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<p>perhaps someone who obviously knows very little about the sport, shouldn’t be commenting on said sport.</p>
<p>Living here in football mania land, this thread rather does my heart good. Have never cared for the game, cannot get excited about it in the slightest, though don’t abhore it as much as in HS, when I refused marching band due to my dislike of football. In those days, it seemed proto military, and I wanted nothing to do with it. </p>
<p>Living in Wisconsin, an interest of some sort must be feigned, and the interest tolerated with a smile, as between Big 10 and the Packers, it is the obsession of the land.</p>
<p>what a bunch of party poopers…sure I guess everyone should stay home and read all weekend</p>
<p>I am female, enjoy watching football, and went to pretty much all home games in college (Michigan). My D1 only went to a few football games at her LAC on parent weekends when it was the polite thing to do with her visitors. 
D2 hates almost all sports and wouldn’t dream of going to a football game. (However, both could sing the Victors by the age of 2, so I guess that is something to hold onto…).</p>
<p>Not everywhere. But it helps if the students are part of the games.</p>
<p>[Badgers</a> football: Student tickets sell out in less than 2 hours : Sports](<a href=“http://host.madison.com/sports/college/football/badgers-football-student-tickets-sell-out-in-less-than-hours/article_993cc013-bc74-54a1-9032-1da3fda6ae23.html]Badgers”>Badgers football: Student tickets sell out in less than 2 hours)</p>
<p>[Shout</a> at Camp Randall Stadium 9/5/09 - YouTube](<a href=“Shout at Camp Randall Stadium 9/5/09 - YouTube”>Shout at Camp Randall Stadium 9/5/09 - YouTube)</p>
<p>[Wisconsin</a> Vs Nebraska Build Me Up Buttercup - YouTube](<a href=“Wisconsin Vs Nebraska Build Me Up Buttercup - YouTube”>Wisconsin Vs Nebraska Build Me Up Buttercup - YouTube)</p>
<p>[Jump</a> Around - Wisconsin vs Nebraska - Full HD - YouTube](<a href=“Jump Around - Wisconsin vs Nebraska - Full HD - YouTube”>Jump Around - Wisconsin vs Nebraska - Full HD - YouTube)</p>
<p>Maybe there is a reason why some of us don’t think football is all that.
[Former</a> NFL player commits suicide | Al Jazeera America](<a href=“http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2013/9/26/former-nfl-playercommitssuicide.html]Former”>Former NFL player commits suicide | Al Jazeera America)</p>
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<p>Other sports may be better for lifetime health, I think.</p>
<p>It’s certainly not declining at Umich where they sold more student tickets this year than ever before. My very geeky son has attended every game since he was a freshman and is now in grad school. He and his equally geeky wife are flying in for the OSU game the Saturday after thanksgiving. And the tickets are really expensive for poor grad students, but worth every penny for them. One year he sold his OSU ticket for $300 but then couldn’t not go so he bought another one.</p>
<p>I don’t know the details at OSU, or MSU, but I’m pretty sure attendance is not declining there either. One of my son’s friends drove to watch the MSU vs Notre Dame game this year.</p>
<p>Football is still king in Florida. Florida right now has: 3 college teams ranked in top 20; 3 NFL teams; high school football players as good as anywhere in America…if not the best. Floridians love football!</p>
<p>I go to Michigan, there’s no apathy. The student body lives and dies with the team football Saturdays. I’m a junior and we haven’t had a home loss yet over the past 17 home games, and I can’t imagine what Ann Arbor would be like if that happens. Gotta win.</p>
<p>D1 saw more football games than she had any interest in seeing as an undergrad at a northeastern FCS school since she was a member of the pep band. Now that she is a grad student at Notre Dame she makes a point of getting out of South Bend if at all possible on game days. Apathy (or even antipathy) towards football runs fairly deep among the grad students she knows, many of whom are international. She says the undergrads she has encountered are largely enthusiastic about the football team, however. And ND has hundreds of thousands of parents, real alums and subway alums who are happy to buy tickets. It will be decades, I’d guess, before ND has to worry about not selling out a home game.</p>
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<p>When I was in high school and my brother was at Michigan, he got me a ticket for the OSU game one year for my birthday. 
Might be the best b-day present I have ever received.</p>
<p>I love football, always have, even as a little girl. I used to get so excited to watch the Cowboys play back in the Tom Landry days.</p>
<p>Knowing what I now know about brain injuries, I find myself cringing a lot at the hits. It seems that the guys who defend the receivers have gotten stronger and so much faster. Some of those hits on defenseless receivers are so brutal, I just know they are causing damage that will be very evident later on. I know the leagues are trying to change this by all the new penalties and such against head to head hits and dirty hits on the “defenseless” receivers, but it’s not enough so far to really curb this behavior in the players yet. </p>
<p>Since they are now being sued by former players and are likely to be held financially responsible for their damages, it seems the leagues have no choice but to change the game radically in order to better protect the players. And of course the fans continue to complain about it.</p>
<p>The changes underway are a good response to the reality of bigger faster players. People will get used to it and a head hit will eventually be booed.</p>
<p>When I was in school (when dinosaurs roamed the earth) I never ever went to games. School and work took up all my time and the last thing I wanted to do on my days off was sit in a stadium. In fact, very few of my fellow student attended games back in the day. D only attended games when she was paid to sing the national anthem.Now as an alum I attend games all the time …though it helps that I am only five miles from the Rose Bowl.</p>
<p>Going to football games was a fun social event at my alma mater (state flagship). I never missed a game in all the years I was there. I think I’ve been to only 1 or 2 since I graduated.</p>
<p>I am with Nrdsb4. All of the information coming to light regarding football-associated brain injuries has ruined it for me, even though I loved to watch it as a kid and went to several UT games as a student (got to see Earl Campbell play a few times). My S, a high school senior, couldn’t care less about whether the colleges he is interested in have football or other athletic teams as he doesn’t like to watch any sports. He finds sci-fi infinitely more entertaining.</p>
<p>On the subject of just brutal, cringe-worthy hits in football:</p>
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<p>And this disturbing fact:</p>
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<p>Who cares about football.</p>
<p>^^^^Oh, only millions upon millions of people care about football. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>When my two youngest started playing ice hockey, I started watching the NHL. I very quickly stopped watching football (which I had watched with varying levels of intensity for 30 years). I wish that there were no fighting in the NHL, but they are making moves to reduce fighting and other concussion-causing behavior. Football, to me, is now a few seconds of action followed by interminable “analysis.” Hockey flows, and with a good large HDTV, is just as good at home as at the game.</p>