[troutman]

"The best board game I ever played": This old CFL simulation packs a punch

https://thestarphoenix.com/sports/fo...packs-a-punch/

Terry Appleby created these cardboard men, starting in 1974, and kept the hatchery running for years. He distilled brains, brawn and fast-twitch muscles into numbers. Those numbers made a board game. That board game — Sports Action Canadian Pro Football — is, by the reckoning of many who follow these things, one of the great all-time gridiron simulations.

“It’s brilliant. The best board game I ever played,” says Tom Tango, the senior data architect for Major League Baseball Advanced Media, and a man who has launched many an influential dive into sports numbers. “Just the smart combination of the intricacies of how football works, as well as ease of play, was phenomenal.”

Garth has poured thousands of hours into this quiet but precocious little game, and not just as a player. He keeps it alive by creating updated cards every year, and makes them available for free download.

So if you want to play the 1975 CFL season using the original formulation, that opportunity exists. If you’d rather play the 2019 season, with Cody Fajardo at quarterback on one side and Andrew Harris running through line gaps on the other, fire up your printer, because Garth has you covered.

https://rpggeek.com/boardgame/5618/s...football/files