Proving Canadian football more ‘super’

I’ve never been much of a clock watcher, but I took one for the team this week and became a “stop watcher.” That’s the Canadian team which believes Canadian football is more entertaining than American football, and that if it’s ever exported to the U.S. there should be a tariff.

As with the tariffs, Canadian common sense prevails when it comes to football’s entertainment value. In the Canadian Football League, you will not see the ball rolling around with 350-pound men mesmerized by it until the ball stops breathing. Nor will you see players taking forever, while the game clock ticks, to meander back to the huddle (or line of scrimmage) all the better to reduce the time their opponents have to catch up. Nor will players head for the dressing room before time, literally, expires.

This has long left me believing — generally — that CFL games are more fun to watch, having more action, more plays and a better chance of seeing three touchdowns in the last 90 seconds. Of course, Sunday’s Super Bowl could be a thriller decided by multiple scores after the two-minute warning. It happens. Just not as often.

Yet I needed proof. Facts. Evidence.

For a long time, I’ve meant to dissect two games — randomly chosen — one north of the border, the other south. I’d use a stopwatch to see how much time the football (it’s always the star) actually spends moving from the moment it’s in play until the end of each play. Also, I’d count the plays in both games to prove one of my points, that there is more “football” in a CFL game.

So I picked the NFL game that sent the Kansas City Chiefs to this Super Bowl, their exciting 32-29 victory over Buffalo 10 days ago. For the CFL, I chose the championship game many believe was the most entertaining ever, from 1989…this IS called “distant” replay and, well, I did have to pick one. It was my favourite of the 17 Grey Cups I covered: Saskatchewan 43, Hamilton 40, the most Grey Cup points ever.

Because I had no idea if the evidence would support my belief, there were surprises. The longest drive in either game — the amount of time the football was actually on the move — ate up 46 seconds in 11 plays for Buffalo’s first touchdown. A 10-play drive in the ’89 Grey Cup consumed 43 seconds of action.

The longest plays are almost always kicks and kick returns, or two plays in one. Few offensive plays last more than 10 seconds, the longest being a 14-second pass (Kent Austin) and run (Don Narcisse) from the Grey Cup. The longest play, period, was a 19-second punt return.

Oddly, in both games 57 per cent of offensive plays lasted five seconds (or less). Even more surprising: the football was carried or thrown or kicked during 60 minutes of “playing time” in both the NFL and CFL games for exactly 16 minutes and 51 seconds (not 50 or 52 seconds…51)!

And here’s my winning analysis. In the randomly-chosen Canadian game there were 21 more plays than in the randomly-chosen AFC Championship.

On Sunday, think what could happen with another 21 plays.