NFL Players Turning to Video Games for New Plays....Perhaps!

There are 28 seconds left in the opening game for the Denver Broncos and they are down by one and the ball is on their own 13 yard line. On second down quarterback Kyle Orton drops back and lets the ball fly and the ball is tipped, heart break right, not quite wide receiver Brandon Stokely comes up with the pass and runs towards the end-zone. Now here is the part where video games come into play, once Stokely gets to the goal-line instead of going into the end-zone he runs along the goal-line and takes an extra six seconds to run off the clock! That is a play that Madden players have been running for years.
When Stokley was asked if running along the goal-line was something he learned from Madden Stokley replied "it definitely was, I think everyone that has played those games has done that." Believe it or not many NFL stars are actually playing these video games, and in large quantities at that.

Sports video games have been around since the creation of video games themselves, in fact it is believed that the first ever video game was a sports game. This game was called Tennis for Two.

For a lot of today's NFL players they have not known a world without EA Sports, the company that makes Madden NFL. Since these athletes have been playing these football games for years it only makes sense that they would start to bring what they do on the television to the field. Why wouldn't these athletes want to play these games nowadays, they are so realistic and they are actually part of the game so they can make themselves and their teammates do things that are not possible in real life. Now I am not expecting NFL coaches to start calling plays as if they were playing Madden, but it is crazy that video games are spilling over into the NFL.

Not only is Madden NFL changing the way some players are playing the game, but I think the bigger impact of Madden is how people watch the game. I believe that Madden is making people more interested in the NFL because of the fact how much a person can learn from playing the video game. When you play a game of Madden NFL you are completely immersed in the game, you're the coach, you're the quarterback then you're the running back or the wide receiver. I feel that Madden can almost be considered a new NFL for Dummies, or a first hand NFL rules training book.