop the offended team from scoring? I do not like the idea that fouling a player, who is on his way to a score, should be an acceptable form of defense. Fouling should not be a tactic defensive players use to stop a score. If basketball would adopt this rule, it would greatly reduce fouling, and allow players, who were on their way to score a basket, to get the points they deserved.

I completely agree w/ u on this Cloudy!!!!

Cloudy · **Joined:** Tue Jan 12, 2010 4:30 am **Posts:** 5277

Jesse wrote:

Cloudy wrote:

There is one thing I like about soccer rules, that I wish basketball would adopt. In soccer, when a flag goes up, it does not halt play as long as the offended team has an advantage, where they might be on their way to scoring a goal. The referees let the game to continue until the offended team loses control of the ball. The foul and its penalty are not lost. The appropriate penalty is assessed against the offending team, only when the offended team loses control of the ball.

I think this is a great rule. Why allow a foul stop the offended team from scoring? I do not like the idea that fouling a player, who is on his way to a score, should be an acceptable form of defense. Fouling should not be a tactic defensive players use to stop a score. If basketball would adopt this rule, it would greatly reduce fouling, and allow players, who were on their way to score a basket, to get the points they deserved.

I completely agree w/ u on this Cloudy!!!!

JESSE, what about my new basketball rule that would allow the offended team to opt for an inbounds pass, instead of taking the free throws, when a foul would put them on the line, if they wanted to...?

Rackme32 · **Joined:** Sat Jan 30, 2010 5:13 pm **Posts:** 272

Cloudy wrote:

JESSE, what about my new basketball rule that would allow the offended team to opt for an inbounds pass, instead of taking the free throws, when a foul would put them on the line, if they wanted to...?

It seems to me that this rule used to exist in international play, but I don't know if it still does... Or, if the rule is gone now, why they canned it. I do like the idea.

BTW, soccer is horribly boring, but I have to admit that when a highlight gets into the ESPN Top 10 or some such, it's almost always worth a look. The problem is the OTHER 89 minutes and 52 seconds of the highlight game... They just need to ban that to make soccer watchable.

Jesse · **Posted:** Thu Jun 21, 2012 2:32 am

Rackme32 wrote:

Cloudy wrote:

JESSE, what about my new basketball rule that would allow the offended team to opt for an inbounds pass, instead of taking the free throws, when a foul would put them on the line, if they wanted to...?

It seems to me that this rule used to exist in international play, but I don't know if it still does... Or, if the rule is gone now, why they canned it. I do like the idea.

BTW, soccer is horribly boring, but I have to admit that when a highlight gets into the ESPN Top 10 or some such, it's almost always worth a look. The problem is the OTHER 89 minutes and 52 seconds of the highlight game... They just need to ban that to make soccer watchable.

Not to continue my spiel about golf and take more heat from BO....BUT I was watching part of the U.S. Open last weekend (not by choice....Wallaby's happens to be a VERY golfcentric bar) and it seems to me that the most exciting part of the game is the part where they putt on the green immediately around the hole b/c I actually found it very exciting and suspenseful seeing the ball either JUST make it into the hole or JUST miss the hole.....

SO, in accordance w/ Rackme's suggestion in re: soccer; my suggestion is eliminate the fairways, the sand traps, and other useless parts leading up to the putting on the green and just make golf the putting on the green part...I would actually probably watch golf more often if this were the case......

OK...now everybody can jump down my throat....

-BO- · **Joined:** Wed Mar 10, 2010 3:20 pm **Posts:** 2291

Jesse wrote:

Not to continue my spiel about golf and take more heat from BO....BUT I was watching part of the U.S. Open last weekend (not by choice....Wallaby's happens to be a VERY golfcentric bar) and it seems to me that the most exciting part of the game is the part where they putt on the green immediately around the hole b/c I actually found it very exciting and suspenseful seeing the ball either JUST make it into the hole or JUST miss the hole.....

SO, in accordance w/ Rackme's suggestion in re: soccer; my suggestion is eliminate the fairways, the sand traps, and other useless parts leading up to the putting on the green and just make golf the putting on the green part...I would actually probably watch golf more often if this were the case......

OK...now everybody can jump down my throat....

Then stop posting about something you know nothing about, nobody gives a shit if you watch golf or not. You don't want to start a fight with me about my profession. There's a reason the free for all forum was almost shut down and it's because people would try to stir the pot like you are.

tiefly · **Joined:** Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:54 am **Posts:** 1665

There were no Euro games on TV yesterday.

Not sure how I survived.

pengwn · **Posted:** Thu Jun 21, 2012 12:28 pm

Jesse wrote:

Not to continue my spiel about golf and take more heat from BO....BUT I was watching part of the U.S. Open last weekend (not by choice....Wallaby's happens to be a VERY golfcentric bar) and it seems to me that the most exciting part of the game is the part where they putt on the green immediately around the hole b/c I actually found it very exciting and suspenseful seeing the ball either JUST make it into the hole or JUST miss the hole.....

SO, in accordance w/ Rackme's suggestion in re: soccer; my suggestion is eliminate the fairways, the sand traps, and other useless parts leading up to the putting on the green and just make golf the putting on the green part...I would actually probably watch golf more often if this were the case......

OK...now everybody can jump down my throat....

Sure. While we're at it, let's get rid of that useless bat swinging and tedious running in baseball; randomly determined throws to the plate interspersed into a home run derby are all you need to decide the outcome of each game

Kickoffs in football are tedious, too. Plus the field's too damn big, and the clock doesn't keep anywhere near accurate time with all those stops and starts, so let's just give each team X possessions from 20 yards out, then call it an afternoon

The NBA may as well be a series of free-throw competitions, and the guys who aren't shooting can run around, get all sweaty, then shove each other into the front rows of fans. Similarly, the NHL becomes a shootout contest, and the guys who aren't shooting skate around, throw some bodychecks and cheap shots, and those that score a goal are allowed to pummel one guy who missed the net entirely if they wish

NASCAR's already been distilled this way - they call it drag racing. Okay, we'll add a left turn or two along the track to increase the likelihood of a fiery wreck, and a mandatory pit stop so some driver's day can be ruined by a tire change that's half a second too slow

Texas Hold'em, deal out all the cards right away, and each player's only options are All-In and Fold. No more blinds, checking, flops, bluffing or goofy glasses - all Degree All-In Moments all the time, baby, 'cause that's what's exciting!

I think I've elucidated my point by now. Those dramatic, attention-grabbing moments fans crave come about as a result of all the boring stuff that happens during most of a match, and if they happened all the time, with pivotal moments defining each any every sporting match, the exciting stuff would become blasé because it would now be commonplace and ordinary. The rarity of those special moments adds to their excitement, and human nature being what it is, we wouldn't recognize them as such without slogging through all that boring chaff

There is one thing about golf on TV that always grates on me, though: camera close-ups of any ball in flight. Against a solid blue or grey sky, there's zero frame of reference for the viewer to determine how far or true the ball is going. I like it when the camera's midway down the fairway, and you can see some trees and gallery folks go by as the camera pans, and I love overhead blimp views of tee shots, but that ball-on-nothing-but-sky extreme-close-up (whoooooaaaaaa!) pisses me off every time I realize I'm watching it for the umpteenth time that day

(And before you tee off on me, BO, I'm knocking golf coverage)

tiefly · **Joined:** Mon Jan 11, 2010 11:54 am **Posts:** 1665

Thank JAH!!!

There's SOCCER on today!!!

My $3, 22 oz. beer tastes better already!

New Scaratings

Soccer is boring...

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