"Blocking and tackling, blocking and tackling," he said, using a football analogy for emphasizing the basics.

He said it was possible for the White House, slowly but steadily, to turn public opinion around, drawing a football analogy to describe how the president might reach that goal.

A football analogy, suggesting the need to have celebrities play a role in the no campaign and claiming not to understand what devo max means?

But in an interview Thursday, Mr. Nelson used a football analogy to suggest he was hedging.

Perhaps the football analogy is unfair.

It puts him in mind of a football analogy, to better explain how he feels about what might come next.

You use the old football analogy, where would you like to be playing, on your side of the 50 or theirs?

Senator George Allen, Republican of Virginia and a prodigious practitioner of the football analogy, is also fond of the phrase.

That football analogy means that a candidate must have the money for heavy media buys as well as regular organization troops to ring doorbells and plant lawn signs.

And he had long ago been taught a football analogy about his approach.