At last I've figured it out!
You're all talking about "ice hockey"!
And I thought I was going to learn something about hockey?
Sigh.

Susan's "We don't have high def, so it took a lot of peering at the screen to catch it" reminded me of the time I was in SC and trying to understand how gridiron 'worked' from only seeing it on the telly and without any guidance from locals. I gradually figured it out but there were three things I found confusing. Being used to real rugby (Union as well as League), where a try is scored only when the player actually controls the ball's contact with the dirt, I thought the term "touchdown" was a bit wimpish; I understood the rules but still though it a bit of a copout.

But the real confusion came when the kicker did the conversion. The usual camera position is midway behind the posts and you could see the ball fly through a beautiful arc until it reached the posts and then it woulf drop like a stone. I couldn't understand this; there wouldn't be a sheet of glass but I couldn't see a net. The locals I asked didn't have a clue what I was not understanding.

When I got back to Australia, there was a late night broadcast of US gridiron so I watched. Blow me down! Behind the posts I could see the ball hit a net, which made it drop. I then realised why I couldn't see it on American TV; NSTC (or whatever the US standard is called) uses 525 horizontal lines on a TV screen but the PAL system broadcast in Australia uses 625 horizontal lines on a TV screen. The limited resolution on American TV just couldn't display the net. The tennis ball also often disappears from the American TV I watched too.   Which, I suppose, is why Americans are so keen on HDTV.

But, rude jokes and plumbing terms aside, I still don't know what a tight end is.

Cheers, Rowan