The NFL Preseason Cannot be Trusted

The NFL preseason is under way and football fans are getting their first tastes of football in the new season. Many of those fans will be fantasy football team owners. To those owners, take this message to heart. Don't pay much attention to the preseason.

Coaches do not game plan for their opponents in preseason. They do not call plays that will give them the best chance to succeed or win. They do not play defenses to stop their opponents and/or win the games. No, the more common practice for coaches is to call certain plays to see how his players will respond. He may want to see how the quarterback will handle throwing the ball on short yardage downs or how the running back will handle blocking. He may want to see more of certain players and just call plays that place those players in the middle of the spot-light. Coaches may want to see how defenses will react if they are set up for a run stop and the opponents pass, so they will call for run defense on passing downs. A coach may just feel his team needs more work on the no huddle and go to that when its not the usual time.

Star players will only play for one or two series in a game, if at all. The coaches already know what they can do and do not want to get them hurt in meaningless action. The preseason is more for the coaches to evaluate the back-ups and rookies in real game action.

Preseason games are not played to full speed. It may seem like it at times when watching the games on television. We fans see the hard hits, the sacks and the break away runs. The players are playing hard. Yet, there is a difference from preseason to regular season games. Many rookie quarterbacks find that although they can handle the preseason action well, when the real season starts, players kick it up another notch. Game speed raises and they need to think a lot quicker.

Often, players will have great stats in the preseason, then when the real games start in September, they nearly disappear. Players who did nothing in they preseason will step up and play great in the regular season games.

No, the preseason games are just not to be trusted. At least not completely.

There are a few things you can use the preseason for. The most important is the health of players. Watch for injuries and watch for player coming back from injuries to see how they look. They can give you some idea if a rookie can handle the NFL action.

Most of all however, you can use the preseason to satisfy that long drought of football-less months we had struggled through. You get to sit down with some snacks and watch your favorite team once again. There is nothing like that first taste of football after going cold-turkey for seven months.