Duration: 21st September – 20th December 2019
Number of books: 7
Hosted by:Crazy Challenge Connection
FALL 2019 SCAVENGER CHALLENGE: NFL’s 100th SEASON
DURATION : September 21 – December 20, 2019
Baseball may always be called America’s “national pastime,” but in recent decades, the NFL (National Football League) has become a national obsession. Pro football is by far the most popular sport in America, its tens of millions of impassioned fans turning the NFL into a rapidly growing multibillion-dollar business.
This season, the NFL is celebrating its 100th season, and we’ve created this challenge to join in the celebration. The challenge consists of two parts, but you do NOT need to complete Part One before beginning Part Two. You do, however, need to choose a conference for Part Two when you sign up for the challenge.
PART ONE:
1. The National Football League today is the most profitable and valuable economic force in sports, easily eclipsing baseball, basketball, and all other competitors in the American sports-business universe. The NFL – by far the richest sports league in the world – generates close to $15 billion in revenue, with teams worth an average $2.5 billion. At this time, the league’s most valuable teams are Dallas, New England, New York (Giants), and Los Angeles (Rams).
🏈 Read a book set in Dallas, Boston, New York City or Los Angeles; tell us the city OR a book with an intact “15” in the total number of pages; tell us how many pages – Sucker Bet by Erin McCarthy (Los Angeles)
2. In August 1920, representatives of four Ohio football teams – the Akron Pros, Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Indians, and Dayton Triangles – met in a Canton automobile showroom to form a new professional football league. Initially called the American Professional Football Association, the organization was eventually renamed the National Football League in 1922. The following month, several additional teams, all from the Great Lakes region, joined the original four Ohio clubs in the new NFL. When league play began, member teams included the Akron Pros, Canton Bulldogs, Cleveland Indians, Columbus Panhandles, Dayton Triangles, Hammond Pros, Muncie Flyers, Rochester Jeffersons, Buffalo All-Americans, Rock Island Independents, Decatur Staleys, Racine Cardinals, Chicago Tigers, and Detroit Heralds.
🏈 Read a book set in one of the Great Lakes States (Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania or Wisconsin) OR a book whose title contains the letters NFL (in any order, not necessarily all in the same word) – Flying Blind by Deborah Cooke
3. In the first matchup between NFL teams, on October 3, 1920, the Dayton Flyers defeated the Columbus Panhandles by a score of 14–0.
🏈 Read book #1 of a series; tell us the series name OR a book originally published in October (of any year); tell us the year – A Veiled Deception by Annette Blair
4. The Green Bay Packers joined the NFL in 1921. In a league with high franchise turnover, the Packers eventually became the oldest surviving franchise.
🏈 Read the book on your to-read list that has the oldest publication date; tell us the date OR a book with a color word in the title – To Marry Medusa by Theodore Sturgeon
5. An NFL game aired on television for the first time in 1939, with NBC producing a local broadcast of a game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Philadelphia Eagles. Since fewer than 1,000 TV sets were known to exist in New York at the time, it is unclear whether anyone actually watched the broadcast.
🏈 Read a book that has been made into a television series/show/movie; tell us the name of the series/show/movie if it’s different from the book title OR a book with fewer than 1000 GR ratings; tell us how many ratings – Fairy Tales from Around the World by Andrew Lang
6. The Los Angeles Rams were the first team to use a logo, painting yellow horns onto their leather helmets in 1948. The Eagles followed by adding wings to their hats in the early 1950s, then the Colts adopted horseshoes in 1954. Dallas entered the league with its lone star insignia in 1960, and the old-time franchises finally joined the logo era a year later, when the Bears’ C, the Packers’ G, and the Giants’ lower-case ny all appeared for the first time.
🏈 Read a book whose title begins with C, G or N (disregard A, An and The) OR a book whose cover is very simple; post the cover – Fantasy by Christine Feehan, Sabrina Jeffries, Emma Holly & Elda Minger
7. Texas oilmen Lamar Hunt and Bud Adams, rebuffed in their attempts to acquire NFL franchises for Houston and Dallas, announced plans to form a new football league to rival the NFL. Their new league, called the American Football League (AFL), began play in 1960 with eight teams.
🏈 Read a book published in the 1960s; tell us the year OR a book featuring a character who found a way to work around a rejection of some kind; briefly explain, using spoiler tags if necessary – Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan (Rachel’s rejection from Nick’s family)
8. In 1965, for the first time, more people polled in a national survey choose pro football than baseball as their favorite sport.
🏈 Read a book featuring a professional athlete; tell us who OR a book from a “most popular” list; post a link to the list – IT by Stephen King (Goodreads Best Horror Novels #2)
9. NFL Commissioner Pete Rozelle announced in June 1966 that the NFL and AFL had reached an agreement to merge into a single league by 1970. In the meantime, the two leagues’ champions met each January in a new AFL-NFL World Championship Game. That game quickly became known as the Super Bowl. The AFL-NFL merger took full effect as the AFL formally went out of existence and the NFL assumed its modern two-conference structure. Most old NFL teams formed the National Football Conference (NFC), while the old AFL clubs (plus a few NFL teams moved over to maintain numerical balance) formed the American Football Conference (AFC).
🏈 Read a book whose title has changed since its original publication; tell us both titles OR a book you added to your list in January of any year; tell us the year – The Mammoth Book of Celtic Myths and Legends by Peter Berresford Ellis
10. The NFL’s Green Bay Packers easily defeated the AFL’s Kansas City Chiefs to win the first Super Bowl in January 1967. More than 32,000 tickets went unsold for the game, held in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, but the game drew more television viewers than any previous sporting event. Today, the average face value of Super Bowl tickets is around $1,000, while the price of a 30-second commercial aired during the Super Bowl is around $5 million and the Super Bowl is usually the highest-rated television broadcast of the year.
🏈 Read the book on your to-read list with the highest average GR rating; tell us the rating OR a book with a 00 in its position on your to-read list (100, 200, etc.), sorted by date added, oldest to newest; tell us the position – Illuminae by Amie Kaufman & Jay Kristoff
PART TWO:
The NFL is divided into two conferences, the NFC (National Football Conference) and the AFC (American Football Conference). For the second part of this challenge, refer to the conference you chose when you signed up for the challenge and complete the following tasks. You may complete them in any order, and you do NOT need to choose between author and title task now, you may fill them in as you go.
* For any eight teams in the conference, read a book by an author whose first and last initials can be found in the name of the team’s head coach; be sure to post a link to the author’s GR page
* For the remaining eight teams, read a book where the first letter of every word in the title (ALL words count!, 3-word minimum) can be found in the team’s full name (including the city). You can only use a letter as many times as it appears in the team name. For example, for Minnesota Vikings, your title can have three words that start with N, but only one word that starts with E.
NFC TEAMS:
CHICAGO BEARS | head coach = Matt Nagy – At Grave’s End by Jeaniene FrostDETROIT LIONS | head coach = Matt Patricia – Rosa Parks: My Story by Rosa ParksGREEN BAY PACKERS | head coach = Matt LaFleur – The Last Rhinos by Lawrence AnthonyMINNESOTA VIKINGS | head coach = Mike Zimmer – The Falconer by Elizabeth May
DALLAS COWBOYS | head coach = Jason Garrett – Larceny and Lace by Annette BlairNEW YORK GIANTS | head coach = Pat Shurmur – Beowulf for Cretins: A Love Story by Ann McManPHILADELPHIA EAGLES | head coach = Doug Pederson – Sweetbitter by Stephanie Danler
WASHINGTON REDSKINS | head coach = Jay Gruden – The Wren Hunt by Mary Watson
ATLANTA FALCONS | head coach = Dan Quinn – Looking for Alibrandi by Melina Marchetta
CAROLINA PANTHERS | head coach = Ron Rivera – Among the Pigeons by John L. ReadNEW ORLEANS SAINTS | head coach = Sean Payton – Company Town by Madeline Ashby
TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS | head coach = Bruce Ariens – The Bad Beginning by Lemony SnicketARIZONA CARDINALS | head coach = Kliff Kingsbury – China Rich Girlfriend by Kevin Kwan
LOS ANGELES RAMS | head coach = Sean McVay – Red as Blood by Tanith LeeSAN FRANCISCO 49ERS | head coach = Kyle Shanahan (ignore the 49) – The Reptile Room by Lemony Snicket
SEATTLE SEAHAWKS | head coach = Pete Carroll –
Earth and Skye 