One of my new fave sports, the LFL

As most of you know, I have never exactly been the type to “keep it between the lines”, and love to go my own way whenever I can.

No surprise then that I have that most of my close friends also think that way, and that I have always admired people that look at the mass of followers that say “You can’t do that”, and just say, “oh yeah….watch me!”

It surprises no one that some of my idols, if you will, are James Doolittle, Charles Lindbergh, Eugene Bullard, Chuck Yeager, Larry Bird, John Elway, and Lance Armstrong. (Feel free to look up those you don’t recognize…or just ask ;) )

Some, however, look at my personal library and are surprised that I also consider Amelia Earhart, Lydia Litvayak, Jackie Cochran, Lyn St James, Patty Wagstaff, Hanna Reitsch, and Sarah Fisher pioneers and idols as well.

I like strong personalities, and I love women. Put the two together, and the fact that, while maybe not a feminist, I love strong women, shouldn’t really surprise anyone.

Don’t get me wrong about the “not a feminist” thing. I think women are every bit as good as any man, and need to have the same chances. I just hate labels and don’t conform well to putting them on myself.

“Geek” is about as far as I go that way, and it’s a rather broad term.

Everyone also knows I love any sport that has to do with running and jumping, and will play or watch them whenever I can. I’m not a bad athlete myself, and have played Soccer, Baseball, Basketball, Football, Volleyball, and Rugby at various levels, and have had some success in Track and Cross Country.

It should come as no surprise, then, that I love the LFL, which combines the two things I mentioned above.

I am fortunate enough to call one of the ladies of the Tampa Breeze LFL team, Carie Small, a friend. She is the one that introduced me to the LFL and ended up inviting me to my first game, ironically, AFTER she was no longer an active player. More on that later.

Carie and I goofing around pre-game

Let me give you a little background on the league:
The LFL, which stands for Lingerie Football League, though no one calls it that, started as a gimmick to go opposite the Super Bowl Halftime Show. Models dressed up in lingerie and “played” football.

It was the epitome of the term “Powder Puff Football” when it started.
Then, in 2009, that gimmick expanded into a league.

The models disappeared, and were replaced with athletes. (However, many of these women are very easily more attractive than your typical model. Thought that is a personal observation, as I have always enjoyed healthy, in shape women over the anorexic starving waif look that seems to be popular lately.)

Bryn Renda snags a catch in warmups

The games are set up on the same rules and groundwork as some of the old Indoor Football league, with 7 on 7 for 17minute halves, and many of the women play iron man, being on both Offense and Defense.

Passion Breaking a Run

Quick Screen Pass

Getting Ready to Go

Run it down their throats

Handing off

It is a gimmick no longer, although, unfortunately, it is still being marketed as if it were one.

The thought of watching scantily clad women play sports lures people in to the game……and unfortunately endangers the players, as well as putting preconceptions in some people’s minds.

The LFL’s image actually hurts it in terms of being taken seriously as a sport in some ways. The uniforms are called Lingerie……but they aren’t. It’s more of a sports bra and short shorts, or bikini, type outfit. As you can well see for yourself.

Split WRs

Breeze head onto the field

In the trenches

The sport isn’t really well marketed, and tends to rely on word of mouth to get butts in seats, and then MTV2 really doesn’t do the game justice, showing chopped versions of the games late at night and one or two weeks later.

It needs to be seen live, full length, and maybe even on ESPN. I mean, really, ESPN shows poker, spelling bees, and billiards, none of which are sports (the first and last are GAMES people), but they don’t show real athletes playing a real sport.

And trust me, these women are real athletes. They train, promote, and play hard for a sport they love to play.

And that is one HUGE difference between the LFL and NFL, in my mind.

The players play for the love of the game in the LFL, something that, sadly, has been missing in recent years from the NFL.

Hence the pending lockout. Don’t get me started.

If Tom Brady played QB, for, say, the Miami Caliente, wearing just the uniform they wear (which is a thought that will haunt my nightmares. Brady in a bikini. AAARRRGGGH. My mind….my miiiiiiiinnnnnddddd. Though, in fairness, he has longer hair than some of the women I know ;) ), he would not be getting up after taking the kind of hit these women deliver. Let’s face it. Brady is probably the Princess of The league as far as QBs are concerned. I don't dislike the guy....not a fan of his BS though.

Maybe he was a bad example, but, pound for pound, these ladies could go toe to toe with most NFL players their size….and I’d put odds on the women.

They don’t play around, and the amount of injuries these athletes sustain will attest to that.

There def has to be more thought given to player protection, I mean, those women hit HARD (And this is from an ex rugby player), and the hockey helmets don’t really do much for protection from that. These women only have shoulder pads, but NONE of the collisions really seem to happen at shoulder height or above.

Injured Breeze on the sidelines

As Carie and I have discussed, most of the hits are well below the pads they wear, and hitting that artificial turf doesn’t help matters either. Back to my friend Carie, she is one of the several injuries that have been sustained this season by the Breeze, the local team here in Tampa. Her ankle got shattered and her leg broken in a practice, badly enough that she is now, as she jokingly calls herself, a Cyborg.

In my first LFL game, where the Breeze played the Miami Caliente, two other women were seriously injured and didn’t finish the game, and in the second game, versus the Passion, while no one was injured out of the match, more than a few of the girls were sporting large turf burns due to the impractical, if attractive, uniforms. And with the teams playing both sides of the ball, the opportunities for injury are even larger.

Touchdown Coming Up....

Reciever in motion

Pregame warmups - Philly Passion

In the middle of that scrum is the ball carrier

WR, meet the Breeze DB

But I don’t think, unfortunately, that the LFL is marketing towards safety minded sports fans just at the moment. Just look at some of the team names and you can see what direction they are marketing towards. Orlando Fantasy. Philly Passion. L.A. Temptation. Chicago Bliss. You get the idea.

Safety doesn’t get butts in the seats, even though if the ladies were able to wear NFL style uniforms (face it, the NFL boys wear stretch pants with pads), with obvious modifications to the upper body padding, they would still be attractive AND protected.

However, I don’t see that happening any time soon, at least until they have a larger league and more games, which in turn brings in more funding. Safety and protection don’t put butts in seats in the world we live in.

Innuendo and skin do. Which, sadly, is just a reflection of the world we live in.

Of course, would I be saying this if I didn’t personally know someone on the team?

Well, it’s me, so, yeah, probably.

Either way…….I’ll be at all the Breeze home games I can manage!

If you are a true sports fan, do yourself a favor….look past the trappings and go to an LFL game if you have a team in your city.

Believe me, you’ll be hooked. Everyone I have ever brought to a game is now an LFL fan, both men AND women!