There can be no doubt the NFL is very much alive, well, and remains the gorilla in the sports room. No other league, at least in America, even comes close regarding popularity. Careful observers on TV have seen a lot of empty seats at NASCAR races in recent times, but not so in NFL stadiums. Even perennial losing teams still pack them in at exorbitant prices.
While it is true that NFL stock has taken a minor dip of late due to the whole uproar about players refusing to stand for the national anthem, to think it does not remain a blue chip is pure folly.
The TV people are more than happy to keep throwing billions at the league for the right to televise their games, their subsequent ad rates remain astronomical, and player salaries continue to rise into the stratosphere of the absurd.
There was a time when all but a couple NFL games were played on Sundays. Then along came Monday Night Football back in the early 70s.. Howard, Dandy Don, and the Giffer were huge hits with the viewing public, as were the games. The only change MNF has seen in the interim has been ratings going up -- not down.
The "couple" mentioned above were the two games on Thanksgiving day. Detroit and Dallas had a monopoly on that.
Sensing another cha-ching opportunity, the league recently began offering Thursday night games every week. Football junkies loved it. Still do.
It's like the public can't get enough of the product.
Yet these very Thursday games and, to a lesser extent, the Monday night contests put teams at a disadvantage. Ask any NFL player, or coach, and they will tell you it's mighty hard to recover from the typical beatings they take on a Sunday to be ready to play another game 4 days later. EVERY day is important when it comes to recuperating from the bumps and bruises incurred during the last contest.
But there's a flip side. Any two teams meeting for a Thursday night clash are at the same disadvantage, unless one has to travel cross-country to get there, but that's another story.
While such teams have to suck it up and get through a short week, they also enjoy a distinct advantage the following week. As in, they get ten days off, while most other teams only get seven. Those extra three days are light years in recovery and preparation time for their next opponents.
This is where the Detroit Lions, as if they haven't already merrily waltzed along the primrose path this season, enjoying every possible break from injuries to star players on their opponents, to a patsy overall schedule, have bumbled into yet ANOTHER advantage.
As has been their long tradition, the Lions played on Thanksgiving day, where they were unceremoniously drubbed at home by the Minnesota Vikings. So they got ten days off before their next game.
Enter the Baltimore Ravens, very much in the playoff hunt. They are currently playing on MNF against the Houston Texans. Both enter the game having had an extra day's rest since their last go-round.
But the Ravens, the Lions' next opponent, will go into that game on one fewer day's rest than normal, while the Lions have had three EXTRA days. Six versus ten. A HUGE disadvantage/advantage, depending on which team one wants to look at.
That would seem to beg the question --- How can it be the "geniuses" that make out the NFL schedules could come up with such an inequity involving these two teams? This is not even remotely close to anything considered "fair". Of all the countless options they had when making the schedule they came up with THIS?
No, we won't hear the Ravens complain about it, because to do so would be considered "whining". Nor will we hear a peep from the Lions acknowledging yet another major advantage/break that has just fallen into their laps.
But it has, and the Lions and their fans once again take it for granted, oblivious to the charmed life they have stumbled through so far this season. The Vikings freshly down to their third-string quarterback when they first met? The Packers newly without Aaron Rodgers? Games against the likes of Arizona (not good), NY Giants (flat-out terrible), a couple with the Bears trying to break in a rookie QB, along with Cleveland (puhleeze), the still Marvin Lewis led Cincinnati team (how does he keep his job?), Tampa Bay (taking on water like the Titanic), and finishing up with the Pack, who is already out of playoff contention (if they have any brains they'll sit Aaron Rodgers until next year and allow him to completely recover)?
That's ten games against teams that either weren't any good to begin with, or were without key players when the Lions faced them.
Hey, the Motown puddy-tats have played a grand total of five games against decent teams. Carolina, Atlanta, New Orleans, Pittsburgh, and Minnesota after that third-string QB mentioned above (Case Keenum) had a few games under his belt to get comfortable. They have lost them all, four of them at home.
And guess what? They better hope the Ravens prevail against the Texans tonight. Because if they lose, the above-mentioned six versus ten disadvantage aside, methinks the Poe-birds will be fired up enough to lay a serious dose of "nevermore" on the woeful one-trick pony (Matthew Stafford) Lions when they dare to go into Baltimore next week.
For all of their oblivious Pollyanne-ish ways so far this season, as they've merrily strolled along, there can also be little doubt the hammer of Thor will eventually drop on their sorry, self-overrated heads.
Why?
Because it's the Lions.
And that's just what they've always done -- or not.
It's just another year piled on top of the colossal scrap heap of the past half century's worth of futility and foolishness.
No biggy.
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