Celebrations+in+the+NFL

Celebrations in the NFL
 * Celebrations** (Celly[[image:http://www.clipartoday.com/_thumbs/Football_tnb.png width="125" height="112" align="left"]]-bray-shuns) are a joyful occasion for special festivities to mark a happy event. In football, they are usually done after scoring a touchdown or making an important play. Throughout the years as the call for entertainment has increased so has the elaborateness of the celebrations, and as a result the restrictions created by the league. This is a controversial topic with many opinions on the whether or not celebrations belong in the league and how extreme the penalties should be, if any, for do them.

**Upsides of celebrating** It is true that football is a game, but it is also true that the NFL is an entertainment based league. In order for people to watch it, the games have to be fun to watch and one of the main contributing factors of the entertainment is seeing outlandish celebrations. On top of that we can all agree that football is an emotional sport. With all the high stakes, hard hitting and humongous intensity it is filled with anger, excitement and joy. When a player achieves his goal then there has to be away to express it, heir-go celebrating. Besides the fun and expressing aspect of it, there has also been studies done that can be linked to celebrating benefiting the team and the player's performance.

**Support for celebrating** There was a Harvard study done, where they looked at the happiness of 5,000 people and they found that when one person is happy it can trigger a chain reaction among their friends and family, causing them to be happy. The studies have documented the common experience that one person's emotions can influence another person's. The new study is the first to find that happiness can spread across groups. When one person in the group became happy the chances that a friend, sibling,or even next door neighbor would become happy increased between 8 percent and 34 percent. Now, if you apply this same idea to the excitement and adrenaline of scoring a touchdown or making a big play, you see how it would have a positive effect on a team. If a player trots into the end zone and does a celebration then it is possible that this could enhance the emotion of their team mates and help them perform better.



**Cons of Celebrating** On the opposite side of the spectrum, there are people that believe that the game should be played according to the rules with no embellishment or extra-curricular activity. The celebrations distract from the actual game of football and in a way can be disrespectful to the integrity to the game. The celebrations focus on a single player's accomplishments and not what the game is supposed to be about, the team. The big egos of the league, the players that have the biggest problem with getting along with their teammates and creating good chemistry, also happen to be the repeat celebrators. Not only do they draw away attention from the respect of playing the game and the team spirit and coordination, they also set a bad example for the younger fans that are watching them. The kids that want to be professional football players when they grow up are seeing the big players dance around, and putting themselves ahead of the welfare of the team by drawing 15 yard personal foul penalties. By teaching the future professionals this, in time the whole league could be filled with self-centered egomaniacs. If the league focuses too much on celebrations it could not only decrease the value of the NFL now, but affect it for years to come. Here's a reason not to do it

**Rules Concerning Celebrations** The rule that takes care of celebrating is the "Unsportsmanlike Conduct" penalty. It is used in the event of a particular player or team who has acted inappropriately or unprofessionally in the context of the game. The rule is for when an act goes against the spirit of the game. The penalty results after the play and is a loss of 15 yards. Plays that cause the penalty are excessive celebrating and taunting, and can even call for ejection from the game. [|Timeline for Celebrations Regarding Celebrations]

__//SOURCES//__ -Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Touchdown_celebration -Dictionary.com http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/celebration -Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unsportsmanlike_conduct -Encyclopedia Britannica http://school.eb.com/eb/article-9476421?query=football%20penalties&ct= -Washington Post http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/12/04/AR2008120403537.html -World Book Online http://www.worldbookonline.com/student/article?id=ar203760&st=football