So I was up in the early AM with the newborn a couple weeks ago and caught Aussie-rules football on FS2. Any of y'all ever watched it? It is absolutely unlike any other sport I've ever watched, but it was also really fascinating. You can't throw or pitch the ball, so you can only advance it by running, kicking, or punching the ball. And when you make a clean catch, you get a free ten seconds where you can pass or shoot without being tackled, which means there's a heavy emphasis on going up for the ball in a crowd. Kinda reminds me of a cross between soccer (moving the ball largely with feet, scoring by kicking through a goal), football (tackling, ball carried in your hands), and the kids' game 500 (basically, there's a Hail Mary every few minutes, with multiple guys going up for a catch). I really enjoyed it both from a sports fan perspective and from kinda an anthropological/philosophical perspective (it's interesting seeing how sports develop from culture to culture--what stays the same and what is totally different). Just curious to see whether any of y'all follow the sport (or have even watched it before). And if anyone is interested, they're right in the middle of the playoffs right now and have playoff games tomorrow morning at 5:30 AM and Saturday morning at 5:00 AM, both on FS2. The playoff system is a little complicated (and, IMO, better than any eight-team single elimination model I've seen in any other sport), but basically the top two teams have a bye right now, and this week's games will determine the other two semi-finalists.
Used to watch it on ESPN back in the early 80's when they struggled to fill time slots. Loved the referees and was just looking for a gif of their scoring demonstration and am very saddened to see that apparently they changed the referee's uniform! They used to wear a cool ass coat and hat:
ESPN would be a lot better if they showed random stuff like this instead of idiots hollering at each other
I used to watch it back in the early days of ESPN when Melbourne was regularly playing.. really enjoyed it!
There was a commercial on yesterday that had a quick shot of a woman operating a hot saw. I immediately thought " let's go back to that and check it out." She was solid. Edit: it was crosscut saw now that I think about it more.