Flag Football is added to the 2028 Olympics - What's the USA Dream Team?
Flag Football was approved today as a new sport in the 2028 Olympics being held in Los Angeles along with lacrosse (six-a-side format), cricket (something called Twenty20 format), squash and a return of baseball & softball.
Unfortunately breakdancing will be cancelled after its one year appearance next year in Paris.
Obviously the NFL and teams would have to allow player to play and who knows if a group of NFL players who haven't played together is better than whomever plays this as teams on their own (sounds like there are international adult flag football tournaments. If so, who is the USA dream team? Are we dropping Mahomes, JaMarr Chase, Justin Jefferson, Kelce etc out there? Does Brady come out of retirement???
October 16th, 2023 at 2:14 PM ^
Denard. Always Denard.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:42 PM ^
I’m entering my 98 umich flag football team in for qualifiers. I’m banking on most countries not sufficiently understanding the rules.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:59 PM ^
My first time playing "organized" flag/touch football was as a freshman at UofM in 2004 - tackle football was more normal for kids at the time and what I'd been playing since 7th grade. Had done some 7on7 in HS but that's pretty different. So I didn't fully get the rules other than "no tackling."
So anyway, some kid comes across the middle on a x-ing route at a short depth and i absolutely clobber him. He gets pissed, I'm confused, I get a flag but fortunately don't get kicked out of the game.
Relatedly, in my HS we had a lot of immigrants who had limited understanding of football. They were usually athletic and hungry but...well, the JV games were usually very entertaining. We had one kid playing safety, sees a wideout running for a deep post, and similarly clobbers him while the ball is at its highest point. A full second after the deafening hit, the ball lands with a thud, in parallel with the flags.
Not understanding the rules can sometimes be painful...for the understanders.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:14 PM ^
Sam McGuffie (assuming he's not training for bobsledding in the Winter Games)
October 16th, 2023 at 2:14 PM ^
This should be decided completely based on ability to properly griddy.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:20 PM ^
Naw it's totally going to just be 2023 Maryland. They are built for 7on7
October 16th, 2023 at 2:22 PM ^
Tacopants would be unstoppable.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:23 PM ^
Tyreek Hill should be the first guy to get a call. I'm not sure what the rules are for flag football but I would imagine quickness and speed would be valued over size.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:56 PM ^
Micah Parsons on defense
October 16th, 2023 at 4:32 PM ^
Agree on Tyreek Hill. And I would much prefer a Lamar Jackson or Kyler Murray type QB to a Mahomes or Josh Allen type. The more water bugs the better.
October 16th, 2023 at 4:52 PM ^
Hill was my first thought as well. Second was Semaj Morgan!
October 16th, 2023 at 2:24 PM ^
USC's whole team; they already think they're playing flag football as it is.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:28 PM ^
Honestly, I don’t like this at all. Football is just not an international sport. You’ll get the odd international athlete (Tim Biakabatuka! David Ojabo! Zoltan Mesko from space!) but it’s an American sport. Might as well add Aussie rules football next time the Olympics goes to the eastern hemisphere.
Wouldn’t Ultimate make more sense?
October 16th, 2023 at 2:45 PM ^
Agreed. Every couple of years they talk about dropping wrestling just to get all of the wrestlers up in arms and watching. Flag football and a few other recent sports are not important to the Olympics. That said if they can get an audience more power to them. It would be dumb for NFL athletes to compete in this (economically). I can see some guys at the beginning or end of their NFL career playing to get some press.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:29 PM ^
Yeah youll get zero active NFL players but youll be able to get enough former college football players that it’ll likely be a joke. I don’t get why youd make this an olympic sport
October 16th, 2023 at 3:50 PM ^
He Hate Me is waiting for the call
October 16th, 2023 at 2:58 PM ^
How about Roque? Poodle trimming? Pistol dueling? Plunge for distance? Halo?
October 16th, 2023 at 5:32 PM ^
I think this is a bit much. Flag football is pretty big right now. UA has legit leagues all the way through High School. I think it would be a pretty awful sport to watch but it isn’t as though barely anybody plays flag.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:01 PM ^
I think it's kinda cool to showcase local culture, it'll only be one year. But yea I expect it to be a medal table of USA-Canada-Mexico. It'd be pretty cool if like Slovenia or South Africa or Uzbekistan field a really competent team that medals tho and then randomly becomes a hotbed for flag football for a generation off the backs of that.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:37 PM ^
I agree that from a player prospective, football has yet to catch on as the infrastructure and culture are just not a good fit.
From a viewer/fan point of view, that may change as FF is essentially ultimate with a football, no? I just read Goodell hasn't ruled out having America's favorite pastime (sorry baseball but it's true) in London... While I think that's absolutely bonkers, maybe FF is the gateway drug other nations need to draw interest in the sport? Also FF strips away many of the unique but America-centric rules and knowledge needed to really learn the sport. Throw, catch, swipe (tackle) and you've got the gist.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:36 PM ^
Mike Barrett
October 16th, 2023 at 2:53 PM ^
I'll take Mike Vick, Barry Sanders, Darren Sproles, Tyreek Hill, Marshall Faulk and Dante Hall.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:57 PM ^
As much as I love the concept, this seems incredibly unfair to all the other countries. This is like having igloo building for the Eskimo nation, as an Olympic sport.
October 16th, 2023 at 2:59 PM ^
Unfortunately my 9 yo just moved up from flag to tackle football.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:53 PM ^
as Long as he’s not getting paid, he can still play in the Olympics. Go son of hillbilly!
October 19th, 2023 at 9:10 AM ^
Didn't they get rid of the amateurism IOC rule back in the 1990s (which is how we got the Dream Team and also NHL-level hockey games)?
October 16th, 2023 at 3:00 PM ^
I was in my 20s just out of school and we put together a team of really good athletes and joined a flag football league that had been around in Grand Rapids.
Our QB had been in the Dallas Cowboy training camp and been cut. (Huge arm but accuracy issues) We had an all league tailback form Hope and an all league tailback from Albion. A DB from Ferris State. A WR from CMU. And we had John Kolesar.
We played the defending champs our 1st game. It was a bunch of mid 30 year old chubby dudes except for their QB who looked like old man Jared Lorenzon. These chubby dudes had plays, audibles, strategy and kicked our butts so bad it was embarrassing.
Whoever wins Olympic flag football will be well practiced.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:07 PM ^
Isn't this a "demonstration" sport and not a part of the permanent roster, like 3-on-3 basket ball was.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:20 PM ^
We gonna have whiffle ball next? Maybe disc golf? Geez....
October 18th, 2023 at 11:57 AM ^
It's FROLF! And it's usually played during the Summer of George.
October 16th, 2023 at 3:26 PM ^
Ditka
October 16th, 2023 at 7:02 PM ^
Eleven mini Ditkas
October 16th, 2023 at 3:30 PM ^
Semaj Morgan apparently
October 16th, 2023 at 3:31 PM ^
Barry Sanders. Just Barry Sanders.
October 16th, 2023 at 4:11 PM ^
My buddy, Scooter McGee, most definitely needs to be on that team. Man, in 7th grade PE that dude had such shifty hips he was able to make those flags dance away from a tackler's grasp like they were on a string. Greatest flag footballer ever at MacGregor Middle School.
Although there was the one time when he tried to get away from 2 opponents' grasping hands at once, and he turned his junk right into the grip of Spike Stadler who yanked for all he was worth.
That stopped the game for a Scooter for a while.
October 16th, 2023 at 4:36 PM ^
Flag Football in, but baseball and softball is out?
Flag football is a non-contact format of American football played by teams of five. American football last featured as a demonstration sport in the 1932 LA Games.
Baseball has featured in several previous Olympics. It was added to the 2020 Tokyo programme after being left off in 2012 and 2016, but it will not be a part of the Paris Games.
Softball, the female counterpart to baseball, has appeared at five previous editions of the Summer Games and was also left off the Paris 2024 agenda.
I realize FF is 2028 but how likely will they bring back Baseball and Softball while adding these other sports?
Olympics are a joke.
Multiple sources, but: LINK
October 16th, 2023 at 4:38 PM ^
Baseball and softball are back in 2028, along with flag football.
October 16th, 2023 at 4:41 PM ^
This is where dual citizenship becomes a major benefit. I’ll be 67 but I bet I could pull together a team for Hungary and finally get to the Olympics.
October 16th, 2023 at 4:50 PM ^
This is PERFECT!! My youngest is 16 and was a DEMON "middle linebacker" in FF. His 'ability' to grab a flopping flag off a runner at full speed was so weird to watch over and over again. He will be 22 is 2028, so a perfect age to represent USA!!!
October 16th, 2023 at 6:14 PM ^
T20 cricket was created when cricket powers-that-be realized that to maximize TV viewership, they could condense the game down to two hours by reducing the number of times each team has to bat (to 20 "overs"; think of an over as being six pitches). A classical test match takes literally days to complete, and the older condensed version, One Day International, still takes as much as 7 hours. T20 takes like 2.5 hours.
Cricket is one of the most-watched sports in the world, it makes perfect sense for it to be in the Olympics. Cool that it'll be in.
October 16th, 2023 at 6:16 PM ^
Unfortunately breakdancing will be cancelled after its one year appearance next year in Paris.
BREAKDANCING was an olympic event? LOL
I was a phenom in tap dancing. Any hope?
October 16th, 2023 at 8:47 PM ^
I don't care who plays but I'd to see them also do field goals. I know it's flag football but it would be cool to see if other countries are good at it.
October 16th, 2023 at 9:03 PM ^
My daughter. When she was 9, she played qb on her school coed team and she threw perfect spirals. She's 20 now, and much stronger, so even better. She's also tough -- sent two boys to the nurse's office the same day in kindergarten.
October 17th, 2023 at 11:36 AM ^
I feel like this will be one of those sports like 3 on 3 bball where the USA is not very good due to the fact we are used to the normal game. Wouldn’t be surprised to see us not be good, specially considering our best footballs players aren’t about to go play flag. That said, Tyreek Hill seems like he could do alright.