This being Super Bowl week, it seems appropriate to contemplate a most amusing description of the quarterback from Eugene's "Stumping the Rocket Scientist" article, April 1997. http://www.jsoftware.com/jwiki/Doc/Articles/Play134
Now I have to apologize to readers outside of the United States of America for imposing on your good nature for so long, when what I was describing derives from the parochial form of football popular in the the USA but (I believe) not well-known outside that country. In that game there is a preeminent hero called the quarterback. He stands behind a line of seven myrmidons, the central one of which (called the center), hands the ball between his legs to the quarterback while in a crouching stance and facing away from the quarterback. The quarterback can hand the ball in turn to one of the people behind the line like himself, or can run with the ball, or he can throw it forward, aiming it in the direction of one of his running teammates. This is called a forward pass, and it is his ability to deliver forward passes so that they are caught by a teammate before hitting the ground that is measured by the rating system described so laboriously above. It is a cliche oft repeated by sports commentators that American football games are won or lost by the "myrmidons", even though it was the "preeminent hero" who gets most of the glory or blame. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For information about J forums see http://www.jsoftware.com/forums.htm
