But in the season opener, everyone is undefeated, everyone is a potential champion, and every story line is an empty page ready to be written upon. The Broncos also went 7-10 and are counting on said franchise quarterback to turn around their fortunes, but that’s no guarantee.īy midseason, one or both of those teams may have had their hopes and dreams already dashed, reducing the allure of this game exponentially. The Seahawks, after all, were 7-10 last year and sent their franchise quarterback to Denver. Perhaps of greater import from the league’s point of view is the mitigation of risk that one or both teams could, well, suck this year. Better to raise the odds of a healthy Wilson by playing in Week 1. But those all occurred last year as the result of a finger injury. Yes, Wilson has been an iron man, missing just three games in his 10-year career. The first is that the more weeks that go by, the greater the possibility that Wilson might be injured and miss the game, thus negating the primary lure. made his first return to Seattle while a member of the Cincinnati Reds (and received a rapturous reception).īut by putting Seahawks-Broncos out there from the jump, the league avoids two potential pitfalls. The most recent local example of this phenomenon occurred in 2007, when Ken Griffey Jr. After all, everyone loves the storyline of “franchise icon who left town returns for the first time.” That was proved last year when Tom Brady went back to New England to face Bill Belichick and the Patriots, amid intense, over-the-top scrutiny. It was an astute move by the league to get the game out of the way early, beyond just being a compelling matchup that will draw millions of eyes to the broadcast. Of course, we now have precisely four months before the season to stoke the hype, during which time every angle of Wilson’s departure and potential reception will be explored, ad nauseam. Rather than having the intrigue of Wilson’s pending return linger for potentially weeks or even months, it will be resolved immediately. It is a satisfying tableau for a season of transition in Seattle. It is the Seahawks’ first prime-time opener since they played the Packers in 2014 and just the second in team history. By then, it was fairly common knowledge that the Seahawks and Broncos will square off at Lumen Field on Monday Night Football in Week 1, Sept. There were enough leaks throughout the day to make the official announcement at 3 p.m. Apparently, there’s another angle to that game that warrants attention - Russell Wilson making his long-anticipated return to Seattle (if you consider two months since his trade to Denver qualifies as a long time). Pardon me - I’m being told that Lock might not even be the starting quarterback for the Seahawks in 2022. The hype and mystique over that reunion is already off the charts. The date of the Broncos-Seahawks game was probably the marquee reveal leaguewide Thursday, because everyone around the NFL wanted to know when Drew Lock would face his old team. 1 American sport with a bullet, here is an essential illustration of their genius in meting out its news in such a fashion as to sustain interest in virtually every month of the year. On a day in which the NBA and NHL featured crucial playoff games, and the MLB had nearly a full slate of action, the focus of most of the sports world was on learning the order of already-determined games. In other words, we had known for weeks the “who” and the “where,” yet they created a daylong Event, capital E, out of the “when.” Somehow, they have managed to take a slate of 17 games for which the opponent and even the site was already known, and fostered a feverish anticipation for its revelation of the date. The feat of promotional sleight of hand performed by the NFL regarding its scheduling rollout Thursday once again leaves me in awe.
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