Author Archives: Nate Raby

I hate the offseason.

I think we’ve covered that thoroughly over the last couple of years, but I feel the need to say it again. Loudly.

I hate the offseason.

The offseason does crazy things to us as fans and football consumers. It makes us latch onto something, anything that sounds remotely like football news. The free agency period is exciting for the first few days, but then as the big names stop trickling in we lose interest. The draft is interesting – or it would be if the NFL wasn’t going to draft 252 linemen this year.

So we’re left with this weird in-between where our newsfeed is filled with absolutely nothing noteworthy.

Worldwide Leader in Overemphasizing Everything

Who cares about Stevie Johnson’s tweet? Who cares about Stephen Tulloch’s bold prediction that the Lions “will be back” next year? Who cares about the Lions or Bills at all? The Clay Matthews extension is news, but nothing I can make fun of (or Ben will hurt me). Most of these stories just look like a reporter went, “Oh, hey, that’s an NFL player! I’m gonna ask him a random question and write 500 words about his answer, even if it’s boring or inconsequential!”

I love football. I love writing about football. I love taking interesting things that catch my eye and putting a spin on them to make them funny. I love pretending to write as DeSean Jackson pouting like a four year-old.

But I hate the mainstream media fluff, and I hate having to turn nothing into something.

The blog has slacked off since our awesome tournament (GO 99 RAMS!), and that’s because I haven’t found a story that’s worth commenting on.  Look back up at that list of headlines again. Do we really need to make a comment about Cruz not showing up yet? It’s April. I’ll be concerned if he’s not there in August. Am I really supposed to get excited about Vick and Brent Celek saying, “Gee, our offense is going to be pretty good!”

And don’t get me started on Tebow. The fact that he’s still making headlines speaks for itself.

This started out as an excuse for why I haven’t written anything in over a week, but it has somehow become a testament to offseason football. And it’s not a soothing and reassuring testament, like the New Testament. It’s a scary, vengeful one like the Old Testament.

Bill Belichick is a vengeful god.

I’m sure things will pick up. The schedules are released tonight, and I’m sure that will be exciting. Maybe after the draft someone will say something offensive about Geno Smith, and that will be fun to dissect. But for now, I feel like I’m just waiting for excitement. And for that I apologize in advance. Because that’s how articles about Michael Sims-Walker get written.

Fucking offseason.