The Canadian Football League is a professional sports league in Canada. The CFL is the highest level of competition in Canadian football. The league consists of nine teams, each located in a city in Canada. They are divided into two divisions: four teams in the East Division and five teams in the West Division.
The National Football League Players Association, or NFLPA, is a labor union representing National Football League (NFL) players. The NFLPA, which has headquarters in Washington, D.C., is led by president J. C. Tretter and executive director DeMaurice Smith. Founded in 1956, the NFLPA is the second-oldest labor union of the four major professional sports leagues; it was established to provide players with formal representation to negotiate compensation and the terms of a collective bargaining agreement (CBA). The NFLPA is a member of the AFL–CIO, the largest federation of unions in the United States.
An all-star team is a group of people all having a high level of performance in their field. Originating in sports, it has since drifted into vernacular and has been borrowed heavily by the entertainment industry.
The WNBA Draft is an annual draft held by the WNBA through which WNBA teams can select new players from a talent pool of college and professional women's basketball players. The first WNBA Draft was held in 1997.
In sports, the practice squad, also called the taxi squad or practice roster, is a group of players signed by a team but not part of their main roster. Frequently used in gridiron football, they serve as extra players during the team's practices, often as part of the scout team by emulating an upcoming opponent's play style. Because the players on the practice squad are familiar with the team's plays and formations, the practice squad serves as a way to develop inexperienced players for promotion to the main roster. This is particularly important for professional gridiron football teams, which do not have formal minor league farm team affiliates to train players. In addition, it provides replacement players for the main roster when players are needed as the result of injuries or other roster moves, such as bereavement leave.
An athletic scholarship is a form of scholarship to attend a college or university or a private high school awarded to an individual based predominantly on their ability to play in a sport. Athletic scholarships are common in the United States and to a certain extent in Canada, but in the vast majority of countries in the world they are rare or non-existent.
A walk-on, in American and Canadian college athletics, is an athlete who becomes part of a team without being recruited and awarded an athletic scholarship. A team's walk-on players are normally the weakest players and relegated to the scout team, and may not even be placed on the official depth chart or traveling team, while the scholarship players are the team's main players. However, a walk-on player occasionally becomes a noted member of the team.
Hoover High School is a four-year public high school in the Birmingham, Alabama suburb of Hoover. Hoover replaced the former W.A. Berry High School. It is one of two high schools in the Hoover City School System and one of three International Baccalaureate schools in the Birmingham-Hoover Metropolitan Area. The school colors are orange, black, and white, and the athletic teams are called the Buccaneers. Hoover competes in AHSAA Class 7A athletics.
USA Football is the national governing body for amateur American football in the United States. It is an independent non-profit based in Indianapolis, Indiana. USA Football designs and delivers premier educational, developmental and competitive programs to advance, unify and grow the sport. As the sport’s national governing body, member of the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Committee and organizer of the U.S. national team for international competition, USA Football partners with leaders in medicine, child advocacy and athletics to support positive football experience for youth, high school and other amateur players.
Two-A-Days is an MTV reality show that chronicled the lives of teens at Hoover High School in Hoover, Alabama, a suburb of nearby Birmingham. It focused on the members of the school's highly rated Hoover Buccaneers football team during the season, while they balanced athletics with school and relationships.
Spain Park High School (SPHS) is a four-year public high school in the Birmingham, Alabama, suburb of Hoover. It is the smaller of two high schools in the Hoover City School System. School colors are Carolina blue, black, and white, and the athletic teams are called the Jaguars. SPHS competes in AHSAA Class 7A athletics.
Hoover High School, often referred to as North Canton Hoover, is a public high school in North Canton, Ohio, United States.
Thomas Rush Propst is a high school football coach who currently serves as athletic director and associate football coach at Coosa Christian School in Gadsden, Alabama. He is also the former head coach at Colquitt County High School in Moultrie, Georgia, Hoover High School in Hoover, Alabama, and Valdosta High School in Valdosta, Georgia. Propst gained national notoriety through the MTV series Two-A-Days, which chronicled the 2005 and 2006 seasons of his Hoover team.
U Sports football is the highest level of amateur play of Canadian football and operates under the auspices of U Sports. Twenty-seven teams from Canadian universities are divided into four athletic conferences, drawing from the four regional associations of U Sports: Canada West Universities Athletic Association, Ontario University Athletics, Réseau du sport étudiant du Québec, and Atlantic University Sport. At the end of every season, the champions of each conference advance to semifinal bowl games; the winners of these meet in the Vanier Cup national championship.
The NBA draft is a major annual event in which the 30 franchises in the National Basketball Association select new players for their teams. Eligibility rules for prospective players have changed several times during the history of the league. No player may sign with the NBA until they are 19 years or older. Players who have played at least one year of college basketball are eligible for the NBA draft; this has been colloquially called the one-and-done rule, with such players called "one-and-done players".
The 2012 NBA draft was held on June 28, 2012, at Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. The draft started at 7:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time, and was broadcast in the United States on ESPN. In this draft, National Basketball Association (NBA) teams took turns selecting amateur U.S. college basketball players and other eligible players, including international players. This draft marked the first time that the first two players selected were from the same school. It also set a record of having six players from one school (Kentucky) being selected in the two rounds of the draft and was the first draft to have the first three selections be college freshmen all from the same conference, the Southeastern Conference. Not only that, but it also featured the oldest player to ever get selected in an NBA draft, with Bernard James being 27 years old at the time of the draft. Of the players drafted, 30 are forwards, 21 are guards, and 9 are centers.
The 2011 National Football League Player lockout was a work stoppage imposed by the owners of the NFL's 32 teams that lasted from March 12, 2011, to July 25, 2011. When the owners and the NFL players, represented by the National Football League Players Association, could not come to a consensus on a new collective bargaining agreement, the owners locked out the players from team facilities and shut down league operations. The major issues disputed were the salary cap, players' safety and health benefits, revenue sharing and television contracts, transparency of financial information, rookie salaries, season length, and free agency guidelines. During the 18-week, 4-day period, there was no free agency and training camp, and players were restricted from seeing team doctors, entering or working out at team facilities, or communicating with coaches. The end of the lockout coincided with the formation of a new collective bargaining agreement prior to the start of the 2011 regular season.
Concussions and play-related head blows in American football have been shown to be the cause of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), which has led to player deaths and other debilitating symptoms after retirement, including memory loss, depression, anxiety, headaches, stress, and sleep disturbances.
The 2013 NBA draft was held on June 27, 2013, at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. National Basketball Association (NBA) teams took turns selecting amateur U.S. college basketball players and other eligible players, including international players. State Farm was the presenting sponsor. The lottery took place on May 21, 2013. This was the first draft for New Orleans under their new Pelicans name after playing as the New Orleans Hornets previously. It would also be the last draft for the Charlotte Bobcats under their old name, as they resumed playing under their old Hornets moniker that they last used in 2002 once the 2013–14 NBA season was over. Anthony Bennett, the first pick in the draft, had a very limited amount of media outlets considering him as a potential #1 pick in the draft. He bounced around the league and then was finally released by the Brooklyn Nets in January 2017 after averaging just 5.2 PPG.
The NFL collective bargaining agreement (CBA) is a labor agreement which reflects the results of collective bargaining negotiations between the National Football League Players Association (NFLPA) and National Football League (NFL). The labor agreement classifies distribution of league revenues, sets health and safety standards and establishes benefits, including pensions and medical benefits, for all players in the NFL. The first collective bargaining agreement was reached in 1968 after player members of the NFLPA voted to go on strike to increase salaries, pensions and benefits for all players in the league. Later negotiations of the collective bargaining agreement called for injury grievances, a guaranteed percentage of revenues for players, an expansion of free agency and other issues impacting the business of the NFL. The NFLPA and team owners have negotiated seven different agreements since 1968.
