In the late 1800's, American football was believed to have been created, in fact, Rutgers versus Princeton, in 1869, was the first American college football game.  The sport became very popular, and different levels of the game were invented. In 1920, The National Football League (NFL) is the largest professional American football league in the world, was formed by eleven teams as the American Professional Football Association, the league changed the name to American Professional Football League in 1921 and then settled on its current name in 1922. The league currently consists of thirty-two teams from American cities and regions, divided evenly into two conferences, the American Football Conference and the National Football Conference. Football is a well known sport, and has different methods of play, indoor and outdoor. Arena Football, also known as indoor football, is a sport similar to American football. The sport was invented by James F. Foster, a former executive of the National Football League. Although the objects of the game for the two sports are the same, they are very different in many ways.

“First Down!” is a commonly used phrase you are more than likely to hear at both styles of these football games; however, in outdoor football the playing field is much larger than the indoor style of football, more first downs are possibly awarded per drive. The outdoor game’s field is one hundred yards for the field of play, and the indoor game is half of that, at fifty yards for field of play, in addition, the action is right in your face! Indoor and Outdoor football both have out of bound lines, but the out of bound line for indoor football is made up of a wall and fans are seated behind this wall, they can literally reach over and touch their favorite players. This gives the fans that feel of being on the field. In Sioux City, Iowa, their Indoor team is called the Bandits, and the fans there are wonderful, they even have a section where the fans have created the “Leap Zone,” this zone lets fans and players interact after a positive thing has been done on the field, for example, when a player scores a touch down, they would go over to the “Leap Zone” and do just that, leap into the air! In addition to the differences of the game, the number of players per team isn’t the same. Most indoor teams have a maximum of up to 25 players per team, while the outdoor game can have up to at least 80 players, and on the field playing, indoor has traditional eight players on the offense, and eight players on the defense. The outdoor game traditionally has eleven players on the offense, and eleven players on the defense. Some of the rules for both styles of football are the same, but on offense one in particular is different, and that is players that are in motion. When a player is in motion, it is the player that is moving before the play actually starts. In the outdoor game, the motion player can only move left or right before the start of a play, and once he starts to go into motion, he can stop moving his legs until the play starts, while in indoor football, multiple players can go in motion before the play starts, and they can either go left or right, or towards the opposing team. For players who are playing indoor football for the first time, this can be quite tricky to catch on to. Some of the rules that are the same are, off sides, pass interference, false starts, and many more. Touch downs are the same, six points, and field goals are the same, 3 points. The field goal posts for the indoor game are much smaller than the traditional style field goal posts for the outdoor game. As it is in the outdoor game, kicking is also a big factor in the indoor game. However, field goals and extra points are done much differently in the indoor game. Indoor, the goal posts are nine-feet wide with a crossbar height of 15 feet (as opposed to outdoor goal posts, which are 18 ½ feet wide with a crossbar height of 10 feet). There are many leagues for each style of football in America, to name a few we have for the outdoor game would be, NFL, AAFL, Semi Pro leagues, and College. Leagues for the indoor game are AFL, AFL2, UIF, NIFL, IFL, and AIFL to name a few.

Despite having some differences, both styles are the same when it comes to hard hitting, scoring, excitement, tailgating and having fans who love the game. I would advise anyone to check out an indoor football game. Any type of football game has great food, fun, and overall just a great experience for anyone. Traditional outdoor football starts in the fall, and indoor football leagues start in the spring. I would highly recommend anyone to get tickets to any of these football games, it is absolutely worth the money!