Football Goonerbait
Sports is Yaoi for straight men
By all accounts the Combine this year has been pretty exciting. A lot of incredible performances and records are being set. Do they mean anything? Going from history…not quite. But good performances at the combine translate to higher draft picks and more money, so it’s good for the guys out there.
I still can’t bring myself to actually watch the Combine because I still find it creepy and boring. Unless you are a scout sicko I don’t know what anyone gets out of it that you can’t get from highlights.
Maybe it’s because I just got back from Japan for the second time but it made me wonder if the Combine counts as Football Fanservice. Draft scouts are out there discussing players measurements the same way otakus discuss anime girl breast sizes. The Combine is like the NFL’s equivalent of “The Beach Episode”, which if you aren’t familiar, is an anime trope where an episode takes place pretty much exclusively for the purpose of showing the girls in swimsuits. It’s also normally a useless filler episode that exists purely for the excuse to see cute anime girls in swimsuits. There are also the “Hot Springs” episodes, which function the same way, as an excuse to almost show you naked girls gathered in a bath.
You might find this comparison very tortured but I must remind you that we all saw Chris Jones’ balls fall out of his unitard during the 40 once so am I that far off? Anime fans might compare bust sizes amongst their waifus but here we sports fans are discussing how bigger hands are good and getting excited when a guy benches a lot more than usual. You know that shot in an anime where the girl bounces and her boobs make the “boing” sound effect? That’s just us watching the asses jiggle during three-cone drills. I do not say any of this to defend weird anime bullshit, I say this to highlight that you, and me, and every other sports fan, is also a pervert. It’s better to accept our perversions than to live in denial.
So I now think of the Combine as the NFL’s Fanservice Filler episode. You get to see all these prime hot athletes in as little clothing as is allowed, for a part of the season that doesn’t actually need to exist. We don’t need the Combine as many prospects can just do pro-days or individual workouts; it’s just useful and certain weirdos would get really mad if you removed it. It’s actually vital to the plot you see.
This also makes every season a tournament arc. Maybe that’s why football rules.
On the topic of “filler” episodes, game (usually sport, but I’m open to including other types such as board games) centered ones tend to be the best, and I wish they were more of a standard in comparison. No matter the cast, setting, or show’s tone, competitive nature is the perfect excuse to ramp things up to 11. The very best of them have occasionally been one of my favorite episodes period, such as Samurai Champloo’s baseball episode.
Samurai Champloo is my favorite anime of all time and iI’ve always found it supremely ironic that in a show that is FILLED with amazing music, perhaps the best song (Aruarian Dance) was saved for that damn silly baseball episode. That episode also DIRECTLY runs right into the climax of the entire show. One minute you get Mugen breakdancing on the mound, the next you have Kariya “The Hand of God” beating Jin nearly to death.
Great fucking show, man.
Would that make the draft the episodes where they spend the whole time introducing new characters that are supposed to advance the narrative, and then spend the rest of the season on the main characters anyway?
So what’s your thought on Strahan x Runyan fic?
Or Tiki x Ronde?
this metaphor gets more and more tortured over time and it’s hilarious
“Football fanservice” omg this is exactly what it is!
The supreme irony of these hypermasculine guys falling apart over how big one guys hands are, or how short another’s arms are.
On some level I feel like there’s also a more juvenile heart ot all of this. In the same way as a kid it’s just cool to see Monster Trucks because they’re big, loud, and crash into stuff. The kid in me just loves to see big dudes running really fast.
So if the Combine is the NFL’s padding fanservice episode, what game is the NFL’s bottle episode? I think it’s when ever the NFC North plays each other. Nothing actually happens and it all looks the same.
Bottle episodes usually use just one set, often to save money.
So probably Rams-Chargers or Jets-Giants would be a bottle episode. No travel. (Unless they’re part of the International Series for some reason)
I can’t say I’ve ever watched the Combine live either, but I do appreciate the fact that the NFL is the only major sport that markets and publicizes its own so heavily (even if it’s profit-driven). It’s also the only point in the year where most of the ugliness of the sport is stripped away to just appreciate some high-level athletes doing what they do best. Brett Kollman’s lofi Combine drills video from a couple of years ago is a fun background watch, but also sorta proves that most of the creepiness of the Combine is just fueled by the commentary team and the extra sanitary/exam room feeling that the live broadcast conveys.
Would the pro bowl be the clip episode?
Hall of fame game is the scrapped pilot?
Training camp the training montage?
I feel like trope comparison could be good offseason fodder
Preseason is the failed series that the producer really loved so he spun it off into what became a successful show.
Nah; Preseason is that filler training arc for a character that gets killed off almost immediately as soon as the actual fight starts.
Whatever works. (unzips)
Outside this site and being on a 49ers forum, I pretty much stop paying attention to NFL from SB ending till week 1.
I did watch XFL one season but forgot about it after that.
Me googling “yaoi” because I don’t live anywhere near that reality.
Just be sure that you’re alone while googling it. Some… interesting results could pop up.