XFL -- Rate game one

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

As of half time:

Thumbs up:

The possession scramble at the start of the game. A rugby scrum would have been better, though.

Mandatory run/pass for extra point: nice that the PAT has the potential to be something less than automatic.

On-field/overhead cameras: a definite plus, although the overhead doesn’t always provide a clearer view of the play as it unfolds. And those on-field Steadycam ops seem to be getting far more exercise than the NY/NJ offence.

Live mikes on coaches/play callers: obviously derived from NASCAR coverage, this adds a new immediacy to the coverage and has the welcome benefit of reducing the amount of inane commentary from the announcers.

The silly phrases many of the players elected to have sewn onto their jerseys. “He hate me” cracks me up, for some reason.

Thumbs down:

On-field interviews between plays: so far, not only have these not been edifying, most haven’t even been coherent. And let the guys get their play instructions before sticking the mike in their faces, fa chrissake.

Jesse Ventura: hasn’t this yoyo got a government to run somewhere?

The Vegas lap dancers, er, cheerleaders: they’re not just bimbos, they sully the good name of bimbos…

The NY/NJ defensive secondary, which so far shows all the mobility of a collection of fenceposts.

Overall: a tentative thumbs up; the standard of play (on the Vegas side at least) is acceptable, and the broadcast is definitely lively. Guess I won’t turn it off, then.

2

Looks like we started threads at the same time. My opinion, it sucks, glorified high school ball at best. I’m pissed that I started an XFL fantasty league. Now I’m going to have to pay attention to this shit?

3

Overall, I think that its alright, but just as a novelty. Once the novelty of this league runs out, it will lose any popularity it may have. Seing some of these weird rules and the weird things the league does is kind of cool, but it won’t be cool for a whole season.

Good-
I do think the posession scramble is kind of neat, and it suits the XFL well.

Matt Vasgersian is the greatest living anouncer in any sport, so that is a plus for the XFL.

There words: He Hate Me

Bad-
The level of play in this league is close to that of my friends and I getting together a pickup game.

The players themselves are garbage. John Avery is the best player in the league, and that is pathetic. Plus, if any player did actually develop NFL caliber skills, he would never stick around the XFL.

I know they are looking for a rougher game, but this is ridiculous. A player jumps offsides and proceeds to clothesline the QB, 5 yard penalty. B.Mack has been just killed out of bounds on like 3 punt returns. This is really stupid, someone will be severly injured soon.

Jesse Ventura is a damn moron, and like Rocket88 I could have swore he has some other job he should be doing.

4

I agree. It won’t be replacing the NFL any time soon, but it’s a nice little back up for the off season. The football is of pretty poor quality (though it sounds like the Orlando / Chicago game might have been worth watching), but this is, after all, the first game of the first season of a second-rate league. I’d imagine it will get better.

The announcers aren’t bothering me all that much, except when they start telling us what a wonderful thing the XFL is. That’s a WWF tactic I could do without. “Boy howdy, I love that I can say anything I want!” Yeah, I might too if you had anything worth saying.

5

Wow, I’m sorry, I love football, but if this is the best show thay can offer up, I won’t bother. It’s not just the quality of play, it’s the quality of “the show.” Honestly, this is absolute crap. I can’t believe that with that kind of backing (WWF/NBC), this is the best they can come up with. I give it three more weeks!!!

6

There were two games tonight, Gazoo.

You are guilty of the following offense:

JUDGING THE WHOLE BY THE CHARACTERISTICS OF ONE
example: This apple has a bruise. Therefore, they are all mushy, and not worth eating.

You can’t make a value judgement (at least, a valuable one) by the observation of a single event in a series of 40. That’s foolish.

Sometimes, the networks broadcast the wrong game. That’s what happened here. The Orlando/Chicago game was a hoot, by all accounts.

If you’re going to pass judgement on one, pass judgement on one. Before you pass judgement on the whole, observe the whole.

7

At the Las Vegas game, they managed to fill the stadium. I assume it was the UNLV college one, so that wasn’t too hard, but it looks nice on TV. Especially compared to the Chicago/Orlando one (don’t know where that one was). The ends of the stadium are completely empty, as is the upper deck, and empty white concrete seats are not impressive looking. They should’ve taken a page from the WNBA book and filled the empty seats with something like banners.

How do they do that overhead camera anyway?

8

Mr.Cynical, it’s not even the level of play, the competition of the game, etc, that I’m disappointed with. It’s the whole thing. Maybe the other game was better, but I honestly felt as if I was watching a high school game on cable access. And this from someone who wanted nothing more than to see football last an additional ten weeks. I really wanted to see the XFL succeed, but after that lame display, I don’t see it happening.

9

Gazoo, I couldn’t agree with you more.

Watch me pass judgement on one. No, not one game. Just one half. I gave up at halftime after yelling at the TV for well over an hour. Maybe if I had watched the Chicago/Orlando game, I’d feel differently, but I doubt it. Most of the complaints below would apply to that game, too.

Reasons why I now hate the XFL:

  1. You were supposed to be good. I WANTED to like you. But since I don’t, I feel bitter and betrayed.

  2. Jesse Ventura is a twit. It’s bad enough I have to put up with his moronic antics as a governor - I live in Minnesota - but Christ on a crutch, Jesse, you’re paid to do more than state the obvious. “The timing was off on that timing play.” Really? “The quarterback scrambled out of the pocket to avoid the rush and threw the ball away down the sideline.” Ok, if you were a RADIO announcer, then I could buy that idiocy, but by God, man, I’m watching the game too!

  3. The X-Cam. The camera work as a whole was atrocious. I want to see a play unfold. I don’t want to see the field only between the hashmarks. The NFL tends to use a side-angle view for all plays. There is a reason why.

(The overhead camera was suspended on a line running above the field from sideline to sideline, SmackFu.)

  1. The whores. Er, cheerleaders. Ooh, I’m so proud of you that you’ve got a great body and you can gyrate your hips at a drunken fan. I admit to keeping an eye on NFL cheerleaders when I’m at a game, but they also keep my attention because they’re athletic and acrobatic. There’s no real appeal for me to watch a half-naked woman gyrate randomly in front of me unless I’m at the strip club. (Note to girlfriend: No, honey, I’ve never been to one. Honest.)

  2. The poor quality of players. As Jay Leno said last night, “How bad are these players if they couldn’t even make the cut for the San Diego Chargers?” They’re pathetic. Yes, I know that the XFL may become like the AFL or NFL Europe- a minor league farm club, where pro teams can develop promising players. But dear God, man, I could do better than that.

  3. The stupid interviewers on the sideline. Such as when Rod Smart (I will not call him “He Hate Me”) came to the sideline to take a play off after his long run, he had a microphone shoved in his mouth and another inane question asked. He panted to catch his breath and ran back to the huddle – and the interviewer followed him onto the field for a few steps before he ran back to the sideline. Sweet God above.

  4. The miking-up of players, coaches, and referees. Sure, that’s “x-treme” and “edgy” and “raw”. It’s also boring.
    Ref 1: So, defensive holding?
    Ref 2: Yeah. Defensive holding, five yards.
    Ref 1: Puts the ball on the 30? Or the 29?
    Ref 2: The 30. It’s a five yard penalty.
    Ref 1: Ok, defensive holding. Automatic first down.
    Ref 2: Yeah. Ok, the ball’s on the 30.

Wow. I feel so privileged that I was able to hear that scintillating exchange of wisdom. Please, can I next hear the beer vendor talking with his buddy? Or is that TOO “x-treme” and “edgy” and “raw” for me?

Or miking up a coach and quarterback:
Coach: 73 left slant Trojan.
Quarterback: Huddle up, huddle up.
Quarterback: 73 left slant Trojan. On one.
Team: Panting to catch breath.

Ooooooh. I’ll wager 99.9% of fans wouldn’t have been able to tell the difference if the coach had called anything else.

  1. The “five yard halo” on punts. The NFL has a two yard halo. If you’re so X-TREME, why the hell are you two and a half times as restrictive?

I admit that I liked some things about it. I liked the removal of the PAT. I like how defensive backs can play bump-and-run coverage for more than five yards, but not from the side or behind. I like the less rigid application of pass interference penalties.

But there’s no way I can watch that again.

10

I wonder how many simulposts are happening right now…

Anyway, now that it’s over, here are a few more thoughts:

Pro: switching to the other game when the first got boring. Smart move in my book.

Cons: The announcers in Orlando. Holy hell, but Jerry Lawler is annoying. In the long term, I think if the XFL wants any real respect, they need to ditch the WWF people and get some real football people involved.

Speaking of Lawler, shut the hell up about the cheerleaders!! You sound like an idiot. Sheesh.

Trying to interview the players and coaches during the game. It’s a nice thought, but they obviously hate it, it makes the interviewers look like idiots, and even when it works, the sound is so muddled you can barely hear what they’re saying. And it’s not like they say anything particularly interesting, anyway.

The sound overall. I really like the idea of miking everyone, but you can hardly make out what they say. And when they have to bleep out a swear word, they bleep like 15 seconds, making it even harder to follow.

Repetition. I get the feeling that after every single touchdown of the entire season, we’re going to be reminded that you can’t kick the extra point. Ditto with the punts being live balls.

Speaking of which, someone explain this to me: how can the kicking team recover a punt if they have to give the receiver a 5 yard halo??

Now don’t get me wrong, overall I quite liked it. As I said, it’s not the NFL, but it’s pretty entertaining. I expect I’ll watch it when I have nothing better to do.

11

I agree with LNO about the bad camera angles. Football is not meant to be seen end zone-to-end zone. Why else do you think seats on the 50-yard line cost more than end zone seats?

Other random observations: Jim Ross is actually a half-decent football announcer. Has he been in the wrong job all this time? Anyone notice that the game clock is sometimes running after an incomplete pass, and sometimes not? That black-and-red ball is hard to see when it’s in the air. Setting the play clock at 35 rather than 45 seconds was having some interesting effects, especially in causing the offenses to have more delay-of-game penalties. The crowds were impressive, even for opening games.

My opinion: get in some real announcers, ditch the goofy camera angles, and this league might be watchable. I’m not going to give up on it after one game, at least.

12

I’ll save MrC some verbage up front and state that I am judging this league based on tongiht’s experience. remember, though, that you never get a second chance to make a first impression. Vinny surely tried to pull out all the stops tonight, and it backfired.

The XFL is, in my opinion, a steamy, festering pile of dog shit. The quality of play was below poor. The game, for all of the talk about fast-paced, took FOREVER and was tremendously boring. The sideline interviews were a flop. The rule changes are either pointless or stupid (no PAT kick means no two-point conversion, which I like). The cheerleaders are whorish looking with no real talent that I could see (most didn’t even have rythym). The scramble at the beginning is dumb. I think there were LESS hard hits than an average NFL game. And don’t get me started on the announcing…

i liked the nicknames on the jerseys, I liked some of the different camera angles. I didn’t even mind the mics much (although they’re bleeped so often, why even bother?). As far as football goes, however, I’d rather watch Cleveland v. Cincinnati in an NFL double-header then watch tonight’s crap again.

But that’s just my opinion, I could be wrong.

13

My company makes the motors on the skycam… Just thought I’d share.

14

Um,

Did any of you expect this to be a pro football game?

I ask, because a lot of you are are talking like you did, and are pissed off that it wasn’t.

You wanna be pissed at someone, be pissed at yourself, for falling for the hype. Me, I expected about that level of play, and got it. I wasn’t disappointed.

15

It was alright, it’s definitely B-grade football, but pretty entertaining too. It’s needs work, there’s no doubt about that. The interviews were stupid and incoherent, the announcers didn’t mention the field position or down for the first quarter and a half! It was the first game, so I’ll give it a few more weeks, hopefully they get the bugs ironed out. I did like He Hate ME, there were some good plays and hits. The cheerleaders in Orlando looked pretty good, the Vegas ones were chicks who couldn’t even get jobs as strippers.
I’m a mark for Vince Macmahon though, but at least I admit my biases :slight_smile:

16

It seems that all of you who didn’t like the XFL saw the Las Vegas-NY game, which was pathetic in a way because the NY offense didn’t show up at all. The Orlando-Chicago game was much better, going down to the last play.

I was disappointed that the play-calling was more akin to what you might see from the NY Giants or Tampa Bay Bucaneers, that is, very conservative. The camera angles were sometimes intrusive to the players and the coaches. The on the-field announcers were even more so, and were less productive.

Now for the positives: The defenses were energetic enough (in the NW-LV game). The punting rules have some interesting results, and the punters were of high quality, as well as the returners. You guys act as if there were pattycake hits all night, when there were some very good licks out on the field. The free ball never came into play. The miking received some interesting sounds when they were not censored. The Chamura interview was very funny, and one of my favorite moments of the show. Jim Ross is by far one of the best announcers in the business, and he was in top form. A lot of you criticize Jesse Ventura and Jerry Lawler, and I didn’t care for Lawler ogling the cheerleaders as much as anybody else, but I think that they were funny and was interested in what they say. OK, they were not taking the game seriously, but then who would be, who should be, in this upstart league? They were out to have fun, and enjoy themselves. If you’re not supposed to have fun watching a football game, then when can you have fun?

Neutral: The constant reminder of the rules. I guess it is a necessary evil since it was the first night.

BTW joey, I have seen a Cleveland-Cincinati game. Pop Warner kids, or the kids that play snow football, with rough tackle and no pads, can play a better game. The XFL games are about NCAA Division 1AA–II level, which many of these players come from. That level of football doesn’t suck.

17

Yes, they are in fact getting paid. I expected to see something on the line of arena caliber play. It wasn’t. I also expected better production quality. I didn’t get it. That was the absolute worst televised football I’ve ever seen.

**Like I said, I truly wanted them to do well. I didn’t expect a lot on the field, but I did expect a good show. I got neither.

18

It was about what I expected. Minor league football with entertaining twists thrown in.

The LV-NY game was garbage. The Orlando-Chicago game was much better.

Rusty Tillman might be the worst head coach of ANY team I have ever seen!

By the way, for a pick on tommorow’s XFL action, click on:

http://hometown.aol.com/nflxfltout/myhomepage/football.html

19

Most of these opinions are similar to those already posted, but here goes:

Gameplay: OK, so it wasn’t that great (admittedly, I watched most of the LV/NY game). Some of the tackling was atrocious, and I laughed out loud when the NY quarterback went back to pass and the ball fell out of his hand. There was some pretty good hitting in a few places, though, and miking the field and the players was pretty cool. Taking it for what it is (offseason, minor-league football), I think it was all right overall. After all, college football isn’t always the highest quality, and I love it.

The rules: I loved the scramble for the ball at the beginning of the game, but they should have more than two players. The no-kick rule after touchdowns is interesting, but I still think the option should be available. The no-fair-catch rule didn’t live up to the hype, but I like the idea of both teams being able to grab the ball after it crosses the 25- or 35-yard line (I forget which).

Camera work: Some of it was interesting, but I really don’t need in-your-face, extreme closeup views all of the time. There’s something to be said for wide angle shots that let you watch the play develop.

Player interviews: They suck. They detract from the flow of the game, they’re annoying, and the players aren’t going to say anything worth listening to. It seems more like an excuse to produce trash-talk than anything else. Get rid of them.

The cheerleaders/strippers: Y’know, you’d think that large breasts and football would make for an entertaining viewing experience. I thought that. I was wrong. I really hope the rumors I’ve heard about player/bimbo skits during future games (ala the WWF) are false.

Miscellaneous: (1) Stone Cold talkin’ shit to Tagliabue during a commercial break - yeah, yeah, that’s the bottom line, all right. Aren’t people bored with you yet? (2) HE HATE ME - My week 1 favorite XFL player. (3) Jesse Ventura - Ummm… well, the guy was a SEAL, he served our country honorably, and he was great in Predator. That’s about all I can say.

20

Might as well chime in with my thoughts:

They need to speed up the player introductions somehow, because that is really going to get old fast. Probably just one of those ideas that sounded great in theory, but doesn’t work well in execution.

The camera angles they were using were great on running plays, but you couldn’t see a damn thing on the pass plays. They probably ought to stick to the sideline cameras and just use the overhead ones for replays.

The cut-in stuff with the wrestlers is unnecessary, and probably turns off a lot of people. Having Austin cut a promo on Tagliabue was an especially bad idea. Try some of the players or coaches next time, or maybe Dick Butkus.

Jesse Ventura sucked on commentary, as much as I hate to admit it. Matt Vasgersian was surprisingly good, though. And while we’re on the announcing, there were a lot of dead spots during the replays and when they were listening in on the huddles, which sounded kind of weird. I dunno, maybe they’ll adjust better as the season goes on.

The Hitmen SUCK. I can tell they’re going to be the XFL’s whipping boys by the end of the season.

He Hate Me was great, but what was up with the guy that had Baby Boy on the back of his uniform? Eh, whatever, I still think the whole nickname thing is pretty cool.

Switching over when the game turns into a laugher is something I wish the other leagues would do more often. The only time I’ve really seen it done before is during the early rounds of the NCAA basketball tournament, and it was a great idea to have another game ready just in case. Kudos to Vince on that one.

Speaking of the other game, it took one quarter to convince me that Jim Ross is one of the best announcers in football. I already knew he was a great announcer, but I was surprised at how well he managed to adjust to announcing a football game. I’ve since found out he used to announce games for the Atlanta Falcons, so no wonder. Some of Lawler’s comments were annoying, but he’s always had great chemistry with JR. That ought to count for something.

A note to Jonathan Coachman: It’s generally not a good idea to try and get an interview with a coach when the game is that close. That aside, I liked the fact that the Orlando/Chicago game seemed a lot less gimmicky than the first one.

Oh yeah. Despite their faults, both games almost made me forget how bad the Super Bowl was, and that’s quite an accomplishment. If they make some sorely needed improvements as the season goes on, the XFL probably has a good future ahead of it.