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It’s fall, baby, and you know what that means. No, I don’t care that Halloween is around the corner, or that ciders are back in style, and I don’t buy into the garbage that is “sweater season.” The only good thing about fall is that it’s the best sports season of the year. The excruciatingly long baseball season is finally starting to mean something, hockey and basketball are starting up, and best of all, football is back. While the next three months are glorious for sports lovers, however, there are many parts of the year that are barren of all exciting sports. With a few simple changes to the various sports seasons, I think I’ve got the solution.
Football
Current season: September – January/February
Proposed season: September – March
I love football. Watching grown men dole out concussions like candy on Halloween will never get old. Unfortunately, the brutality of the sport is both a blessing and a curse. It makes it entertaining, but it also limits the amount of games players can handle without dying or losing the ability to walk.
While I wish I could extend the football season year-around, I know that’s not possible, so all I’m asking for is one more month. Football is the only thing that keeps me, and much of this nation, going during the brutal winter months. Taking it away from us so harshly right when the weather is at its worst is just cruel. If hockey players can tough it out for 82 games, football players should be able to sack up for an extra four.
Plus, with more and more indoor stadiums being built, soon the weather won’t even be a factor for games. Please, NFL and college teams, just give us until March when the snow starts to melt and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel again.
Basketball
Current season: October – June
Proposed season: December – August
Look, as cool as it is to have four major sports all playing at the same time each fall, it’s unnecessary. We’re not rationing our sports correctly. Currently, baseball owns summer, and as we all know, baseball is boring as shit. Let’s save our exciting sports for when we really need them. Let football own fall and let’s push basketball back a few months so we can have a reprieve from doing nothing but drinking all summer. Playoffs in August is the best way to finish out summer strong.
Hockey
Current season: October – June
Proposed season: November – July
Same reasons as basketball, with one minor change. I’m tired of the NHL and NBA having the exact same playoff schedule. I know their fan demographic doesn’t have too much overlap, but I’m one of them. If I have teams in both playoffs, I’m committing to drinking 3-4 nights a week for, like, a month. I can’t sustain that. It’s hurting my liver, my wallet, and my ability to not get fired. Let’s space these two seasons out. That way we can enjoy both to our heart’s content, and maybe even get some people watching both sports instead of picking one.
Baseball
Current season: April – October
Proposed season: May – September
I’ll say it: the baseball season is way too fucking long. 162 fucking games? I don’t even want to watch an exciting sport for that many games, let alone baseball. Baseball’s best trait is that it’s fun to go to the games, so let’s cut out any months that would make that not fun. No one’s trying to lose feeling in their hands during an October game or pay money to sit in a drizzle for four innings before an inevitable rain delay in April. Baseball is the slowest sport in the world, and I’m tired of watching games that I know don’t matter. Let’s cut this meandering season down, make each game mean something, and get baseball moving at a reasonable pace.
Soccer
Current season: I don’t know.
Proposed season: Never.
Guys, I’ve tried. I’ve tried to like soccer. I’ve tried to look past the dramatic flops, the messy upward counting game clock (with a random amount of extra time at the end), and the fact that goals are scored roughly as often as I go to the dentist. I’ve watched a variety of games, in a variety of leagues, and I even worked a summer at an MLS game.
It’s just not an exciting sport.
Even when rooting for team USA I could barely muster up the energy to care, and I once got stand-on-your-feet-and-cheer into an hour-long table tennis match during the Beijing Olympics. Sorry soccer lovers, I’m over your sport, and you bring nothing to the table. I say we get rid of it all together and maybe put our heads together to think up a new, cool sport in its place. Maybe something with horses. Polo, but full contact? I don’t know, but we’ll figure it out. .
Respond
Nick Arcadia
The opposite of a life coach. Email or DM me if you want some bad advice: nickarcadiapgp@gmail.com
@noampao
noamio
The NBA is the worst professional sport out there, and that is a fact. Why bother with an 82 game regular season when you can pick the teams that will be in the playoffs the summer before the season starts. You can probably pick the two teams in the finals too. Oh yea, and the game doesn’t matter until late in the 4th quarter.
In conclusion, 5% of the game matters, as well as 0% of the regular season.
BIG3. Join the revolution.
Couldn’t agree more. Pro-basketball is a complete joke. If we are doing calendar changes, it should last no more than a month. Even that might be too long.
I thought I was the only one who hates the NBA. I honestly don’t know anyone who watches. It’s pure crap.
Almost everyone I know who watches it is Eastern European, or not white.
Baseball is not the slowest sport in the world. That would be football. Average of 18 minutes of game action versus 11 minutes. Red zone or bust.
Those 11 minutes of football are more exciting than a whole week of early-season baseball though.
Yea those 1 yard rushes up the middle are so awesome.
Get these ridiculous numbers outta here. Think about what you’re saying.
I’m trying to post a link to the WSJ study but Grandex is letting me down.
Had to stop allowing people to post links because of all the “make $400 a day by working from home” stuff.
Goddamn Russian bots.
I was wondering about that. I tried to post a link from the US Census Bureau backing you up that Oklahoma is in fact in the south. It wouldn’t post though.
Your baseball bashing will not be forgotten. Now everything I read from you, no matter how good, I’m gonna be thinking “yeah but he shit on America’s pastime”
Uh, in case you haven’t noticed football is now America’s religion, replacing baseball and Christianity both.
Is it hockey season yet?
Terrible take Nick, ending baseball in September gives you that much longer until meaningful basketball and hockey games are played. Also it’s only like 3 weeks from the Super Bowl to meaningful college basketball. I’d do May-October for baseball.
Awarding the Stanley Cup in July for the only sport that can be played outside in winter is the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard (not that it’s ideal currently)
If that’s the dumbest idea you’ve ever heard, you need to get drunk more often. There are no outdoor rinks in the NHL and June is just as weird as July for hockey.
I mean, the NHL has several annual outdoor games at baseball and football stadiums. Not that late into the year, but still.
Isn’t it one outdoor game? The winter classic.. or am I missing something
No, it’s up to around half a dozen now.
Uh, have you heard they’re putting a team in Nevada, where exactly zero people play hockey? That is a dumd idea! It’s been proven again and again that warm weather teams are going to fail. I hate Bettman. That midget fool. Quebec deserves a team and would support it.
Uhhhhh dude the talent coming out of ‘warm weather’ areas is insane now. Hockey is growing and the sport is better for it.
Espn will still talk 99% percent about the nba even during the Stanley cup with the NBA finals over a month away with these changes. Fact
The memories from the Turner Field picture was a bit much.
GTFOH with the hockey, baseball, soccer, and NBA takes.
NBA is garbage.
Hockey is amazing.
Soccer can be exciting. If you don’t like it, don’t watch it.
Baseball is probably the purest sport created. Those late August, September, and October games are the most exciting times in sports. Just the instant trumpeting of the FOX baseball playoff music gives me goosebumps!
Hot Take: every sport that isn’t football or college basketball has a season that’s just too damned long. Shrink them down and make them exciting. Every college basketball and football game matters. Every single one. Not true for any other sport.
But play golf year round because how else am I going to take a Sunday afternoon nap?
Who’s following college basketball November – January? Unless there’s a game on a aircraft carrier or Kentucky is undefeated, most college basketball fans start caring during the conference tournaments
Guys whose alma maters are usually in the Top 25??
Also of note, people who went to school with a big basketball program and no real football program. I went to a Big East school, our football wasn’t D1 so yeah, every bball mattered.
I guess I’m one of those who follows College Basketball from November-January.
People who don’t watch college hoops until the conference tournaments aren’t college basketball fans. People who cheer for good teams watch every game.
Peoples’ alma maters who have been out of bowl contention since Columbus Day.