My First Sports Board Game

My journey into sports board game started when I was a young kid, I received a football board game for Christmas called "All-American Football Game" by Cadaco.  Although I knew that this game was a 'vintage' football game and that it was a college game (I noticed, for example, that the picture on the cover showed players wearing the old style Roger Staubach-type facemask instead of the kind that Joe Montana would wear, and that the rule book stated that the kick-off was from the forty yard line),  I didn't mind, however, because American football, whether it was college or professional, was my favorite sport, and I was eager to just start playing and creating my own fictional football season!

The game was very unique in that it did not have any loose playing pieces or paper except for the playing discs.  The game used spinners instead of dice, for example, and the rules were cleverly printed on the back of the box cover.  Two players would put various offensive, defensive, and special team plays that are put into the two spinners attached to plastic holders that were built into the base of the game.  After selecting the plays, both players would spin to see the outcome of each play in the game.  In fact, even the red plastic football and first down markers were built into the game base.

One of the best aspects of this game was that you did not need to keep track of play time, downs or score on a separate paper since everything can be manually tracked on the scoreboard that can be attached to the game for the two generic home and away teams.  Needless to say, the design of this game was very clever.  And believe it or not, I actually still have this football game in good condition!