Backyard Basics

Title card

Backyard Basics, also known as NFL Backyard Basics: Football Tips from the Pros, is a one-off television special that teaches the basics of football. The special, which combines live action with animation, is hosted by Sunny Day and a live action kid, with appearances by several of the pros featured in Backyard Football 2002. It was produced in association with NFL Films.

The special aired on television at least twice. It originally aired on CBS on November 16, 2002, and was rerun on the now-defunct Nickelodeon Games & Sports channel. The special was also released on DVD, and can now be viewed on YouTube.

Backyard Kids that appeared in the Special

• Stephanie Morgan
• Pete Wheeler
• Pablo Sanchez
• Dmitri Petrovich
• Sunny Day
• Achmed Khan
• Reese Worthington
• Maria Luna
• Keisha Phillips
• Chuck Downfield
• Taylor (Sunny Day’s Co-Host)

Backyard Football 2002 advert

• Ricky Johnson
• Vicki Kawaguchi
• Tony Delvecchio
• Keisha Phillips
• Angela Delvecchio
• Lisa Crocket

Pros featured

• Donovan McNabb, Philadelphia Eagles
• Tony Gonzalez, Kansas City Chiefs
• Terrell Davis, Denver Broncos
• Marcellus Wiley, San Diego Chargers
• Martin Gramatica, Tampa Bay Buccaneers
• Bill Gramatica, Arizona Cardinals

Trivia

• Backyard Basics wasn't Humongous Entertainment's first attempt at adapting one of their properties for television. In the late 1990s, Humongous, Nelvana, and Lancit Media developed a show called Putt Putt 'n Pals; the deal fell through. Backyard Sports remains the only Humongous property to receive a cartoon adaptation.
• The Clubhouse is portrayed as having the ladder in another area, unlike how it's depicted in-game from the corner where Single Game and the Hall of Fame options are visible.
• The special explains how, in the games, the pros are kids in the present day: the Clubhouse magically transforms the pros back into kids.