5 High School Football Movies You Probably Dont Know

 School's back in session and fall is approaching. Which means its time for some football. While the NFL rules Sundays, Mondays and Thursdays for that matter. College Football owns Saturdays, and Friday nights belongs to high school football.

I started thinking about high school football movies. We all know Friday Night Lights, Varsity Blues, and Remember The Titans. What about those movies no one remembers? 

I'm here to share 5 high school football movies you may not know or remember.

5 Reggies Prayer

Let's start off the bat, this is not a good film but it meant well. Starring the late NFL great Reggie White, the very 90's B-movie film follows Reggie playing an version of himself. Never winning a pro championship and sensing there's a higher calling for him, he retires from pro football and coaches a high school team in Oregon. There he helps steer members of the team on the right path, and works to steer one in particular from a life of crime.

Mr. Miyagi himself Pat Morita is also in the film. Brett Favre makes a cameo, and wrestling legend the Big Show makes his film debut as the villain of the film.

Reggie's Prayer is available on Tubi.

4 Carter High

If you've seen Friday Night Lights, you know their championship opponents Carter High were the big bad thugs of the Texas high school football scene. At least that was the narrative that was portrayed during the film and in subsequent stories. This 2015 film starring Charles Dutton, Vivica A. Fox, and Pooch Hall. Show's the other side of the coin for Carter High School's football team that season. They were not all bad kids, but some got into some serious trouble and a grading scandal rocked the school and almost disrupted the entire season.

Carter High is available on tubi. 

3 Woodlawn

This 2015 film based on real events, follows former NFL player Tony Nathan's life story one season. When his hometown of Birmingham, Alabama integrated he and his teammates at Woodlawn had to lean on one another and faith. To overcome the hate and odds for a successful season. It's an inspirational film and displays a turbulent time in history through football.

Woodlawn is available on Tubi.

2 Johnny B Good

Johnny Be Good stars Anthony Michael Hall, Uma Thurman, and Robert Downey Jr. Although its considered a comedy and is very goofy in nature. It tells a cautionary tale about the college recruitment process of high school athletes. The lengths some schools will go to get a commitment from a player, and how many are always looking to get something out of the recruitment process.

Johnny Be Good is available on Tubi and Pluto.

1 All The Right Moves

This 1983 film was released as Tom Cruise's star was shining from Risky Business. In this movie he stars as a high school standout dreaming of a scholarship offer. So he can escape his small economically depressed town, and achieve career goals he's set out for himself. That all is at risk when he clashes with his coach played by Craig T. Nelson and realizes not everyone in town has the same ambition he does.

Sadly All The Right Moves is currently only available on streaming platforms to rent.

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5 Best Fictional Football Players

 Football season is now in full swing, in addition to writing about 5 underrated football movies. I dug a little deeper and looked at football players in movies. Here are 5 of the best fictional football players in TV and film.

5. Smash Williams

Brian Williams nicknamed "Smash" was the flashy yet hard running star running back of the Dillion Panther's in the Friday Night Light's TV series. Loosley based on Boobie Miles, Smash is a complex teenager who gets to display throughout his three season run on the show. While on the field with the ball in his hand's, The Panther's always were in the game with a chance to win. Despite some setbacks his skills allowed him to walk on to the team at Texas A&M in the series.

4. Shane Falco

Shane Falco was a scab hired to finish out a strike shortened season in 2000 The Replacements. A college football star who flamed out, he used his second chance to rehabilitate his playing style and career. He had the arm and the heart, he just had some mental issues he had to work through and get's to show his talent in leading a team full of scabs to 3 of 4 wins in a faux NFL.  

3. Alvin Mack

Alvin Mack was the middle linebacker for Eastern State University Timberwolves in 1993's The Program. Much like in real life defensive players don't get as much shine, but he was the heart of the defense. Riling his teammates up, and racking up the tackles on a path to the NFL, he struck fear in his opponents mostly through shit-talking  A game changer on defense, if he were a real person he would be in the conversation as one of the best linebackers ever.

2. Becky "Ice Box" O'Shea

Yes, she's a girl. Yes, it was pop warner football but Becky O'Shea changed the momentum of the game for the Little Giants in the 1994 film. She was arguably the best overall player on the field on both sides of the ball, playing linebacker and quarterback for the team as she spearheaded a comeback against the more talented Cowboys. The fact her putting down the pom poms and following her heart of being a football player, changed the game. Showed how much of a impact she made on the field.

1. Willie Beamen

Steamin Willie Beamen though a fictional player probably inspired guys like Cam Newton, Deshaun Watson, and Lamar Jackson. A backup quarterback for the Miami Shark's in 1999's Any Given Sunday, he is soon given the starting spot and never let's it go. He had a dizzy and dazzling style of play and was dangerous with his legs and his arm. He was also brash and hard-headed but stood on his morals, and his quick rise to fame got in his head. Evident by his commercial , despite all that he was a playmaker on the field and one that was a highlight every time he touched the ball.

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5 Underrated Football Movies

 College football is back dominating Saturdays, and the NFL kicks off their season later this week. I started thinking about football movies, more importantly one's nobody remember or just wasn't popular for whatever reason when it debuted. For that here are 5 underrated football movies.

5. Rise and Walk: The Dennis Byrd Story

When it comes to TV movies based on a NFL player's story everyone adores Brian's Song, the 1971 film starring James Caan as Brian Piccolo and Billy Dee Williams as his friend and teammate Gale Sayer's. In 1994 Fox TV produced a film that is just as good in Rise & Walk: The Dennis Byrd Story starring Peter Berg. Dennis Byrd was a New York Jet's defensive end who was left paralyzed after colliding with teammate Scott Mersereau. Through therapy and determination he was eventually able to walk again and this is his story.

4. Invincible

Football films based on real scenarios the golden films  which are quite inspiring are Rudy, Remember The Titans, and We Are Marshall. 2006's Invincible starring Mark Wahlberg is just as inspiring as those films. Based on the true story of Philadelphia substitute teacher Vince Papale who attends a open tryout the Philadelphia Eagles are conducting and actually makes the team. Being as though Vince was truly down on his luck before making the team, the film has a good message about pushing through the storms of adversity. 

3. The Longshots

Another film based on a true story, The Longshots is a 2008 film starring KeKe Palmer and Ice Cube. KeKe play's Jasmine Plummer a pre-teen who join's a pop warner team encouraged by her Uncle Curtis played by Ice Cube. She must work through the typical sexism even from adults against a girl playing a male dominated game even as she clearly has the skill. 

2. Wildcats

1986's WildCats stars Goldie Hawn who yearning to be a football head coach and live up to her fathers legacy, takes a job at a tough inner-city school. She deal's with racism being a white woman coaching a predominately Black team in a male dominated sport, and sexism as everyone think's she doesn't have a clue. When she however refuses to be intimidated, the team soon follows her lead and starts winning. Besides Goldie Hawn, the film features young cast members such as Wesley Snipes, Woody Harrelson, Robyn Lively, and Mykelti Williamson. Even Aunt Helen from The Jamie Foxx Show is in the movie, in her debut film. A young LL Cool J even makes a brief appearance in the film.  

1. Draft Day

2014's Draft Day stars Kevin Costner as the general manager of the Cleveland Browns analyzing his options for who to add to the team on draft day. Besides antagonizing over who to pick, he must also contend with relationship/family scenarios, threats from management, agents and other folks who feel they have a voice. And his fathers legacy, a lot to take in over the course of a day. The film covers the business side of the NFL and the craziness of everything that goes into making a draft decision. For people who enjoy learning how the front office makes decisions even if it's dramatized, as much as they like the on the field product. This film is for them.

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Diddy, Vince McMahon, & the NFL

  It’s playoff time in the NFL, and after a rough season fueled by protests, fans picking their sides in the protest and choosing to stay away, 45 and his vendetta against the NFL, over saturation, and fan remarks that the product has fallen off. The NFL is hoping for some very good playoff matches that will bring fans back.
  In the meantime there are two things that are possibly brewing that could change the NFL, or provide some stiff competition. I’m talking Diddy's bid to buy the Carolina Panthers and rumblings that Vince McMahon is angling to bring the XFL back.
  Diddy buying the Panthers would be a event of historic proportions that would deserve all kinds of praise and parties. I truly believe it would put Diddy over the hump to Billionaire status, but for the culture having a black owner in a league dominated by black players could really help address several issues between players and owners. Throw in Diddy becoming the second youngest owner in the NFL, he would be able to connect to a lot of the players, more than the current owners ever can. He may be able to convince the powers that be, to bring a little more showmanship to the game. It could also help usher in a new age of sports ownership, I believe Diddy is smart enough to let football people do football work. But he surely would put his spin on the Panthers, and breathe new life into it. He’ll face opposition from other owners of the “old guard” but I’m sure he’s ready for that.
  Vince McMahon revitalizing the XFL, if done right could bring serious competition to the NFL. The first time around it tried to go overboard with the extreme aspect of football, which ended up injuring some players unnecessarily and suffered from having mostly second rate players or has-beens. The anticipation for the XFL was initially high, but quickly deflated as the season went on.
   There are a few things that were successful the first time in the XFL, the overview camera angle which years later the NFL implemented, and letting the players place nicknames on the back of their jerseys to stand out. In today's NFL where players are often punished for standing out and showing personality that would be a welcome change.
   There are several players still in their prime who are out of the NFL preview, but still have more than enough in the tank. If the XFL can acquire enough playmakers, tone down the extremeness of their rules which was the wave the first time around, and make player safety a priority. They would actually have a chance at being more successful this time around and being an true alternative to the NFL. Of course there will be people who will doubt it because it’s not the NFL, and others who will use Vince McMahon’s association with wrestling as knock not to watch it, but if there is quality, consistent gameplay those factors will become nonexistent.
   Vince McMahon is a very competitive guy, and he wants to be known as more than just a wrestling promoter. A revamped XFL could be his chance to show he can be successful businessman outside the NFL.
    Diddy is the man, ambitious, a go-getter, game changer and a motivator. If these two gentlemen get what they want, professional football will definitely change...for better or worst only time would tell.

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