Football never goes away. It's the games that have returned. The first game of the 2013 NFL (pre)season was the Hall of Fame game. The Dallas Cowboys and Miami Dolphins took the field in that game last Sunday. I was there so I know that it happened. I may have been paying more attention to Hall of Fame inductee Cris Carter prowling the sidelines but there was a football game. Cowboys won. The Hall of Fame game has always had a false start feel for me. I've always felt that the NFL's preseason schedule really starts the weekend that all the teams take the field. It's a fairly stupid feeling as all these games are exhibition games. None of them really count. The Hall of Fame game kicked off the new football season on paper. Yesterday's slate of games kicked off the new football season in my little mind.
Six games last night. Including the pairing that many think could be repeated in the Super Bowl. San Francisco 49ers-Denver Broncos. Eight more games tonight. Including the Houston Texans-Minnesota Vikings. That should be a fantastic preseason game. The last two games of the opening weekend of the preseason are tomorrow. Even if is only the preseason, NFL games are back. It's a great thing.
The significance and future of preseason games are often debated. It's become quite obvious that Roger Goodell wants to link these games with his ridiculous dream of expanding the regular season. He sees dropping two preseason games as a fair trade for adding two regular season games. It's a foolish view. Sixteen games that count is enough. I also think that four games that don't count is the right number. I enjoy watching them but I'm likely in the minority. The majority want to see a real football game and that's not going to happen. Preseason games are a coaching tool. They always have been. They are simply meant to be a more intense practice. More intense because your team is finally hitting a team in a different uniform. Coaches need to see many of their players in an environment like that. That is even more true now with the lightened practice rules found in the new CBA. I doubt that there is a coach in the NFL that thinks anything less than four preseason games is enough. Fans just need to try and accept these meaningless games as the more intense practices that they are. Appetizers? Now, I don't think that the owners should charge regular season prices for preseason games. That's just wrong.
The best thing about preseason games is that regular games are near.
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