The Physics of Football

Ponca City, We Love You writes "There will be a program on applied physics and real time strategy that you might want to watch on television today. Conservation of momentum during elastic and inelastic collisions is one aspect on which to focus as players tackle their opponents. It is of critical importance that the Patriots bring down New York's huge and powerful running back, 6-foot-4, 265-pound Brandon Jacobs. An average-size NFL defensive back's mass combined with his speed — on average, 4.56 seconds for the 40-yard dash — can produce up to 1600 pounds of tackling force. A tackle with half a ton of force may sound like a crippling blow, but the body can handle twice that amount because the player's equipment spreads out the incoming energy, lessening its severity." Nanotech specialists from Cornell have developed their own take on the "physics" of the Super Bowl by creating the world's smallest trophy, which will be awarded today to a contestant who best explains an aspect of football physics. Just some food for thought while you watch the game on your brand new HD television, though you'd better not be watching it in a church.

Comments

Go Giants!

[Ang31us]

Momentum = Mass * Velocity Brandon Jacobs is HUGE and runs very fast.

For those who are interested..

[run4power]

For those who want to view the submissions, all submissions are uploaded to youtube with the tag "nanobowl".

Wrong title

[Affenkopf]

As an European I'd like to point out that the article is not about football but about some strange American sport where the foot isn't even used (or at least not that often,I have no idea to be honest).

Re:Wrong title

[sayfawa]

I'd like to point out that this blog is written in American (yes, American, not USian) English. A dialect distinct from the English you may be used to. And in this language football is, in fact, the name of the current subject. Complaining that we use the "wrong" words for things is as silly as complaining that the Spaniards say "juegos" instead of "games". It's a different language. Get over it.

Re:Wrong title

[carpe_noctem]

Yes, but the ball itself somewhat resembles a foot. So by using those terms, it's not the Europeans who are backwards!

Re:Wrong title

[drewmoney]

20 out of the top 21 leading point makers of the regular 2007 season are kickers. Guess how they put points on the board.....yeah, they kick the ball. NFL Scoring Stats

Re:Wrong title

[RobBebop]

Yes, but the ball itself somewhat resembles a foot

If this is what your foot looks like, sir, then I suggest you seek the help of a professional foot doctor. Your egg-feet will scare the children.

Re:Wrong title

[Blitz22]

The term "football" probably comes from the fact that the sport is played "on foot" as opposed to on horseback. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football/ So yeah, it IS about football.

Re:Wrong title

[UnxMully]

I'm happy to call it American football if you're okay to call soccer European or world football.

Feel free. Though I should point out that Soccer is a contraction of Association Football, there's a good article here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Football_(soccer)#History_and_development, and predates American Football by some time - the first rules being codified in the 1850s. The less charitable among us followers of more robust codes tend to call it Wendyball or poofball, mainly because of all the falling over, rolling about and crying that goes on.

Then there's Rugby Union (football), which dates from around the same time, and the bastard child Rugby League, aka the thickhead crashball game. Not to mention a whole host of other games including a number of forms played in Ireland (Gaelic) which have been played for close to 700 years.

Compared to all of these games, American Football can be considered something of a johny-come-lately.

So call it Football if you want, but the rest of the world differentiates different styles of football even if you're not aware of their existence.

Re:Wrong title

[PietjeJantje]

That's true. Regarding Slashdot, if your target audience is national, "football" is ok..on the other hand if your target audience is international use "American Football", unless you want to communicate you're ignorant of the biggest sport on earth named with the same sequence of letters, and serve your percentage of international viewers a title which means something different to them.

Re:Wrong title

[Anonymous Coward]

I know! It's so hard to consider context! I need to be spoonfed my stories!

Re:Wrong title

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

http://slashdot.org/faq/editorial.shtml#ed850
Slashdot seems to be very U.S.-centric. Do you have any plans to be more international in your scope?

Slashdot is U.S.-centric. We readily admit this, and really don't see it as a problem. Slashdot is run by Americans, after all, and the vast majority of our readership is in the U.S. We're certainly not opposed to doing more international stories, but we don't have any formal plans for making that happen. All we can really tell you is that if you're outside the U.S. and you have news, submit it, and if it looks interesting, we'll post it.

Re:Wrong title

[Anonymous Coward]

If you can't even tell a language and a dialect apart (and you obviously can't, given that you refer to US-American English as both), you really shouldn't talk about linguistics. Shut your trap and don't embarass yourself.

Re:Wrong title

[KDR_11k]

I'd also like to shout out to Microsoft for improving HTML to suit their needs...

Re:Wrong title

[KeensMustard]

Have you been in a coma for 40 years? If so, that would explain your basic lack of understanding of the world you live in and share with others.

I find it amusing that the rest of the world sucks up as much American culture as possible, from our music, In my CD stacker: Coldplay, Dire Straits, Bjork, REM, Midnight Oil, Crowded House. I think maybe REM is American.

movies Curious thing. I checked my DVD collection. Maybe 1/3 American. 1/3 not. 1/3 a mix of American and others. Much of what is ostensibly American, turns out to be a mix of a number of cultural influences and participation.

and television shows Couldn't really get a representative sample because I don't watch much TV (although Top Gear is a must watch, along with Mythbusters).

to going in droves to our crappy McDonald's that are popping up all over the world (hint: McDonald's sucks. Stop going). Actually I quite enjoy an occasional visit to McDonalds - I like the thai chicken wrap if it is lunchtime and the espresso is passing grade (good considering how much training the barrista must get) if it is just a short break. Like most people I generally end up at McDonalds because they have outlets on the roads I travel. Notably McDonalds tries to approximate the foods we like to eat - we influence McDonalds, McDonalds doesn't influence us. Hardly the burgeoning frontier of American culture.

But then they get all prissy when we call football football. We call your football soccer, but we call our football football. It's the way we do things over here. If you don't like the names we use for sport, fine. But don't get all in a huff over it. But "we" in this case is the audience and members of /. And We call any number of games football, just like We mostly use metric and not the exaggerated length of the foot of King James II as a unit of measure. For reasons of clarity then, it is necessary to qualify the language used to suit the international audience on this site.

Watch Sport Science

[sponga]

There is a show called 'Sport Science' on Fox Sports where they take all these extreme athletes of all types of sports in America like NBA, NFL, NHL, I.R.L., softball, soccer, billards and it goes on. The text article is nice but they provide so much more info on the show and visual demonstrations with great players like Jerry Rice, Ben Roathlisberger

The MMA one is a really interesting one when you have Bas Rutten making the scientest jaws drop with the amount of pressure they hit a target. One hit I remember broke the 1000lbs of force and they were telling these guys that they are throwing concussion hits.

Good episodes like...
Human Flight: Who Are The Highest Flyers in Sports?
Sudden Impact: Who Hits the Hardest in Sports?
Reaction Time: Who Reacts the Fastest in Sports?
Cheap Shots: What does a Cheap Shot feel like in Sports?
Out of Control: Elements of the Game you can't Control

Rugby...

[Bazman]

England could do with some of those guys in their rugby team, assuming they don't mind playing without helmets and body armour - oh, and multi-million pound/dollar sponsorship deals...

So no chance then.

Re:Rugby...

[Anonymous Coward]

And you can't play either of them.

Re:Rugby...

[pbhj]

>>> usually weigh around 300-350 lbs [21-25 stone for the Brits in the audience]

We've been metric since before I was born, I'm 31. I'll let you off though as no-one over here seems to have noticed either.

So it's 135-160 Kg, thanks.

Apparently theres a game on today

[Anonymous Coward]

I cant wait till its over so everyone will shut up about it.

Re:Slow news day

[Robber Baron]

Must be a slow news day. This is neither "news for nerds" nor "stuff that matters". Sure it is. Now when the jocks beat you up or stuff you in a locker, at least you'll understand a little of the physics behind it.

More physics

[PPH]

I will be conducting a careful study of wave propagation through viscous silicone mediums subject to oscillating vertical acceleration.

Re:Why bother with physics when you can just cheat

[Reverberant]

The Patriots had broken a rule that had recently been explicitly laid out by the league. (See article).

Pats fan here. Yes, the Patriots broke the rules and were punished for it, but let's put this into perspective:

1. It's not against NFL rules to steal signs
2. It's not against NFL rules to steal signs using video cameras
3. It is against NFL rules for clubs to use video-recording equipment outside certain designated areas during games.

The Pats got in trouble for #3, not #1 & 2.

Of course #3 apparently contradicts league guidance on shooting from end zone positions ("but there are no restrictions on shooting from both upper end zone positions as long as the opportunity is provided to both teams") which apparently means there is some room for interpretation.

And c'mon... did they REALLY need to cheat against the Jets? The 4-12 Jets? You would think that wiser head couches would save their cheating for games against stronger teams.

The incident happened in the first half of the first game of the '07 season. In the prior year, the Jets were a playoff team that beat the Patriots in November '06 (which I remember because I was there). There was every reason to expect that the Jets would have been a strong contender this past season.

Behind the Scenes Equipment Testing

[flyneye]

I personally worked for a paint factory that manufactured the paint that goes on the helmets(Yes,the NFLs helmets made by RYDELL).The problem we were overcoming was the old paint weakened the strength of the helmets causing splits and cracks.Our method of test consisted of 10 ft. of 4inch PVC duct taped to a pillar.At the bottom of the pillar,a box,little bigger than the helmet w/4 inches of foam rubber.The helmet sat in the box and two 10 lb.sledgehammer heads duct taped together were dropped to dent the helmet upon which it was inspected for cracks or splits radiating from the dent.The old paint wouldn't withstand a single hammer head.Ours withstood both in the end.
          Cost of research,less than $50 U.S. Scienterrific,huh?

It's Jonah Lomu, all over again

[LadyLucky]

If you haven't seen it, his classic try against England in 95.