From Pig Skin to Big Wins - About the Football

Football, or American Football for those of you that are from other countries, is a very commonly played game in the United States. To play football you need a field, a team, a game plan... and then there's the football itself.

Footballs look very different from other sports balls. Instead of a kind of almost completely rounded spherical shape, the football is what is known as a "prolate spheroid" which is an elongated sphere made to look almost cylindrical.

The shape allows the football to be easily spiraled through the air, increasing the speed the ball can achieve and the distance the ball can reach.

Of course, this is just for when the ball is thrown. Footballs can also be kicked and so there are players who train specifically for one of two things. The first is in regards to distance. Punters have to kick the balls as far as they can to get the opposing team away from their goal line. On the other hand, there are players whose objective is more about accuracy and height - to kick field goals.

Footballs used for professional or college level games are made of cow hide leather and inflated to certain specifications to make sure there isn't any kind of cheating. (Deflate gate, looking at you.) Footballs for high school or recreation can instead be made from rubber, or even plastic.

Despite the pigskin moniker, leather (usually cow or deer) has been almost always what professional footballs were made from.

In the beginning, footballs were made of inflated pig bladders. Inflating them was a messy job, so they often stuffed it full of things like straw. That, unfortunately, would change the shape too much for the ball to be effective. They began to surround the bladder with leather and since then, that has been the major material to use.

According to the NFL rulebook, the current ball specifications are:

"The ball shall be made up of an inflated (12 1/2 to 13 1/2 pounds) urethane bladder enclosed in a pebble grained, leather case (natural tan color) without corrugations of any kind. It shall have the form of a prolate spheroid and the size and weight shall be: long axis, 11 to 11 1/4 inches; long circumference, 28 to 28 1/2 inches; short circumference, 21 to 21 1/4 inches; weight, 14 to 15 ounces."