Worst week ever

APRoger Goodell

Last February, some bright soul in the NFL marketing department decided that the best way to market the annual scouting combine was with a series of ads proclaiming “2009 starts now.” As a ploy to get people to tune in to six hours of wind sprints, the campaign was almost too exciting, like a kid downing his Adderall with a Mountain Dew. Pro football may be the closest thing there is in this country to a year-round sport, but even the NFL media juggernaut struggles to find seven months worth of intrigue in an offseason that basically boiled down to Rex Ryan’s dyslexia, questionable long-term contracts from Al Davis and Roger Goodell going up a hill and coming down a mountain (accompanied both ways by Jim Mora, for reasons that were never completely clear).

If the combine kicked off the 2009 season, I guess the third week in July is supposed to be the brief stoppage in the second quarter when stadium security tackles a drunk wandering onto the field. There’s nothing going on this week, and nobody around to cover it if it does. The result has been like a not-unappealing episode of “The Twilight Zone,” a world where every event is properly categorized in the public consciousness. When Tony Romo broke up with Jessica Simpson, all the national columnists who would’ve written columns invoking Joe D. and Marilyn were on vacation, so it was up to us as individuals to come to the rather mature conclusion that — all things being equal — it’s not worth concerning ourselves with the romantic tribulations of Romo and the biggest reality TV star of 2002.

Allen Iverson

Such moments have been few and far between. I blame baseball, which isn’t unusual. Ideally, the All-Star break should last about six hours. I don’t see why not — all it would take is scrapping two rest days and the Home Run Derby. That’s a small price to pay to get our sports back. (Note: This last point does not apply to the adorable Brewers fans who are over the moon about Prince Fielder winning the Derby, like it’s an actual accomplishment.)

Let us be clear: This is the worst sports week of the year. Nothing else comes close. Super Bowl bye week and the start of April (just after the NCAA tournament but before MLB teams stop getting random off days) are depressing, to be sure, but there is always something to watch.

This week all you can do is live vicariously through Allen Iverson, which just means your hip ends up hurting. Later in the week, if you stay up late enough, you can catch the first few holes of the British Open and get a laugh or two by pretending you can see through time. At which point you will likely fall asleep, safe in the knowledge that we’re one day closer to everything getting back to normal.

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