If you know me at all, you know that during the Fall there is not much that I enjoy more than watching college football every Saturday and supporting the Falcons on Sunday. That being said, since we don’t have television or cable in Germany I have had to spend time on the weekends keeping up with Georgia Tech and the Dirty Birds on game tracker. I’m still able to stay in the know, but it’s definitely not the same as being able to watch it either live in Bobby Dodd stadium or on t.v.
Well about a month ago we started seeing posters in the subways announcing the "German Bowl" that was coming to Frankfurt on October 3rd. Out of pure curiosity we looked into it and found out that there is a German American Football league that runs from Roughly April to October and that the equivalent of the superbowl would be in Frankfurt this year. To our surprise tickets were available ranging from €10-30 (translation: only $14-42 to see the best two teams in the league in the championship). We were totally there!!
Of course we had no expectations for quality, but we went for it with our American comrades Ryan and Katy. This year’s game featured the Berlin Adler (Eagles) vs. the Kiel Baltic Hurricanes. Uniform-wise, it looked like the Iowa Hawkeyes vs. the Miami Hurricanes (except the uniforms have advertisements all over them). It was a blast, although the level of competition was probably in the ballpark of a division I-AA school. The size of the players probably wasn’t much smaller than in the NFL, but the speed was much slower. Case in point – the teams were able to run some option plays against each other, which wouldn’t fly in the NFL. Surprisingly, while there were some American players on the teams, the majority of the players were actually German. They also seemed to do their best to keep the game moving (i.e. running out of bounds did NOT stop the clock). Lastly, I’ve never been to a game with fewer penalties – perhaps that’s because Germans really like to follow rules!
It was nice to see some live football, even if the crowd was only 13,000. To make it more interesting Marisa and I decided to pull for the Kiel Baltic Hurricanes while our friends rooted for Berlin – I mean what fun would it be if we didn’t cheer for a team. The game came down to the wire with the Berlin Adler winning 28-21.
No German Bowl would be complete without the cheerleaders - not exactly Dallas Cowboys but they were there.
The Kiel Baltic Hurricanes taking the field, resembling the Miami Hurricanes - Kiel is much colder than South Beach however.
The Berlin Adler slowly strutted onto the field seemingly way more "badass" - and they backed it up too.
All lined up.
This cheerleading squad was a little skankier than the actual team cheerleaders, thus, they got to perform at halftime and leave afterwards - I think they had to go to work. Notice the band set up directly behind them - it was a German rock band that opened up the halftime entertainment with, I kid you not, "Rock You Like a Hurricane" by Scorpions (you may recall this jam from such video games as Guitar Hero III - Scorpions were a real German band, fyi)
This fine specimen is not a lineman....not a linebacker......not a defensive end.......not even a center - he's the place kicker, and he never missed.
Katy and Ryan, pulling for Berlin
Marisa and Justin pulling for Kiel
Berlin continuing their domination, winning 28-21.
