Flipper Football

As I was driving home one day I spotted setting out by the side of the road for the trash several large sheets of peg board. And I was like are you kidding me? Who would throw these away?

As they say one mans trash is another man’s treasure. And how appropriately I’ve turned some of them into a great treasure at that.

I decided to make a gathering game for my Tiger Scouts. I concocted a Flipper Football game. Using the old Paper Football game as inspiration I designed a board with Five zones. Each zone with a point value. 10, 20, 30, 40, TD(50) points. Rules on how to play at the end of this post.

All Scrape materials were used in this project.

• 1/4" Peg Board
• 3/4" Molding
• Spray paint
• Painters tape
• X-acto knife
• Foam Core
• Foam Craft sheets
• Sharpie markers
• Miter Saw
• Circular Saw
• Glue Stick
• Varnish
• Paint Brush
• Thinner
• Ruler
• Wood Glue
• Screws
• Tape measure

I determined what would be a manageable size for the game. Initially I was going to just make one but figured why not make two this way the scouts could also play as teams if desired. I cut the boards down to 2” x 4”. I gave each board a coat of white paint first.

Using painters tape I taped off rectangular scoring zones (5 in all). Then I did simple boxy numbers with tape. Using a x-acto knife I trimmed up and squared off zones and letters. I made each zone increasingly narrower.

Spray painted each board a medium green overall coat. After this was dry, I masked off a small square area that will be used as the football launch area.

I cut a plastic sleeve and taped it over the area as a shield for the area already painted. I painted this area a florescent orange.

Making sure the boards were completely dry, I took my x-acto knife and carefully removed all the painters taped letters and zones.

Note: if Paint appears like its going to peel up re-cut along tape edge.

My initial thinking was to make a netted containment area to keep the footballs from flying off the boards.

This proved impractical and rather clumsy. So I decided to make side and end rails. Using some scrap wood and cut down 6 pieces to match the size of the boards.

I mitered the corners and then glued and screwed them to the peg boards. Then varnished each for a nice finished look.

Now that the boards are finished I started rethinking the flip football game pieces. Initially was thinking the whole triangular paper football. But with the netted containment not an options I went with more of a shuffle board type of game piece.
I cut down scrap black foam core in the shape of footballs. Then glue sticked scrap yellow foam sheets to the foam core one side first and trimmed off the excess to match foam core shape. I did the same for the opposite side. This gave each football enough weight for them to be flipped across the board.

I finished each football drawing with sharpies a basic football look with seams, stripes, etc.

I only did the design on one side. The reason will be explained in the rules.

Debuted the Flipper Football game at our Tiger Den meeting. It was meant to be a gathering game. So the kids as they arrived would play the game to try and score the highest point total after 4 flips.
The game was a big hit and I think they would have played it the whole meeting if we didn’t have other things to do.

I was super pleased with how they turned out, a true trash to treasure. I’ll be able to pull these out any time we need a quick game to play. Plus that was only a portion of one sheet of the peg board. Wonder what else I can come up with.

Post Note: When I was teaching the kids the rules, mechanics and how to play the game, It quickly became apparent to me that art of flipping hadn't entered into these kids lives yet. Teaching them this fine motor skill was unexpected. So a bonus for me helping introduce these kids how to flip things with their fingers.

Game play: The mechanics of this game is more like shuffle board. Flipping the footballs horizontally across the board. As opposed to Paper Football where your flipping a triangle thru uprights.

2 - Player Rules. When playing head to head one against another player.
A Game is playing 4 Quarters (4 flips per player per quarter)

Each player takes 4 turns flipping their 4 individual footballs from the orange launch pad. The footballs have to be more than 50% of the ball inside the white boundaries of any given score zone.

Note: It's up to you if you want the players alternate shots but its easier to score just having each shoot four total score then other player shoots.

Each flip is totaled together for a total score for a single quarter.

After each player has taken their first flips and points awarded. That concludes the quarter, then a new quarter each player again flips their footballs and totally points. This repeats for each quarter.

The Player with the hight total at the end of the 4 quarters is the winner.

Multiple players 3-4 or more.

Game rules for 2 player apply just each player keeps their own point total and again after 4 quarters the player with the highest number of points is the winner.

Team Play

Divide the number of players into two teams. Each team player then only gets two flips per quarter the teams players total their individual scores together for a over all team score. Continue play through 4 quarters. The team with the highest total wins the game.

Special rules:

Out of Bounds: If a ball is flipped off the board it’s considered out of bounds and the player forfeits that shot and or shoots their remaining shots if any.

Interference: If a flipped ball rolls or lands on the side or end rails this is considered interference and the ball is removed from the game board until other shots completed if any. And an extra shot is given to the opposing player.

Flag on the Play: If a football is flipped over it. Its all blank yellow on the back side making it look like a Yellow Flag on the play. A Flag on the play means a player loses a shot during his turn.

Questionable Calls: It’s important to have an impartial referee. To make close calls where its hard to tell if football is in or out 50%. Oh an Referee's decisions are final.

Attached is a score pad in PDF form I created for games. Fits on 8.5” x 11” with 4 score pads sheet.