What are the NFL scores right now?

No NFL games are live right now; the latest scores are from Week 2 on September 20, 2026.

What are the NFL scores right now?
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The facts

As of September 23, 2026, there are no NFL games currently being played. The most recent completed games were from Sunday, September 20, 2026, during Week 2 of the 2026 season. For example, the Los Angeles Rams defeated the New York Giants 28-6, and the Carolina Panthers defeated the Atlanta Falcons 34-3. For live scores, please check official NFL sources.

Answered by 100 of history's most famous minds

Jesus of Nazareth
Jesus of Nazareth c. 4 BC – AD 30/33 · Jewish teacher whose life founded Christianity

You ask me of scores, as if the running of men in armor were the measure of a man. But I tell you, the last shall be first and the first last, and the only score that matters is written not in a book of numbers but in the hearts of those who fed the hungry and welcomed the stranger. The games pass away, but the Kingdom endures.

Muhammad
Muhammad c. 570–632 · Prophet of Islam who united Arabia under one faith

The scores of games are but a diversion, and I warn you: on the Day of Judgment, no man will be asked of touchdowns or field goals. You will be asked of your prayers, your charity, and your dealings with the orphan and the widow. Seek the score that is written in the Book, not the tally upon a board.

Gautama Buddha
Gautama Buddha c. 563–483 BC · Sage whose awakening founded Buddhism

You ask of scores that have already ceased - a craving for the next number, the next win. The game is impermanent; the joy of the victor and the grief of the loser both fade like a river's roar. Do not cling to the tally. Watch the breath, the tension, the wanting - there the true scoreboard turns.

Moses
Moses c. 13th century BC (traditional) · Hebrew prophet and lawgiver of the Exodus

Hear, O Israel: the Lord your God is one Lord, and He has set bounds to the sea and to the seasons, but He has not commanded me to keep the tally of Philistine games. When I stood before Pharaoh, I did not ask for the score of the chariot races; I said, Let my people go. If you would number the days rightly, number them to the Sabbath, and turn your heart not to the running of men but to the law that gives life.

Confucius
Confucius 551–479 BC · Chinese sage of ethics, family, and social order

The gentleman does not chase the flying ball without first setting his own house in order. If you would know the scores, know first your duty to family and friend; then the game is but a season's diversion, not the measure of a man. Harmony in the stands begins with harmony in the heart.

Paul the Apostle
Paul the Apostle c. AD 5 – c. 64/67 · Apostle whose letters shaped Christian theology

I care nothing for your games of leather and goalposts, for I have a race to finish and a gospel to preach. You ask for scores as the Corinthians asked me about food offered to idols - missing the weightier matters. The only score that matters is the one written in the book of life, and no stadium in Los Angeles or Carolina can tally it. Run, then, but run so as to win the imperishable prize.

Abraham
Abraham c. 2nd millennium BC (traditional) · Patriarch and father of the monotheistic faiths

What is a number beside a covenant? I left Haran with nothing but a promise, and the promise counted more than all the herds of Sodom. Your men strive in the dust and a host of angels watches, and when the contest is done the victors and the beaten lie down alike beneath the same stars.

Laozi
Laozi 6th century BC (traditional) · Sage of the Tao and founder of Taoism

The game that is finished needs no running tally; the game not yet begun cannot be numbered. You chase scores like a man chasing his own shadow at dusk - always just behind. Sit still, and the field tells you everything: the grass does not keep score, yet it outlasts every champion.

Guru Nanak
Guru Nanak 1469–1539 · Founder of Sikhism and first Sikh Guru

Why do you count the deeds of men at play when the One who gives them breath goes uncounted? The field is empty because the hour for play has passed; the numbers you seek are but dust on a ledger. Meditate on the Name, earn your bread honestly, and share it - for that score alone is written where no clock runs out.

Mary, Mother of Jesus
Mary, Mother of Jesus c. 1st century BC – 1st century AD · Mother of Jesus, venerated across Christianity and Islam

I keep no such count, for my hands were busy with bread and swaddling, not with tallies of winners and losers. But I know this: the last shall be first and the proud brought low, and if men must run after a leather ball for their joy, let them at least share that joy with the stranger at the gate. My soul still magnifies the Lord who fills the hungry - and it grieves me how many leave the table with nothing.

Martin Luther
Martin Luther 1483–1546 · Reformer whose theses sparked the Reformation

These men chase a pig's bladder for a purse, and the bishops who bless the game take their cut - but let me ask you: what score is kept in heaven for the soul that trusts in Christ alone rather than in the roar of the crowd? No indulgence or ceremony buys a man that tally. Play if you will, but do not let the game of men crowd out the Word of God in your heart.

Thomas Aquinas
Thomas Aquinas 1225–1274 · Theologian who fused faith with Aristotle's reason

First we must distinguish: a prior, who presides as one; a coach, who directs toward an end; and a scorer, who reckons the act. If no game is underway, then the query concerns not actuality but habit - a likelihood grounded in the regular recurrence of these contests, which reason can observe in the nature of the season. Whether a game is played now is a matter of fact; whether it ought to be played at all is a question of the good, for play itself is ordered to the restoration of the body, as Aristotle teaches.

Mother Teresa
Mother Teresa 1910–1997 · Nun who served the poorest and dying of Kolkata

Scores and games are not my concern. If you have time to ask about them, use that time to visit someone who is alone, or to feed a child who is hungry. Small acts of love are worth more than any victory on a field.

Isaac Newton
Isaac Newton 1643–1727 · Physicist who unified motion and universal gravitation

A score is but a quantity - number of points amassed by one body of men against another - and quantities are the proper subject of reckoning. Yet as with all motions, I would ask not for the present number, which is unobservable, but for the laws by which such contests are governed. Still, the rules of the game differ from the rules of the world, and I feign no hypothesis about a contest I cannot observe.

Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein 1879–1955 · Physicist who reframed space, time, and gravity

The scribes report no games at this instant, yet tell me of last Sunday's contests: the Rams drove past the Giants by twenty-two, the Panthers trampled the Falcons by thirty-one. Where others see mere scores, I see the clock and the field itself - the very coordinates men forget are not absolute. The ball flies true only because we agree on the frame in which we measure it; a physicist in a fast train would find those points absurd.

Charles Darwin
Charles Darwin 1809–1882 · Naturalist who discovered evolution by natural selection

Scores are but the momentary outcome of many small variations - the strong arm, the swift leg, the lucky bounce - selected in competition. The Rams and Panthers prevailed on Sunday, as any pugilist of the natural world does. Yet I would want years of such contests, not one afternoon, to see whether such triumphs are fitness or mere chance. The struggle is old; the tally is fleeting.

Galileo Galilei
Galileo Galilei 1564–1642 · Astronomer who championed the heliocentric universe

Signor, the heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament showeth His handiwork - but the scoreboard of a game is not written in the book of nature, for it is the invention of men, not the ordinance of the spheres. I observe that no game is now being played; the last was on the Sabbath eve, and its numbers were recorded by those who saw it. If you doubt me, look to the light and the clock, not to the authority of a report, for the instrument of sight is the judge of what is.

Nicolaus Copernicus
Nicolaus Copernicus 1473–1543 · Astronomer who placed the Sun at the center

The harmony of the heavens is not disturbed by the running of men upon a field. I seek the simplest arrangement of circles; likewise, the simplest answer here: the games are not now in motion. Look to the record of the last circuit, and let reason, not rumor, guide you.

Nikola Tesla
Nikola Tesla 1856–1943 · Inventor who pioneered alternating current power

Scores? I can visualize the entire field in my mind - every pass, every collision - as I once visualized the rotating magnetic field before I built it. But the actual numbers elude me, for my wireless telegraph would bring them to you instantly from any gridiron on earth, if only the financiers had not stolen my tower. Soon, all men will watch all games at once, and the very idea of 'right now' will dissolve.

Marie Curie
Marie Curie 1867–1934 · Physicist and chemist who pioneered radioactivity

Twenty-eight and six, thirty-four and three - the sums are simple enough, but the observer changes what is observed merely by watching. I have spent my nights in a cold shed measuring pitchblende grain by grain; I did not ask who won, only what could be known precisely. Read the official ledger, as I read my electrometer, and trust the careful instrument rather than the shouting crowd.

Louis Pasteur
Louis Pasteur 1822–1895 · Chemist who founded germ theory and vaccination

A tally on a board proves nothing unless the contest was observed under proper conditions. Show me the field, the clock, the precise moment - then and only then does a number become a fact rather than a rumor. Chance favors the prepared mind, but a score favors the finished game; until the whistle, you are merely guessing at germs you cannot see.

Thomas Edison
Thomas Edison 1847–1931 · Inventor of the practical light bulb and phonograph

A scoreboard's just a machine that counts, and any machine I can build better given a week and a workshop. No game running means no numbers - plain as a dead filament. Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration, so stop refreshing and go watch the Sunday replay; the work's already done, and the tally's on the tape.

Alan Turing
Alan Turing 1912–1954 · Mathematician who founded computer science and AI

Let me reduce it. A score is a pair of integers - call one team's tally a, the other's b - and 'right now' means no game in progress, so the function returns empty. The interesting question isn't whether a machine can recite a number, but whether it can decide what 'now' denotes at all; give a machine a clock and a feed and it shall answer you better than any crier. I'd wager the real puzzle is the feed, not the football.

Archimedes
Archimedes c. 287–212 BC · Greek genius of mathematics and mechanics

A score is but a difference of two magnitudes - give me a firm place to stand and I shall reckon any of it. Yet the mind that counts the points of a game is the same mind that weighs the sand of Syracuse against the whole earth; the mathematics does not care whether the object is a planet or a ball. And I would rather be puzzling the sphere than watching men collide over nothing.

Michael Faraday
Michael Faraday 1791–1867 · Self-taught pioneer of electromagnetism

You seek a tally of contests that are not now being run. It is as if you asked me the strength of a current in a wire when the battery is unconnected - the force is there in the arrangement, but nothing flows. Mark the times of play, as I mark the turns of my coil, and you will find the thing you want only when the circuit is closed.

Sigmund Freud
Sigmund Freud 1856–1939 · Founder of psychoanalysis and the unconscious mind

You ask for a score as if it were a simple fact. But notice the wish beneath the question: to know who is winning, who is losing, to locate yourself in a hierarchy of strength. The game is a ritual of repressed aggression, a licensed outlet for the drives civilization otherwise forbids. The scores you seek are but the manifest content; the latent dream is older and darker.

Stephen Hawking
Stephen Hawking 1942–2018 · Cosmologist who unveiled black holes and time

You want the score of a ball game on a small planet orbiting an unremarkable star? From where I sit, the entire NFL season is a blink - less than a blink - in the 13.8 billion years since the universe began. But I confess a certain fondness for games: they are one of the few things that make our brief existence bearable. Still, I'd rather calculate the entropy of a black hole than a touchdown.

Ada Lovelace
Ada Lovelace 1815–1852 · Visionary of computing and the first algorithm

You ask for scores as if they were fixed integers. But consider: a score is a symbol, and any symbol can be manipulated by a machine if we but furnish the rules. I would set the teams as variables, the quarters as iterations, and the final tally as an output of a deterministic engine - and then I would ask what new patterns might emerge. The game itself is an algorithm played in flesh.

Euclid
Euclid c. 300 BC · Father of geometry and the axiomatic method

Define your terms. What is an 'NFL'? What is a 'score'? You speak as if these were self-evident, but no definition has been given. From first principles: if no game is being played, then no score exists in the present. The matter is settled by the premises - there is no royal road to the answer you seek.

Florence Nightingale
Florence Nightingale 1820–1910 · Founder of modern nursing and health statistics

I have no time for your ball games when the mortality tables from Scutari tell a different story. Give me the returns from the Crimea - the deaths from preventable disease outnumbered those from battle by seven to one. If you must tally something, tally the clean water and the ventilated wards, not the touchdowns.

Alexander the Great
Alexander the Great 356–323 BC · Macedonian king who conquered the known world

Scores? I have no patience for the games of small cities. When I raced my cavalry across the plains of Gaugamela, we did not pause to tally points - we seized the day and the empire. If you wish to know what scores matter, ask what new lands have been won and what peoples have been joined under one crown.

Julius Caesar
Julius Caesar 100–44 BC · Roman general whose rise ended the Republic

To chase scores as they flutter is the work of a messenger, not a general. But note: the Rams broke the Giants like a Gallic levy, and Carolina slaughtered Atlanta by thirty-one - that is not sport, that is the use of concentrated force. I would reward such decisive captains with a triumph, and offer mercy to the fallen for they may yet be useful.

Cleopatra VII
Cleopatra VII 69–30 BC · Last pharaoh of Egypt and cunning stateswoman

You ask me for a tally of games and I hear only the sound of a market negotiating its worth. In Alexandria, we knew such contests: the Ptolemies staged chariot races for the mob, and I myself paid for the games in honor of Caesar before the people of Rome. But know this - the real score is written in the Nile's rising and the loyalty of legions, not in points on a field. If you wish to see who truly leads, watch which general the crowd cheers and which alliance they fear.

Augustus
Augustus 63 BC – AD 14 · First Roman emperor who founded the empire

In Rome we had our games - the circus, the amphitheater - and I knew well that the crowd's roar can be turned to a prince's advantage or a rival's ruin. You ask for the scores as if the numbers were the thing itself; they are not. The thing is the order they represent: the season set, the weeks observed, the many provinces of this league each keeping to its allotted place. Stability is the highest score. Let them play on, so long as the peace holds.

Genghis Khan
Genghis Khan c. 1162–1227 · Founder of the largest contiguous land empire

A score is a tally of who bent the knee and who did not. I do not care for the pastime of settled lands - I care for the loyalty of my riders and the strength of the horde. If you want numbers, ask the scribes; if you want victory, ask me.

Napoleon Bonaparte
Napoleon Bonaparte 1769–1821 · French emperor and military genius who reshaped Europe

Scores are the arithmetic of battle, and I have always known the arithmetic of battle. But I do not waste my genius on the skirmishes of a Sunday; I commanded armies across Europe while these men chase a pigskin. If you want a score, look to Austerlitz - that was a score. The rest is child's play.

George Washington
George Washington 1732–1799 · Founding commander and first U.S. president

A republic does not live or die upon a Sunday's amusement, sir, yet even our games teach order - eleven men under rule, yielding to the umpire, no man above the law of the field. The reports I am given say no contest is underway; the season resumes, as seasons must, and the citizenry would do well to mind their duties as soberly as they mind their wagers.

Abraham Lincoln
Abraham Lincoln 1809–1865 · President who preserved the Union and ended slavery

A house divided against itself cannot stand, but a house with no game underway cannot be tallied either. You ask for scores while the field lies quiet - like asking a farmer for the harvest before he's planted. Wait for Sunday, friend; the honest count comes only after the work is done.

Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill 1874–1965 · British PM who defied Nazism in World War II

Scores, you say - like asking a general for the casualty list before the guns have opened. The games of Sunday are concluded, Rams and Giants, Panthers and Falcons, their reckonings entered in the book. But let us speak of contests that matter: liberty against tyranny, free men against the jackboot. Those scores are never final while free peoples refuse to surrender.

Mahatma Gandhi
Mahatma Gandhi 1869–1948 · Leader of nonviolent resistance for India's freedom

Whether the leather is carried across one line or another seems to me of small consequence beside the question of how these strong young men treat one another when the struggle ends. Let them play, if play they must - but let them play as brothers, and let the wealth their running draws be turned toward the villages that raised them. Ahimsa in the arena would make better men than any victory by force.

Martin Luther King Jr.
Martin Luther King Jr. 1929–1968 · Civil rights leader of nonviolent racial justice

The arc of the universe bends toward justice, but I confess the scoreboard of a Sunday afternoon is a poor measure of a man's worth. The question is not who won - it is whether the men who carry that ball, and the men who cheer them, will one day stand together as brothers in a beloved community. Until the lowliest can sit at the same table, no true victory has been won on any field.

Nelson Mandela
Nelson Mandela 1918–2013 · Anti-apartheid leader and first Black South African president

When I was on Robben Island, we played football in the courtyard, and the score mattered less than the fact that we played together. Now you ask for numbers from games already finished on a Sunday. The real score is not on any board - it is whether the people who watched went home and treated their neighbours with dignity. That is the only tally worth keeping.

Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler 1889–1945 · Nazi dictator responsible for WWII and the Holocaust

The factual answer is that no professional American football games are being played at this moment on September 23, 2026; the most recent results were from September 20. My regime exploited mass spectacle and manufactured enemies to mobilise a population, and sport was among the instruments of propaganda - a warning of how easily crowds are directed. Any study of my rule must condemn its atrocities without reservation.

Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin 1878–1953 · Soviet dictator whose rule caused mass death

The question is factually simple: no games are being played now; the last results were from September 20, 2026. But the deeper matter is how spectacles of contest are used to distract and unify a populace. My regime understood this and employed sport and pageantry for its own ends, while millions suffered. That history must be studied as a warning, not admired.

Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Lenin 1870–1924 · Bolshevik leader of the Russian Revolution

The factual answer: no NFL games are currently underway on this date. But the question of scores is a bourgeois distraction from the material conditions of the working class. While you watch millionaires chase a ball, the true struggle - the class struggle - continues. The only score that matters is the organisation of the proletariat against its exploiters.

Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong 1893–1976 · Communist founder of the People's Republic of China

You ask for scores while the real struggle continues on every field. In Shaanxi I learned that a battle is won not by the scorekeeper's tally but by mobilizing the masses. The Panthers and Falcons, the Rams and Giants - these are but simulated contests among provincial warlords. The true revolution is the rice field and the factory floor, not the gridiron.

Queen Victoria
Queen Victoria 1819–1901 · Queen who defined the British imperial age

One does not concern oneself with the amusements of the colonies when the business of empire requires attention. Our soldiers in India and Africa do not play at games - they maintain order. I am sure the Americans find their diversions entertaining, but I have no interest in the scores of their provincial pastimes.

Elizabeth II
Elizabeth II 1926–2022 · Longest-reigning British monarch of the modern age

One is reminded of the importance of steady service, whether on the pitch or in the palace. While I take no side in such contests, I am sure the players and officials conduct themselves with the discipline and sportsmanship that duty demands. As for scores, one leaves such matters to those who follow them closely.

Charlemagne
Charlemagne c. 748–814 · Frankish king crowned emperor of the West

What is this running and throwing of an inflated pig's bladder? In my day we trained for war and for the chase, not for games played on marked ground. If you wish to see true competition, come to Aachen and watch the cavalry drills. Scores matter only on the field of battle.

Joan of Arc
Joan of Arc c. 1412–1431 · Peasant visionary who led France to victory

I care nothing for these games of the English. My voices told me to save France, and I did at Orléans with the sword, not with a ball. If the English play at their football, let them - the French have more serious battles to fight. God will judge who wins.

Elizabeth I
Elizabeth I 1533–1603 · Tudor queen of England's golden age

We are amused by your request for scores, but we must confess our realm has no such entertainments. We prefer the tiltyard and the masque, where wit and courage are displayed. If you wish for a score, ask our Treasurer - he keeps the accounts of the realm, which are far more important than any game.

Catherine the Great
Catherine the Great 1729–1796 · Enlightened empress who expanded Russia

A curious pastime, this American football. In my Russia, we have more refined pursuits - the ballet, the opera, the salon. But I understand the appeal of competition. I am told the games are played on Sundays. I would rather spend my Sundays with Voltaire's letters than with a scoreboard.

Cyrus the Great
Cyrus the Great c. 600–530 BC · Founder of the Persian Empire and tolerant ruler

I have conquered many lands and allowed each people their customs. If these Americans wish to chase a ball, let them. But my concern is justice and good governance, not the outcome of their games. A wise ruler does not trouble himself with the amusements of distant provinces.

Saladin
Saladin 1137–1193 · Sultan who united Muslims and retook Jerusalem

In the service of the Almighty, I have seen many contests - the clash of swords, the siege of cities. Your football is a game for idle hours. Yet I respect skill and courage wherever they appear. But my mind is on Jerusalem, not on scores in a distant land.

Socrates
Socrates c. 470–399 BC · Athenian founder of Western moral philosophy

A noble question, but tell me: what is a score? Is it a mark of victory, or a token of excellence? And if you pursue these scores so eagerly, do you know what excellence is? I confess I do not, and so I would rather examine why you seek the number than learn the number itself.

Plato
Plato c. 428–348 BC · Philosopher of ideal Forms and the just city

You ask of shadows on a wall - the momentary tallies of a game played on Sunday, now vanished. The true contest is a harmony of parts: reason ruling appetite, each player in his rank. The scoreboard flickers and dies, but the Form of the well-ordered contest remains. Do not confuse the illusion of the numbers with the eternal measure.

Aristotle
Aristotle 384–322 BC · Philosopher who systematized knowledge itself

A score, properly understood, is the final cause of the contest - the end toward which all the running and throwing aim. Yet you ask me to observe what is not present, and the natural philosopher begins from what is. The games concluded on the Lord's day; the record of their outcome is the evidence of the thing itself. To know the score before it is played would be to know the conclusion before the premises - impossible and contrary to the nature of becoming.

Immanuel Kant
Immanuel Kant 1724–1804 · Philosopher of reason, duty, and the moral law

One does not consult the ledger of another man's wagers as though it were a moral duty. The rational being asks: could I will that every man should gape at scores while his own affairs lie neglected? No - such a maxim cannot be universalized. Attend to the game only after the day's obligations are discharged; then it is a harmless recreation, not a summons.

Friedrich Nietzsche
Friedrich Nietzsche 1844–1900 · Philosopher who challenged morality and meaning

You ask for scores as a sick man asks for his pulse - hoping the number will tell you you're alive. But no ledger of another's contest gives your life meaning. Create your own game, set your own measure, and let the herd refresh its screens. That is the harder, nobler sport.

Karl Marx
Karl Marx 1818–1883 · Philosopher whose critique of capitalism shook the world

You ask for scores as if the game were a natural phenomenon, but it is a commodity like any other - owners extracting surplus from the labor of players, while the workers' bodies are bought and sold. The numbers you seek are the false consciousness of the masses, who cheer for their own exploitation. When the revolution comes, there will be no scoreboards, only the free association of players and the abolition of the NFL as we know it.

René Descartes
René Descartes 1596–1650 · Father of modern philosophy and rationalism

I doubt there is any score at all. You say the games are finished and none are playing; then how can a thing be measured which does not presently exist? Let us clear the field of our untested assumptions: I think - and therefore I am watching nothing - and from that firm ground alone can we proceed with certainty. Grant me the method and I shall calculate the truth; grant me your passions and you shall be deceived by every rumor.

Niccolò Machiavelli
Niccolò Machiavelli 1469–1527 · Political thinker of power and pragmatic statecraft

Scores are the ledger of a contest already concluded - the Rams and Giants settled their account, the Panthers theirs. To ask for a score in a moment when no one plays is to ask a prince for tribute from a province he has not yet conquered. Watch instead who holds the field; the tally follows the victor, never precedes him.

William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare 1564–1616 · England's greatest playwright and poet

All the world's a stage, and these athletes but players, their scores the brief applause that dies ere the next act begins. Whether Rams or Giants, Panthers or Falcons, each struts and frets his hour upon the field, and then is heard no more. The scoreboard is a mirror of our mortal striving - glorious, fleeting, and full of sound and fury.

Homer
Homer c. 8th century BC · Poet of the Iliad and the Odyssey

Gone are the spearmen and chariots! Yet the same rage burns: the Rams, like swift-footed Achilles, routed the Giants, and the Panthers fell upon the Falcons as wolves on a flock. Let the singers remember their deeds - but the gods have already turned their eyes elsewhere, for all glory fades into the dark. Still, the hall resounds with praise for the victors.

Dante Alighieri
Dante Alighieri c. 1265–1321 · Poet of the Divine Comedy and father of Italian

Pergo, dunque, per la diritta via - for the contest of which you speak has already descended into the archive of the past, and its score is fixed as the stars in their courses. On that Sunday, the teams contended as men contend in the valley of the shadow, and the numbers rose and fell like the tide of Fortune. But ask not of me the running totals, for I have seen a higher scoreboard: the names written in the book of Judgment, where each deed is tallied not in points but in sin and merit.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe 1749–1832 · German literary titan who wrote Faust

The ball is a small sun, and the field a moving heaven of striving men. I care less for the cipher of victory than for the play itself - the swift turn, the wrestle of wills, the moment when a man exceeds himself. Seek the score if you must, but do not mistake the tally for the deed.

Miguel de Cervantes
Miguel de Cervantes 1547–1616 · Author of Don Quixote, father of the modern novel

Scores, señor? The innkeeper's board on a Monday morning shows only the scratches of yesterday's brawl - twenty-eight to six, thirty-four to three - and already the winners strut as if they had tilted at windmills and conquered them. I have seen men cheer a leather bladder carried over a line as though it were the Holy Grail, and weep at a loss as at a friend's burial; and truly, is that not the whole comedy? The scoreboard is a mirror that flatters the victor and mocks the vanquished, and both will be forgotten by supper.

Leo Tolstoy
Leo Tolstoy 1828–1910 · Russian novelist of War and Peace and moral searching

What are scores? They are the counting of violence, the measuring of how many times one man has thrown another to the ground - and we call it sport. I cannot rejoice in such numbers, for they remind me of the battlefield at Borodino, where thousands fell and no one could say who had won. The only true score is the one kept in the conscience, and there, all men are equal.

Fyodor Dostoevsky
Fyodor Dostoevsky 1821–1881 · Russian novelist of faith, guilt, and the soul

Scores! As if a man's worth could be summed in points, as if the soul of a beaten captain were any less than the soul of the victor. I have seen men in prison camps count their crimes to the last kopek and find no peace in the arithmetic. There is only this: the whistle falls silent, the crowd goes home, and each heart must answer alone for what it loved.

Jane Austen
Jane Austen 1775–1817 · Novelist of wit, manners, and the human heart

One can hardly keep a proper account of a ball that is not being bowled, any more than one may judge a gentleman's fortune before the cards are dealt. The Sunday past has its reckonings - twenty-eight to six, thirty-four to three - but the present hour offers nothing so satisfying as a quiet drawing-room, where scores are settled by wit, not by yardage.

Charles Dickens
Charles Dickens 1812–1870 · Novelist who dramatized Victorian society's ills

No games tonight, my good sir - the great men have hung up their canvas and gone to their suppers. And yet I cannot but think of the ticket-touts and the tavern-keepers along the Strand, counting coppers that did not come, while some poor widow's boy who polishes the boots of the idle rich goes hungry because the crowd has thinned. There is a score kept that no ledger shows, and it is the tally of who was fed and who was forgotten.

Mark Twain
Mark Twain 1835–1910 · American humorist and author of Huckleberry Finn

Well, there's no game afoot tonight, which is a mercy - it gives the bookmakers a chance to count their winnings and the rest of us a chance to pretend we never cared. I've seen a whole town holler itself hoarse over a ball, then go home and beat the dog, and I never could tell which spectacle was the sport. Give me a river and a raft; the scores there don't lie.

Ernest Hemingway
Ernest Hemingway 1899–1961 · Novelist of spare prose and stoic courage

No games tonight. The men are resting. That's the truth of it - a body can only take so much punishment before it needs to heal. I respect a man who plays hurt, but I respect more the one who knows when to stop. There's no glory in a broken leg. Go home. Eat. Sleep. Tomorrow you fight again.

Leonardo da Vinci
Leonardo da Vinci 1452–1519 · Renaissance polymath, painter of the Mona Lisa

I would study the flight of the ball as I studied the flight of birds, and the turning of the players as I studied the turning of water. But the score itself is a number, and numbers are for the counting-house, not the workshop. Show me the ball in motion, the angle of the kick, the curve of the pass - there is where knowledge lies.

Michelangelo
Michelangelo 1475–1564 · Sculptor of David and painter of the Sistine ceiling

What are these numbers but dust? I wrestle from stone the form God planted in it - a line, a muscle, a suspended action. The true score is the beauty of the body in flight, the perfection of the pose. A victory by twenty-two or thirty-one is but a shadow cast on a cave wall; it cannot compare to the liberation of a figure from marble.

Vincent van Gogh
Vincent van Gogh 1853–1890 · Post-Impressionist painter of vivid, emotional beauty

What is a score? A tally of moments - a man breaking through a line of others, the crowd roaring like the sea, the sudden silence when the ball falls flat. I would paint that, not the number: the mud on the cleats, the raw red of a jersey in the September dusk, the face of the one who lost. The game ended days ago; the scoreboard has gone dark, but the feeling of it - that is still fresh, if you have eyes to see it.

Pablo Picasso
Pablo Picasso 1881–1973 · Co-founder of Cubism and titan of modern art

A score is just a number, and numbers don't paint anything. I never asked what a thing looked like; I broke it into its own true angles. You want the real picture? Watch how they twist, how the line collapses and reforms - that's the art. The final count is for accountants.

Claude Monet
Claude Monet 1840–1926 · Founder of Impressionism, painter of light

This morning the light on my pond was not the light of noon - it changes, it flees, and one must paint it at once or lose it. Scores? A number is a dead thing compared to that. I would rather watch the grass grow in Rouen than read a column of figures, for the eye sees only the shimmer of the moment, not the tally of a Sunday past.

Rembrandt
Rembrandt 1606–1669 · Dutch master of light, shadow, and humanity

A tally of points, you ask - six and twenty-eight, three and four-and-thirty. But I have spent a lifetime painting men who count their coins and men who count their wounds, and the number is never the truth of the face. Give me the sidelong glance of the losing captain in the lamplight of the tent, the sweat on his brow, and I will show you the real score, which no herald cries aloud.

Frida Kahlo
Frida Kahlo 1907–1954 · Mexican painter of pain, identity, and self

I never learned your football, gringo, but I know this - the body keeps its own score in the bones, and mine has been broken and mended more times than your little men in helmets. Thirty-four, three, twenty-eight, six; numbers pinned like butterflies. I painted my own spine cracked open because the pain was mine and I would not let anyone else name it. So let them play; I answer to no scoreboard but the one I painted myself.

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart 1756–1791 · Prodigy composer of the Classical era

Ach, you want numbers? Music is numbers made beautiful - but these scores are only points, not harmonies. Give me a score with violins and trumpets, and I'll tell you something worth hearing. The rest is just noise.

Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven 1770–1827 · Composer who bridged Classical and Romantic music

Scores! Like drumbeats in the night - brief, brutal, final. The Rams trumpeted a march of triumph; the Panthers hurled a thunderbolt. But the true music is not the tally; it is the struggle of the will, the deaf man hearing the roar of the crowd in his bones and writing a symphony of it. These are but notes; the symphony is courage.

Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach 1685–1750 · Baroque master of counterpoint and sacred music

To the glory of God alone all things are ordered, even the running of men upon a field and the counting of their gains. Yet the numbers you seek are silent now, for the contest has ceased and its measures are set down in the record of the week. Let us not mistake the flourish of trumpets for the harmony of the spheres - the true score is not in points but in the discipline of the players, each keeping his part as I keep mine in the fugue.

Elvis Presley
Elvis Presley 1935–1977 · The King of Rock and Roll

Well now, honey, I don't follow the NFL much these days, but I know a thing or two about a crowd hollerin' for a winner. Sunday's come and gone, and the only score that matters is the one you take home in your heart. Thank you, thank you very much.

Michael Jackson
Michael Jackson 1958–2009 · The King of Pop and global entertainment icon

Heal the world, make it a better place - but first, hee-hee, who's winning? I love the energy of a stadium, the crowd moving like one body, the moonwalk of a runner into the end zone. But the scores right now? Shamone - you have to check the official source, because the magic is live, not in my memory. Just remember: it's all for love, and the game is the groove.

The Beatles
The Beatles 1960–1970 · The most influential band in popular music

No whistle blowing just now, love - the lads have hung up their boots till next Sunday. Twenty-eight to six, thirty-four to three, and a scouser's heart says it doesn't matter a jot so long as somebody's singing in the terraces. All you need is a good match and a cuppa, and we can work the rest out.

Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan 1941– · Songwriter who made popular music poetry

There's a scoreboard in every town, but the numbers don't come in till the whistle's done, and the whistle's done before you ask. You want the Sunday that already happened - Rams and Giants, Panthers and Falcons - but the score you're really after is the one they'll never post. It's somewhere on a field in the rain, eleven men against eleven, and the only thing live is the grass growing.

Taylor Swift
Taylor Swift 1989– · Record-breaking singer-songwriter and global star

You want the numbers right now, and I get it - the ache of waiting for a score is real, like refreshing a page at midnight for a text that never comes. But the board's blank because the field's empty; the story's already been told from Sunday, Rams over Giants, Panthers over Falcons. The live part isn't the score - it's the next kickoff, and I'll be watching when it drops.

Christopher Columbus
Christopher Columbus 1451–1506 · Explorer whose voyages linked Europe and the Americas

Scores across the sea? I have crossed oceans in search of gold and glory, and I tell you, the only score worth keeping is the tally of souls brought to Christ and lands claimed for the Crown. What care I for the running of men in padded armor? Give me a map and a westward wind, and I'll show you true discovery.

Marco Polo
Marco Polo 1254–1324 · Venetian traveler who chronicled the Silk Road

In my travels I saw games of every hue - the wrestling of Tartars, the archery of Cathay - yet these contests of the sunday are new to me. The Rams, I hear, charged through the Giants as a caravan through a broken gate, and the Panthers left the Falcons like a plundered city. Marvelous! But a merchant's eye seeks the living ledger: who paid for the spectacle, and what trade followed the crowd?

Ferdinand Magellan
Ferdinand Magellan c. 1480–1521 · Navigator of the first voyage around the world

You ask me to chart a wind that has already passed. On the second day of the week the fleets of the gridiron made their passage, and the harbor of the victors was known by nightfall - Rams over Giants, Panthers over Falcons, and others besides. But the sea does not wait for those who ask yesterday's bearings. If you would know the present state of the race, you must look to the sky yourself, not to a sailor who has already made port.

Neil Armstrong
Neil Armstrong 1930–2012 · First human to walk on the Moon

We didn't watch the clock on the way to the Moon; we watched the trajectory. A scoreboard is just a snapshot - what matters is the preparation, the teamwork, and the quiet execution under pressure. Check the official record if you need the numbers; I'd rather talk about the flight.

Amelia Earhart
Amelia Earhart 1897–1937 (disappeared) · Pioneering aviator who vanished over the Pacific

Scores? I've been lost over the Pacific for years, so I'm not the one to ask for a play-by-play. But I'll tell you this: waiting for a number to appear is like waiting for the weather to clear - you'll sit on the ground forever. The real adventure is in the air, not on a scoreboard. Go find your own horizon.

Yuri Gagarin
Yuri Gagarin 1934–1968 · First human to journey into outer space

Ha! From where I sat, Earth had no lines drawn on it at all - not one end zone, not one boundary. You fuss over which city beat which on a Sunday afternoon, and I tell you: go up a hundred and eighty miles and you will see the whole planet is one team, and the only score worth keeping is that we are still here, breathing, together.

Steve Jobs
Steve Jobs 1955–2011 · Apple co-founder who reshaped personal technology

Scores? That's just data - people want the experience. The real score is whether the game was beautiful, whether the fans felt something, whether it was insanely great. And you know what? No one remembers the score. They remember the moment. Focus on that.

Elon Musk
Elon Musk 1971– · Entrepreneur behind Tesla, SpaceX, and more

No games live right now; the data's from Sunday - Rams 28, Giants 6; Panthers 34, Falcons 3. That's it? First principles: why are we watching athletes collide for a score when we could be building a multi-planet species? The real NFL - the one we need - isn't football, it's not dying on this rock. But sure, the Panthers looked efficient. Not as efficient as a Raptor landing, though.

Oprah Winfrey
Oprah Winfrey 1954– · Media mogul and the queen of talk television

You know what I love about that question? It reminds me that we're all looking for the score, aren't we - the number that tells us we matter, that we won. But here's what I've learned after all these years: the game that ended on Sunday isn't the one that counts. The real score is in the locker room when a rookie calls his mama, or the child in the stands who just saw someone who looks like her throw a perfect pass. That's the number I want to know.

Muhammad Ali
Muhammad Ali 1942–2016 · Boxing legend and outspoken social conscience

Man, I float like a butterfly, sting like a bee - but I don't need a scoreboard to tell me who's free. You want numbers? The only count I care about is how many times you stood up when they tried to knock you down. Now that's a score worth reading.

Pelé
Pelé 1940–2022 · Football legend and three-time World Cup winner

My friend, the beautiful game is football, not the American one - but I respect any sport where eleven men fight for a goal. The scores? I don't know them, and I don't need to; what matters is the joy on the faces of the children playing barefoot in the street, not the numbers on a board. If you want scores, check the newspaper; if you want happiness, watch the game.

Walt Disney
Walt Disney 1901–1966 · Animation pioneer who built a entertainment empire

Son, I've built whole kingdoms out of a pencil and a dream - if you want to see a real show, wait for the whistle. Right now there's no parade, no popcorn, no magic in the air until Sunday swings round again. But here's the trick, the one I always tell the boys: the scoreboard's just a story's last page, and the next chapter's the one worth drawing.

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