Rename American Football
Football is played with feet. America’s version mostly uses hands. Maybe it’s time to fix the name.
Goal: start a real conversation, collect supporters, and normalize a better name for future generations.
Soccer is football. American football needs a new name.
This campaign is not about hating the sport. It’s about admitting the name makes no damn sense.
My position, clear and simple
I’m an American citizen who lived 27 years in Europe. So I’ve heard both sides of this, and the logic is plain: a sport played primarily with hands should not own the word “football” inside the one country where it creates the most confusion.
Renaming it would not change the sport, the fandom, or the money. Stadiums would still fill. TV deals would still print cash. The Super Bowl would still be the Super Bowl. People would get over it, like they always do, because the product did not change.
The global game stays football. America’s game gets a clearer name. Everybody wins.
Campaign video
Comedy Social TV presents the opening shot.
Add your name
If you agree the name should change — or you just enjoy the debate — add your name.
No spam. Just the campaign, the chaos, and the name-change argument.
Quick poll
Vote and see local results. This version stores votes in the visitor’s browser.
Total votes on this browser: 0
Possible replacement names
- Gridiron — the cleanest serious option.
- American Gridiron — clear, accurate, still traditional.
- Ameriball — modern, campaign-friendly, slightly ridiculous.
- Bodyball — literal and dumb enough to survive.
- Handegg — the meme option, brutally accurate.
Why this exists
My sister Nadine said the name would never change.
So I bought the domain.
That is how this campaign started. A family argument, a weirdly obvious truth, and one late-night decision to make the joke real.
Why American football should not be called football anymore
Every now and then, a cultural habit becomes so normal that people stop questioning it. The name of America’s most popular sport is one of those habits.
For most Americans, “football” means the sport played on Sundays in massive stadiums with helmets, shoulder pads, and playbooks thick enough to qualify as textbooks. It is an enormous industry and a deeply rooted part of American culture.
But step outside the United States and the word “football” means something else entirely. Across Europe, South America, Africa, and much of Asia, football refers to the global game Americans call soccer. It is played by hundreds of millions of people worldwide and watched by billions.
It requires almost nothing to begin: just a ball and a bit of open space. Children play it in streets, parks, beaches, and schoolyards. Goals can be improvised from backpacks, stones, or chalk marks on a wall. The name fits because the game is played primarily with the feet.
American football, by contrast, is played almost entirely with the hands. Players throw the ball, carry it, hand it off, block with their bodies, and tackle with their arms. The ball may only be kicked a few times during a typical game.
Historically, the explanation is simple. American football evolved from nineteenth-century versions of rugby and association football played at American universities. At the time, several different “football” games existed under the same broad label. Over time, the American version evolved into its own sport with unique rules, strategies, equipment, and culture.
But the old name remained.
Tradition won over accuracy.
That may have made sense in the nineteenth century. In the twenty-first century, it creates confusion and forces people to explain something that should be obvious. A sport played mostly with hands should not be the default owner of the word football.
More importantly, changing the name would not hurt the sport. Stadiums would still fill. Fans would still watch. Broadcasters would still sell ads. Sponsors would still show up. The game would remain exactly what it is.
Only the label would change.
And people would get over it.
The global game stays football. America’s version gets a clearer identity. That is not an attack on American football. It is a naming correction.
Soccer is football. American football needs a new name.