If you"re trying to find a quick to the question, "how many game balls space used during the supervisor Bowl?" the NFL has a quick answer: 54, according to a 2015 update to the main rules. Yet have you ever before wondered around the ins and also outs of the footballs provided for the large game or the NFL games more generally? for instance, world refer to footballs as pigskins, yet as Time points out, they"re actually created from cowhide. Is the organization feeding you a bunch of bull by passing their balls off together bacon-adjacent? Let"s handle the meat of the football together.

You are watching: How many footballs are used in a game


*
Bob Levey/Getty Images
Footballs offered to it is in a pork product. As Time describes, ago in the 1850s, the precursor to current-day football involved playing v a leather-encased pig bladder that world inflated by mouth. The idea of pressing your lips against a pig"s pee sack sound vaguely revolting and raises the uncomfortable inquiry of the "other white meat" has actually a yellow flavor.


That alone seems choose a factor to move to cowhide. After all, if you"re walk to death an animal and also turn component of the carcass into a plaything, girlfriend don"t want to need to wonder whether it tastes favor a toilet. However people had actually a various beef v these balls. The pig bladders leaked and tore as well easily and also would then have to be packed through straw or a similar filing. Lock were later on replaced with much less incontinent rubber bladders. Obviously, these beefy balls can take more of a beating since you don"t see plenty of time outs because that stuffing them through straw. However even if a beefy NFL player happened to bust a ball or deflate one, each football team has lot of of balls to play with.


*
Timothy A. Clary/Getty Images
Since 1941, all of the NFL"s balls have been supplied by Wilson Sporting Goods, per Sports Illustrated. Every year, the company manufactures 700,000 footballs, and also according to the NFL, Wilson furnishes each team with roughly 780 game balls, amounting to around 24,960 balls for whole season. During the regular season every team bring 12 major balls and also 12 back-up balls, for a complete of 24 every team and 48 each game. The number jumps to 54 for the at sight Bowl.

See more: What Is The Derivative Of Sin(X/2), What Is The Derivative Of Sin^2(X)


Prior to every contest, designated officials examine the balls come ensure they fall within the accepted PSI variety (12.5 to 13.5 pounds per square inch) and also don"t have any type of other disqualifying characteristics. The NFL estimates that 7 to 10 balls are frequently discarded prior to the supervisor Bowl. Hopefully, this Wilson balls have actually faces attracted on them prior to officially being cast away.