Adventures in Indexing, Volume: Who Remembers? : Questioning My Aptness for Description of Sports

In the course of indexing football images, there are three particular elements I have difficulty with on a consistent basis. Those three are the Subject, Description, and Title elements. My problems with them all stem from the same root: I know relatively little about football. Unusual, I know, for someone who grew up in the state of Alabama (and who attends the University of Alabama), but it's true nonetheless. I don't really like football. Never could get into it. So where most people who see this image would find something they instantly recognize and can make sense of, the first possible description to pop into my head was: "Both teams pursue as referee holding invisible football attempts escape." Obviously, that's not the correct description. Unfortunately, because of the way the shot is staged, I'm not entirely sure what is. I can identify a number of the players in the image, but I have no idea precisely who the ball-carrier for the play is, beyond a supposition based on the facings of the various players.

Likewise, my first thought for describing this image was "Lucy van Pelt (14, Alabama) fools Charlie Brown (10, Alabama) yet again." With the Subject element of course including Hoaxes, Charles Schultz, and Performance Art.

Admittedly, that probably wasn't as bad as my first idea for a description for this: "Referee scratches his own crotch, both teams panic." The accompanying title being, of course: "Iron Bowl 75 Referee Scratches Crotch, Both Teams Panic."


It doesn't take a genuis to realize that none of these titles, descriptions, or subject identifiers are what the client would want, but beyond the case of the one my impulse suggested a Peanuts reference for, I have little to no clue as to what is actually going on in these images. Like the person who assign a video of a Sprint Cup race at Talladega in the following fashion: "Dozens of men drive in circles on same stretch of road for hours, most refusing to stop for directions," there's a sense in which the description is, technically apt. There is also, as in that case, a much greater sense in which the description is entirely wrong.

In that sense, I was hoping for some help or feedback. Anyone more sports-savvy  than I (read: anyone at all) want to offer feedback or suggestions? They would be greatly appreciated. For now, beyond putting up the actual identifications of the relevant players, I'm inclined to leave these alone until I can get help deciphering them. Which, I suppose, makes it an excellent time to try indexing some DePol engravings.