The NFL is the largest sports league in the world. She still wants to expand. But the rules are complicated, playing football requires equipment and a lot of time. That’s why the NFL relies on small flags and a “giant fun factor” to conquer the world.
For the common sports fan, American football is primarily about hard tackles. Twenty-two men in tight leggings and nearly indestructible helmets rattle together with an energy that could power the Super Bowl halftime show.
As a Central European football fan, it is hard to understand the physical wear and tear that inevitably occurs: in almost every game, a player is led off the field injured or carried off. There is a separate protocol for head injuries (admittedly an area in which football needs to be more active), as well as torn tendons or broken bones.
20 games instead of 60 or 100
The inevitably enormous physical effort still characterizes the sport today with a number of side effects. The most obvious is the need for protective clothing. The helmets are constantly being revised, and there are also pads for the shoulders, back and chest or tape for the ankles. The spartan game plan follows directly on from this. Players on a European soccer team play a good 60 games a year, while teams in the NBA like to play around 100 on their way to the title.
And in the NFL? The Super Bowl winner played almost 20 games. Nothing more is possible, the sport is simply too strenuous and the strain on the players is too high. When it was discussed in 2019 whether the NFL would play 18 instead of 16 games in the regular season, ESPN reported on a study by the NFL players’ union. She calculates that the average career length of players would fall from 3.4 to 2.8 years. Since 2021 there have been 17 games per season for each team.
Equipment costs money, stress costs time
Another problem: Because of the risk of injury, the Pro Bowl, the NFL’s All Star Game, has long been primarily a contact avoidance game. It’s the last game of the season before the Super Bowl and no player wants to start the holiday with a torn Achilles tendon. Exporting the sport also suffers from these factors. The required equipment costs money, and the high strain on the athletes costs time. The latter also prevents football from theoretically being included in the Olympic program. A tournament within four weeks seems unthinkable.
But the NFL has apparently found a solution to all these problems. A new miracle weapon ensures an exciting All-Star Game, solves all time and resource problems, prevents injuries rather than causing them and will make its Olympic debut in 2028. Her name: Flag Football.
“Everything that’s cool” – without a car accident
A first impression of the football variant on the big stage will already be given this spring, at the Pro Bowl mentioned above. Instead of helmets and pads, the best football players in the world stand on the field with fast glasses, gold chains or bucket hats. Good mood far and wide, no one needs to worry about injuries. Because flag football is contactless. Two flags or flags on each player’s side must be grabbed, then the game’s turn ends. Since contact doesn’t play a role, the offensive and defensive lines, i.e. the men who are directly opposite each other on every play and rattle into each other at the kickoff, are missing.
That leaves seven players per team, including quarterbacks, receivers, running backs, cornerbacks and so on. “You have your moves, your passes, your routes or you have to defend them. Everything that’s great in football, you have in flag football too. The only thing is that your body doesn’t hurt the next day like you’ve been in a car accident.” says Mona Stevens and attests that her sport has a “gigantic fun factor”. She has to know. The 31-year-old is a quarterback for the German national tackle football team, a wide receiver for Germany’s flag football team and is also a flag football ambassador for the NFL and, as an expert, part of the NFL team on broadcaster RTL.
Lots of energy for expansion
She often has colleagues who switch from flag football to tackle football. “It’s boring, I can hardly get a ball,” is what she hears more often. “In flag football, there’s always action. You get more passes, you run more routes,” she explains. The change is possible, but it just takes a few weeks to get used to it. The NFL is also relying on this effect.
The American sports giant is currently pursuing its expansion with a lot of energy. “America’s Game” wants to go out into the world. An important pillar of this project are the games abroad. Games have been played regularly in London since 2007, and the NFL has also been playing in Germany since 2022 – with an impressive response. The NFL has been a guest in Mexico City several times, and next year the football circus plans to stop in São Paulo.
Being able to experience a sport live is one thing. Actually operating them is something completely different. If the NFL wants to be a global league, it also needs global stars, like the NBA. In the best basketball league in the world, many top players come from the USA, but also from Greece, Slovenia, Serbia and Cameroon. This is – still – unthinkable in the NFL.
“Who’s hitting each other with equipment in the park?”
A formula for success in football, the world’s largest sport, is the extremely low requirements for playing materials. You need a ball, actually any object that can be thrown and caught is enough. You can throw two jackets on the ground as goalposts. That’s it. “You need an infrastructure for football. Who’s going to get equipment in the park? But you can also play flag football in the park or on the beach. That’s the extended version of catching the ball,” explains Sebastian Vollmer, who played for New England for seven years Patriots active in the NFL, the minimalist concept.
Due to the few resources that the game requires, it has long since become part of school sports. “As a child, you now have the chance to grow up with it. In contrast to tackle football, the inhibition threshold is much lower, for both children and parents, because the risk of injury is significantly lower. Boys and girls play together,” explains Vollmer. “And you can always switch to tackle football if you feel like it. Flag football is also a good way for the NFL to find the next star from Africa or Europe.”
Patrick Mahomes soon to be an Olympian?
And then there are the Olympics. The games will take place in Los Angeles in 2028. Flag football is also on the program. NFL megastar Patrick Mahomes recently expressed interest in taking part. “The NFL is very interested in having the sport represented in the Olympics,” Stevens said. At the same time, the players have the historic opportunity to win their first football gold. Germany could also have a chance of winning a medal. At the 2023 European Championships, the men won and the women took bronze.
The sheer popularity of football may not significantly change flag football. The access options in everyday life do. At the beginning of the 20th century, football took over sports bars and living rooms around the world. With the tailwind of LA 2028, football can finally conquer parks, beaches and school halls – only this time without a helmet.