Web site of the week: NFL Under the Helmet
Web site of the week: NFL Under the Helmet
There's more to the NFL than what you see on the field. The Fox television show and companion Web site, "NFL Under the Helmet" (http://ww2.nfl.com/reebok/index.html), explore the behind-the-scenes lives of professional football players. Hard-core fans and casual followers alike will appreciate the site's lighthearted approach to the popular contact sport.
You won't find game stats and box scores on NFL Under the Helmet's site; instead, the site looks at the off-field interests of football players. For instance, a recent interview with Buffalo Bills star quarterback Drew Bledsoe asked him what CDs were in his stereo rather than how he reads pass defenses. In another recent profile, Washington Redskins linebacker LaVar Arrington talked about his childhood and the impact his parents had on him while he was growing up. While the interviews don't go too far in depth, they succeed in showing a side of players that we'd never see on the field.
A workout video clip section is another cool feature of the Web site. The clips pair fitness professionals with NFL players such as Pittsburgh Steelers wide receiver Plaxico Burress and Carolina Panthers linebacker Dan Morgan to demonstrate exercises the pros use to stay in shape. NFL Under the Helmet also features a weekly photo gallery, wallpaper you can download for your computer and a link to the NFL online shop.
Though the site has a nice variety of features, there's not a lot of content to navigate. Player profiles are regularly updated on the site's front page, but there is no archive for looking back at previous stories. Such an archive would allow Web surfers to see if their favorite player had been profiled and probably increase the site's traffic.
Overall, though, NFL Under the Helmet does a solid job of showing a different side of the men millions root for -- and against -- on the gridiron every week.
Notable quotables
"[Arnold Schwarzenegger] and I got along wonderfully, except for one thing: I used to eat Red Vines licorice all day long on the set, and Arnold would walk up and say, 'Do you know how many carbs are in those?'" -- Claire Danes, on her co-star in "Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines," in People magazine.
"I did a show where a guy had on a shirt that read 'I love Michelle Branch,' written in lipstick. I said to him, 'This next song is for you.' After that, about 15 guys in the front stood up on their chairs and started writing all over their bodies. It was so weird." -- Singer Michelle Branch, in Seventeen magazine.