I’ve always been a football fan ahead of anything else (soccer in some areas of the world) where scoring is a relative rarity which means each goal (your team scores) is greeted with euphoria and pant-wetting joy. That is the way I like it, few goals so each is celebrated like winning the lottery. In other sports goals or points are more forth-coming so aren’t celebrated to anywhere near the same extent, like in basketball where point scoring is so common it is greeted with a ripple of applause rather than apeshit euphoria, perhaps with the exception of points scored in the dying seconds of the game that could turn the result.
So which way do you all prefer it? High scoring i.e. a small amount of joy frequently throughout the game, or low scoring so a much more intense feeling on a few occasions.
Medium low scoring. I’m not all that interested in watching soccer, but baseball is the greatest of all sports.
Baskeball, however, I find incredibly dull. It’s only remotely interesting in the last two minutes of a close game, and I actually thought the addition of the shot clock to college basketball made me lose most interest in the game. The North Carolina four corners offense was one of the great things about the game.
Low scoring please. Also, I prefer individual sports which are usually judged by best time, not goals, points or shots.
Sports like basketball don’t interest me in the least. They may as well just play the last five minutes of the game. That’s were it’s won/lost anyway. Until then, it’s just an exhibition showing off some trick moves and shots.
In general, I can’t say. In sports I like, typical low.
2-1 and 1-0 baseball games are the most tense sporting event there is, where every batter coming to the plate could have a massive effect on the outcome.
I also like low scoring, defensive football games. Field position takes on a more central role, and each down becomes important in the battle for field position.
My other faves are boxing and auto racing, though, so scoring it doesn’t really come into play. A “high scoring” fight is, of course, better than a tactical, defensive, counter-punching affair in anyone’s opinion.
For me, it depends on how much I enjoy the sport. I am a tremendous baseball fan, so, as other have commented previously, it can be thrilling to see a 1-0 or 2-1 game. With football, however, which I also enjoy, I find multiple consecutive stalled drives to be frustrating after a while. But I suppose that can be the difference between great defensive plays and sloppy offense.
If it’s a sport I don’t care for (i.e., basketball or soccer or hockey), I’d rather see the scoreboard being lit up so that the pace stays very active. Short attention span theater, you know…
I’m a medium scoring kind of guy. 3-7 “scores” per team / per game. If I watch any kind of ball related sport.
I’m a NASCAR guy myself, so I like lots of lead changes, with the 8 & 15 cars running up front!
Baseball needs a pitch clock. Too damn slow for my taste. And with 150+ games, who cares about any one outcome? </me runs off to hide from the rabid baseball fans>
I like baseball, which can be anywhere from very low to medium.
I love NFL and rugby (league and union), where scoring is usually medium-low to medium high.
And i’m also a big fan of Australian Rules football, where scoring is definitely at the high end of the scale.
But, despite being very impressed by the skill involved, i just can’t get into basketball. It just seems way too repetitive to me, at least as a spectator. I played basketball in high school, and that was a different story; i loved playing.
While it’s a bit of a stretch to call it a “sport”, I think the point inflation on pinball machines has gotten ridiculous. There’s no reason why a game should have a high score in the billions.
The only sport I watch with any regularity is (American) football. I tend to enjoy lower-scoring games because it means the defense is somewhat matched against the offense. If I wanted to watch drive after uninterrupted drive to the goal, I’d watch basketball.
I think soccer is just a hair too low-scoring. A 2-1 game is exciting. A 0-0 game, particulalry one with only a few shots on goal, is much less so. A world cup final decided by penalty kicks is LAME.
In general, I like hotly contested low-scoring games, though I can enjoy a run-away at the very end of the game in baseball or (American) football (not in basketball or soccer so much). The tension really gets me into it.
It can be frustrating to watch a typically low-scoring sport with people who get all their excitement from seeing the points add up. I hate watching soccer when my dad’s around–the entire time my brother and I were wrapped up in World Cup games, he was sitting there whining about the lack of goals and saying that the goal ought to be enlarged to “make the game more exciting.”
I’m a hockey fan if that gives you any clue. A high scoring hockey game can be fun though. I tdepends on the quality of the game. A good team can make a low scoring game a blast. A bad team (clutch and grab) can make a game draaaaaag.
To me, the greatest (American) football games were the old AFL shootouts you used to see between Daryle Lamonica and Len Dawson, between Joe Namath and John Hadl. In my book, a 47-45 game with a lot of deep passing beats the hell out of a 6-3 game of tight defenses and ball control offenses.
As for baseball, while the occasional pitchers’ duel can be exciting, I’m old enough to remember 1968, when a .301 average was enough to win you a batting title, and pitchers were utterly dominant. It was boring beyond belief!!!
I realize there’s no "right "answer here. We’re simply disagreeing over what’s more entertaining. There must be many people like the OP, who think a 0-0 tie is thrilling. But I’d sooner watch paint dry than watch the kind of “world class” soccer game in which both sides are clearly playing for a scoreless tie, in hopes of getting lucky in the shootout.
I once heard it said that the best possible hockey score is 4-2. I find it hard to argue with that. Then again, a triple-OT 1-0 game can be the most exciting thing in the world. So yeah, it all depends on the quality of the play.
How thrilling a game is doesn’t depend solely on the score, I have seen games with plenty of goals that weren’t that exciting because the goals were all that happened. On the other hand I have seen plenty of 0-0 draws that were thrilling because of the number of chances created and the style of play but the ball just wouldn’t go in the net.
You never get two teams playing for a 0-0 draw, every team would rather win the game in normal time than face the highly risky prospect of a penalty shootout. The only time you might see a team going for a draw is if the team knows they are inferior to their opponents and the game is reaching it’s dying stages. If the team has been under the cosh for most of the game they may chose to settle for a draw and hope to get lucky on penalties once there are only 10 minutes left, but you can bet your ass the team with the upperhand will be eager to settle it in normal time than face a lottery.
I think the most exciting game I ever saw was the OU-Texas game last fall. I’ve never been so close to cardiac arrest. Great matchup and a 6-0 score going into the 4th quarter with a 12-0 final.
Of course, the NCAA game of the century was a 30-31 game between OU and Nebraska in 1971.
A good matchup matters a lot more than how high the score is, at least to me.
For some reason, the FILA philosophy on wrestling officiating is “points are good.”
No. Points are exciting. Points make it easy to decide who won. Points take it out of the officials’ hands. These objectives are good, but points themselves are neither good nor bad.
When I’m watching wrestling, I prefer low scores - because low scores indicate technique meeting technique - sprinkled with a few big-point moves because they’re exciting to watch, and a few hardcore high-scoring, high-technique matches. As a rule, I like thinking about position and strategy, so low-scoring matches present more of an opportunity to consider technique and planning. Big-point moves, of course, are fun to watch, and the romps where two top-level guys are too good to defend each other are absolute gold.
The only sport I watch with regularity is baseball, and the 2-1 score is absolutely ideal. 3-2 isn’t bad either. 1-0 is almost too much tension for me to take.
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