For sports fans, the weekend is a cornucopia of wonderful games to watch. This is particularly true in the fall with its traditional pattern of College Football on Saturday and NFL Football on Sunday and Monday. As the parent, child, girlfriend, boyfriend, partner, husband, wife, roommate, or best friend of a sports fan, this can be a challenge. It must be true that some games are more important to watch than others but it’s hard to know which is which. As a sports fan, the power of habit and hundreds of thousands of marketing dollars get in the way of remembering to take a break from sports and do something with your parent, child, girlfriend, boyfriend, partner, husband, wife, roommate, or best friend. To aid all of us in this, and just because it’s fun, I’m going to write a weekly post highlighting a single game that is ideal for skipping. Use this to help tell yourself or someone else: “Do not watch this game!”
Sunday, 1 p.m. ET, NFL Football, All the Games but mostly San Diego Chargers at Miami Dolphins and Arizona Cardinals at Dallas Cowboys. They’re on CBS and Fox but do not watch these games!
Most weeks I make an argument that a specific game on the NFL calendar is a clear cut choice for skipping if you’re going to skip a game. I try to make the game I choose one of the prime-time games so that you have a chance to skip an entire time-slot as opposed to skipping one game just to watch another. If I dip into the 1:00 or 4:30 Sunday time-slots, I do it with a game that most of the country is going to get. This weekend is a little different. This weekend, there’s a game on the calendar that’s so good, I’m suggesting that the ideal way to watch football this weekend is to skip the entire 1:00 Sunday afternoon slate. That’s seven games to skip but the majority of the country will only be getting two, the San Diego Chargers at the Miami Dolphins and the Arizona Cardinals at the Dallas Cowboys. The reason to skip these games is to rest up, relax your mind, and prime yourself for the game the entire country, excluding Arizona, the Pacific Northwest, and Northern California will get at 4:25, the titanic matchup between the New England Patriots and the Denver Broncos; Tom Brady and Bill Bellichick on one side, Peyton Manning and Peyton Manning on the other.
It’s a tough suggestion to make. Both the 1:00 games look to be good ones. The Chargers and Dolphins find themselves in similar positions at this point in the season. They both have winning records but are looking up, way up, in the standings at the Broncos and Patriots respectively. They’re good teams but they’re likely to be fighting to make the playoffs this year as wildcard teams, not division winners, which means they’re actually direct rivals for a playoff spot. Head-to-head results are one of the top tie-breaking factors, so this game could become very important by the end of the year. The Cardinals and Cowboys are also similarly situated. They’re both at the top of their divisions but are looking over their shoulders at high-powered teams in their division. The Eagles are lurking right behind the Cowboys and the 49ers and Seahawks are chomping on the Cardinals’ tail. Neither is secure in their positions.
All that said, if you want to experience the 16th matchup between Tom Brady and Peyton Manning in all its nostalgic glory and its very current drama, you might want to come into that game fresh and ready to focus. If that means blowing off a couple of good but not great games before-hand, that might just be the thing to do. Take a longer brunch than you might otherwise do. Mow the lawn. Get to the bar early to claim a stool for the 4:25 game. Stay home and cook a New England Dinner AND some green chili enchiladas so you don’t run out of victuals during what might be, not a good, but a great game!
Alternate: If you or the sports fan in your life is a fan of one of the teams that plays at one, then this isn’t a good plan. Instead, skip the ESPN Monday Night game between the Indianapolis Colts and the New York Giants because Andrew Luck going against Eli Manning is going to feel like the under-card of the Manning-Brady fight.