Give
Him
A Zetz!

The Sunday morning Yiddish Football
League is playing for a trip to the
Matzah Bowl on Nov. 28.

STEVE STEIN SPECIAL TO THE JEWISH NEWS

N

Not all the
Sunday foot-
ball
action
takes place at
NFL stadi-
ums. No mat-
ter what the
weather, the
men in the
Yiddish Football League
(YFL) get together at 9:30
every Sunday morning dur-
ing the fall for their weekly
5-on-5 or optional 6-on-6 "one-
hand touch" games at Birm-
ingham Groves High School.
What started in 1986 as a
group of friends and ac-
quaintances getting together
for pickup games became a
league in 1990, and it has
been going strong since then.
In fact, 1993 has been
dubbed, "The Year of the
Great Expansion." Two teams
were added to the original
group of four, giving the
league six squads of six play-
ers each plus a few substi-
tutes. Players range in age
from the mid-20 to early-30s,
and the vast majority are

Jewish.
Off the field, most of the
players are accountants, at-
torneys, salesmen and small
business owners. Playing
football gives them a great
opportunity to blow off some
steam.
Brian Giles of Southfield,
one of the league's founders
and the self-proclaimed com-
missioner, heads the YFL
Executive Committee that in-
cludes the six team captains:
Evan Chudnow of West
Bloomfield, Mitch Cicurel of
West Bloomfield, Howard
Eisenstadt of Birmingham,
Rick Halperin of Birming-
ham, Ken Rosen of Troy and
Scott Silberman of Bloomfield
Hills.
Players were drafted the
first three years of the YFL;
this season, teams were
drawn up by the Executive
Committee in an effort to
keep the league competitive.
Games last for nearly two
hours, with sudden death de-
ciding ties. The field is 50
yards long (first downs are 20

The Yiddish Football League piles on.

yards) and the team which
scores the most touchdowns
is the winner. There are no
referees.
"We're usually done by
11:30, and that's important
because a lot of the guys have
season tickets for Lions
games, said Giles, 28, the
owner of a commercial real
estate company.
After the games and before
everyone heads home, the
players gather for their week-
ly kibbitzing.
"Getting a chance to play
football is a major reason why
I enjoy the league so much,
but the best part of the day is
the few minutes that every-
one is in the parking lot after
the games," said Matthew
Chasnick 29, of Oak Park, an
accountant and another YFL
founder.
"We talk about the Lions,
Michigan, what NFL games
are on TV that day, who had
a baby that week, who didn't
have a baby that week ..."
"When the league began,
not one of the players was

married," Chasnick said.
"Now„ I'd say 99 percent of
the guys are married and 85
percent have kids. I don't
know if football had anything
to do with that, but those are
the facts."
However, you don't see
many wives at the games. "I
guess it's turned into kind of
a tradition that girlfriends
show up at all the games; fi-
ancees go to a few; and the
wives wise up and never go,"
said Sari Cicurel, who has
been married to Mitch Ci-
curel for two years.
That attendance pattern
may change in the near fu-
ture. When the children get
older, Sari says, there's a
good chance they'll start corn-
ing to the games with their
moms to cheer on their dads
and take advantage of the
wide open spaces at Groves.
Most of the kids have been
born in the past year, Sari
says, and most are boys. Her
first child, son Ari, was born
Jan. 25. Will these boys make
up the next generation of

of YFL players? Their fathers
sure think so.
Sari understands her hus-
band's dedication to the
league because she's a big
football fan herself.
She and Mitch, an attor-
ney, own season tickets to
both Michigan and Michigan
State football games.
"The guys in the league
have fun, but they're very se-
rious about it, too," Sari said.
If you miss a game, you'd bet-
ter have a good excuse.
"We went to a wedding a
few weeks ago and Mitch
couldn't play football. Mitch
called Brian (Giles) from the
wedding to find out how his
team did.
"I think the guys like to
play because it's exercise; it's
a chance to get out of the
house and be with their
friends in an organized ac-
tivity for a couple hours every
Sunday. They're very com-
petitive, and they love foot-
ball."
Not one YFL game has
ever been canceled. Play has