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This year, the National Football League will expand the regular season from 16 games to 17. In return, the players and fans will be treated to one less preseason football game (just three instead of four) prior the start of the regular season.
As a young lad (decades ago in the 1970’s), a couple of friends and I drove to Dallas to take in an August preseason game between the Cowboys and the Pittsburgh Steelers. Those two teams were the faces of the NFL in the 1970’s and had become bitter rivals. The game was played what was (at the time) a relatively new Texas Stadium in Irving, Texas. The stadium was demolished ten years ago in favor of the new AT&T Stadium in nearby Arlington.
For those who don’t remember Texas Stadium, it featured a big hole in the roof to keep the rain off paying customers. Dallas Cowboys fans would brag (as they quite are prone to do) that the hole in the roof of Texas Stadium allowed God to watch his favorite team play football. Ugh.
This was also the time period when Dallas Cowboys fans started calling the franchise, “America’s Team”. The impeccably dressed Dallas head coach, Tom Landry, would wear his trademark fedora hat along the sidelines and consult with quarterback (and former Navy hero) Roger Staubach about in-game strategy.
As a Steelers fan, I wanted to see Pittsburgh shut down these arrogant Dallas Cowboys and quiet their uppity fans during this mid-August preseason encounter.
Visitors to Dallas-Fort Worth in the month of August should expect sizzling 100 degree temperatures, and that’s exactly what we encountered that day and late into the evening inside of Texas Stadium.
We drove three hours west on I-20 from Shreveport and parked my car at 5PM at a lot nearly a mile away from the stadium. One of my friends and I wore our black and gold Steelers t-shirts while “Mr. Cowboys” was proudly wearing a home team blue and white shirt of his own. We trudged over a few hills and then navigated a heavily traveled bridge crossing over a freeway before finally reaching Texas Stadium’s huge (and very hot) parking lot. That’s where the season ticket holders were allowed to park.
By the time we were able to find our seats (end zone – upper deck) for my first in-person NFL game, the three of us were pretty whipped by the excessive heat as we finally sat down. During the hour prior to kickoff, we were able to watch (with the help of binoculars) our heroes warming up on the field before the game. There was Shreveport’s own Terry Bradshaw! I spotted Franco Harris, Jack Lambert, “Mean” Joe Greene and the entire Pittsburgh Steel Curtain defense. “Mr. Cowboys” eagerly pointed out a few of his favorites such as Drew Pearson, Tony Dorsett, and 6’9” Ed “Too Tall” Jones, too.
In retrospect, it was a rather glorious evening to be able to say you saw so many future NFL Hall-of-Famers on the field at one time.
After downing a few overpriced stadium soft drinks, we sat in the shade of the Texas Stadium upper deck but continued to swelter along with 65,000 other paying customers. Texas Stadium did not have air-conditioning and, sadly, the rooftop cover also kept the heat inside of that facility for the entirety of the game.
As the first quarter opened, we were treated to watch the starters for both of these Super Bowl quality teams on the field. The crowd, like the players, was drenched in sweat, but the cheers for our favorite teams were quite impressive.
Then the second quarter started.
Sadly, there was no more Terry Bradshaw or Franco Harris or Lynn Swann playing on the field for Pittsburgh. For “Mr. Cowboys”, Roger-the-Dodger was also done for the night as was running back Tony Dorsett and other starters.
Though all three of us knew most of the back-up players for the Steelers and Cowboys, the lingering August heat helped bring on a feeling of “Why did we bother coming all the way over here for this?” by halftime of the game.
When you drive nearly 200 miles to watch a preseason football game, you stay through the entire game. That hot Saturday night in Dallas, we were among, perhaps, the final few hundred fans remaining in the stadium by the end of the game.
Live and learn. Preseason NFL football games are, for the most part, simply a chance to get your football “fix” and then realize that you fooled yourself into believing it might be a meaningful experience.
Since that night in the mid-1970’s in Dallas, I have not been back to a football stadium to watch another preseason NFL game. This weekend, NFL football fans flocked to stadiums to do just that once again.
For anyone who has endured an entire NFL preseason football game by sitting in the stands for the entire game, I salute you!
In 2021, NFL team owners sell season ticket holders a home football schedule which includes (a) nine regular season games and one preseason game or (b) eight home games and two preseason games. In Texas, the AFC Houston Texans will play just one preseason home game but get nine regular season home games, while the NFC Dallas Cowboys will have only eight home regular season contests but be forced to peddle two preseason games.
This weekend at NFL preseason games around the league, fans in attendance were “treated” to seeing such quarterbacks as Ben DiNucci (Cowboys), Bryce Perkins (Raiders), Tyler Hundley (Ravens), Kyle Lauletta (Browns) and Shane Buechele (Chiefs). This isn’t a knock on any of those players, but this isn’t exactly what you were hoping to see when you shelled out good money to attend an NFL preseason football game in person.
NFL preseason games are obviously intended to give the teams a chance to see how back-up players will perform if given a chance to play at some point in the future. The problem is that the tickets for the farcical preseason exhibitions are priced the same you pay for a regular season game.
In many NFL markets, the only way to see a home football game is to get (and hold onto, year after year) a season ticket for the home team. The cost is so high (most game tickets are $100 or higher) that some people buy season tickets in lieu of taking a vacation.
As long as the market is full of buyers, NFL teams can maximize their revenue by packaging these preseason stinkers at the same price as their regular season games. For the season ticket holders, they can try to re-sell these preseason home tickets on a secondary market in order to recapture some of the cost.
If you’re having trouble sleeping, I suggest that you turn on one of these NFL preseason games at home over the next week.
There is a great chance that you’ll be sound asleep by halftime!