American Football
Sudden death has been perceived as a particularly poor fit for gridiron football because the process gives an inherent advantage to the team who gains possession of the ball: they can score and end the game immediately (even by driving a relatively short distance into field goal range and then kicking a field goal), but the team on defense cannot (other than through far rarer scoring strategies such as the pick-six or the safety) score immediately.
All organized forms of American football have abolished pure sudden death for overtime as of the 2011 season. Most levels of the game, including high school football and college football, never used it, instead either allowing ties to stand or using alternatives like the Kansas Playoff. The National Football League was an exception; the league used pure sudden death in its playoffs beginning in 1940 and in regular season matchups in 1974, finally modifying its process for playoffs in 2010 and then regular season games in 2011.
Read more about this topic: Sudden Death (sport)
Famous quotes containing the words american and/or football:
“Let those flatter, who fear: it is not an American art. To give praise where it is not due, might be well from the venal, but would ill beseem those who are asserting the rights of human nature.”
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