There’s no guarantee you will be able to get him to truly like many other sports if he’s an “all football all the time” kind of guy. You will never like Home Depot as much as DSW or the strip mall on the corner as much as the Galleria. There are just qualitative and stylistic differences that can’t be replicated.
But it’s worth a shot. The way we learn to like something is to understand it. The way you get him to agree to sit through or play the sport of your choice so you can explain the fabulous little details to him is to watch an entire football game with him and let him explain it to you, play by play and down by down.
Don’t insult or denigrate the football game. You have to respect his game if you want him to respect yours.
Let’s say you want to get him interested in playing golf with you. Turn on a PGA tournament and sit down with him. Tell him how they have to look at the length of the fairway, the bends in the course, the hills and valleys, the rough, the trees, the wind, the sand, and water hazards.
Help him find some of the same strategy he loves about football in the game you love. All games have strategy and plays. They just come together in different ways.
You might have to bribe him with his favorite dinner or something else he likes to get him to sit down with you, and you should go into the golf match (or basketball game or whatever) with a bit of understanding about his beloved game of football so you can draw parallels he will understand and appreciate.
It’s best if you can get him to commit to sitting through the whole game so he will have to give it a fair shot. (Give the football game a fair shot, too!)
