What Is the Meaning of Grid Iron?
Grid Iron, or Gridiron, is a term used to describe aspects of the sport of American Football, as well as an interchangeable term for the field of play and the game itself.
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The Game
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The game of American football, or Gridiron, is played with 11 players from each team on the field at one time: 11 on offense, attempting to advance the ball forward, and 11 on defense, attempting to stop them. Points are scored when a team advances the ball to their end zone, or completes a field goal kick between two goal posts placed at each end.
Field of Play
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The term gridiron is also used to refer to the field itself, which is 330 feet long by 160 feet wide. There are two 30 foot end zones, or scoring areas, at each end of the field. Lines run across the width of the field every 5 yards with two "hash" lines running the length of the field equidistant from the midpoint and sideline on each half of the field.
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History
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Before the modern playing field evolved over decades of rule revisions, lines on the field ran both horizontally and vertically, forming a checkerboard-like appearance. This gave birth to the name "grid" iron.
Usage
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The term gridiron is widely used in Europe, Australia and New Zealand to differentiate the sport from more popular sports in those countries. Soccer, as it is called in the U.S., is internationally known as football, and games like rugby and Australian rules football are similar to gridiron football.
Walter Camp
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Walter Camp was head of the Ivy League rules committee for three decades, beginning in 1878. During his tenure he established two critical rules which evolved the game from rugby and Australian football games. He instituted the first down system and establishing the modern gridiron scoring system.
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