September Ten
Today is not September 10, it’s September 5. It’s the first weekend in September, and I’m going to give you ten really good reasons why September is a very good month, the first week in September is a very good time of the year, and the month of September in general is a great month for sports.
1) It’s Labor Day Weekend.
Who doesn’t like Labor Day Weekend? It’s a day off work for most people and a lot of bosses actually relent and let the work crew off early on Friday for a 3 1/2 day weekend. It’s the last big, fun bash of summer for most people. It gives them the time to go camping, hiking, boating, etc. We like Labor Day.
What exactly is it we are supposed to be celebrating on Labor Day? I get the others. President’s Day. MLK Day. Celebrating great people of the past. Memorial Day. Veteran’s Day. Celebrating war heroes. July 4th. Celebrating the birth of the country. So, Labor Day. Are we celebrating organized labor? Is this all for the AFL-CIO? The Teamsters? Is it for cheap labor, the guys who are trying to get work outside of Home Depot? Are we celebrating them? Are we celebrating our heroic women who are IN labor? I don’t get this one. Glad to have the day off, though.
2) Baseball season has finally hit September.
That means a lot of things to teams in contention, because September is the stretch drive for all teams looking to either win a pennant of make the playoffs.
But the real reason it’s great is that, let’s face it, the baseball season is a lot like taking a really long walk. You start out with good intentions (Opening Day, the early part of the season), you tell yourself, hey, I’m walking, this is good for me, right? Then, the middle of the walk (middle of the season) gets there and you feel like it’s NEVER going to end. You’ve been walking for what seems like hours (or playing games night after night) and you’re not even half done. You are just walking because you know you’ve got to just keep going. Then September comes in the baseball season (and the home stretch of your walk) and you can see the end in sight. You see a conclusion to the journey out there, formerly off in the distance, but now in sight. Home. The finish line. After a long summer, baseball now is coming down that home stretch.
3) College football season has kicked off.
Actual college football games that actually count in the standings have already been played. This is great news for all of the millions of college football fans that live for this time of the year. A partial slate of games were played on
Thursday and Friday (the new weekly cycle of college football includes games on Thursdays, Fridays, and even sometimes on Sundays, all the more to gain more TV revenue), with another large batch of games ready to go today, on Saturday. Next week, pretty much everybody will kick off their first game of the season. College football season is back, baby.
4) Pro football pre-season games are finally over this weekend.
Let’s face it. The biggest scam being perpetrated in all sports is the NFL charging people full price to see four pre-season football games. You get all excited thinking it’s football season. The teams you love run out onto the field. And then, the starters play a grand total of about five plays and retire to the bench, done for the day. You get to pay full price to watch freaking backups play nearly an entire game. Your usual pre-season game you get to watch the 54th through 90th best players on a team that only uses 53 players.
It is like going to a Broadway play advertised as starring Al Pacino and instead, being forced to see Al Sharpton. Or Al Bundy. It’s a rip off of epic proportions. Thankfully for pro football fans, after this weekend, the worthless pre-season is now over and the regular season is set to begin on Thursday of next week. And people can finally get their
money’s worth when they pay to see a game.
5) Tennis is playing the final major event of the year.
The U.S. Open has begun its early matches, and all eyes are on Serena Williams as she attempts to win her 22nd singles major of her career, but more importantly, she would be going for an actual same year Grand Slam of winning all four women’s tennis majors in the same calendar year. A pretty rare type of accomplishment, it hasn’t been done since 1988 (Steffi Graf), and it would cement her legendary status as the greatest women’s tennis player in history.
Even more impressive, it would mean she would be winning the battle against time. In a sport where the younger, stronger players always seem to be coming up and replacing the older players, it is Serena Williams, who will be 34 later this month, that is the dominant player with the potential Grand Slam ahead of her, who keeps winning out over all of the younger players. It would be one of the most impressive accomplishments of this century. The story will play out in a couple of weeks.
6) Hockey season will soon be starting.
Most of the teams from the NHL will be starting their training camps within the next week. That’s all you need to know. It’s no longer just “working out in the off season.” Teams are getting ready for the regular season to begin in early October.
7) Pro basketball season will soon be starting.
Pro basketball starts its training camps at the end of September. An interesting basketball season awaits. People who get antsy when their sport is in its off season can now start amping up for another regular season that begins late October. Too often, basketball, football and hockey fans lose interest during the summer, but they start getting fired up when September finally comes.
8) Golf’s playoff is on.
One of professional golf’s best inventions is now taking place. The Fed Ex Playoffs. Most of the other sports had playoffs. Golf didn’t. They used to have every one of the big names pretty much disappear after the PGA Championship ended in the middle of August. Then they came up with the idea of a four tournament playoff that was similar to NASCAR’s “Chase For The Cup” whereby the players that qualified could compete for a huge cash prize for the winner.
Golf has its Fed Ex Cup where the WINNER of their “playoffs” gets paid Ten Million Bucks! That’s enough to make even the wealthy brand names to want to win it. The second of their four tournaments, the Deutsche Bank Classic is going on now with the field of 100 set to be reduced to 70 (after which they will be further reduced to 30 for the Tour Championship final event). All the big names are there in Boston this week.
9) Fantasy Football drafts are taking place.
This is also a great time of the year because most fantasy football drafts are being held about now, around the early part of September (just in time for the season that starts next week). All of the planning and strategizing that has taken place over the summer gets reduced to the reality of THIS is when you’ve got to make up your mind and draft the team you want to have compete for your championship. It is likely one of the football fan’s most important days of the year in terms of sports interest.
10) You have time off from The Rat Race.
You get a day off of work. You have a long weekend. You can watch all the sports you want and not have to worry about anything. THAT is reason enough to celebrate.
