Aug 19, 2013
The NFL preseason period is always a rough time for anyone invested in the game – whether it’s the players themselves, the coaches or the fans at home. The preseason is mostly used as an experimental lab of sorts for the coaches to determine which players will make up the best roster, and who won’t make the cut.
While the positional battles rage on, sometimes the decision is made a lot easier by a timely, however unfortunate injury. A number of players have already gone down for the entire upcoming season – some of which were just added to the roster in the past offseason.
This all boils down to what makes the NFL so intense – the fact that it’s not a league which asks the question of “if” injuries will occur, but rather “when” and “how” intense they will be. This aspect of the game, among other things, is what separates football from other sports. There’s something to be said about a league where every team is expecting a far different roster at the end of the 17 weeks than the one which kicked off the season in September. NFL teams are always on the alert for adjusting their rosters and making decisions to replace the fallen players.
The obvious question that arises from this trend is whether the league needs to tone down the level of violence and tackling in order to curb the number of injuries every single year. Many believe that the rules which the NFL has already set into place are ruining the integrity of the game and the most recent big-name injury could be used as an example.
The Miami Dolphins’ newly acquired tight end Dustin Keller just suffered a nasty knee injury that will sideline him for the entire season. There are those who claim that the tackle on Keller was illegal. However, many others are purporting that due to the league’s heightened rules against hits to the head, the defender opted for a much lower tackle and, unfortunately, absolutely destroyed Keller’s knee.
Neither argument seems to be a clear cut “winner” as both point to an NFL that would lose plenty of fans, but whether we like it or not, such is the reality. This is a league of uncertainty. A league of “any given Sunday”, where anything can happen at any time and you gotta deal with it.
Is there’s one group who really can’t stand this uncertainty it’s the fantasy football fanatics, who sometimes idiotically (like myself, I might add) draft their fantasy leagues during the preseason and have to live with the consequences of such injuries. But, that’s really besides the point (aka a rant…).
So what’s to be done with the UFL – the Uncertain Football League? If there’s one thing we can learn from past years it’s that somehow it all works out. The injuries end up churning out some excellent storylines and the emergence of stars we would otherwise have never known. Sure the injuries suck and the uncertainty of the outcome of any given tackle can be harrowing, but if you’re looking for anything less, go watch baseball. The NFL is great because it keeps you on the edge of your seat every week, and frankly, that’s just how we like it. Even us frantic fantasy footballers.
