Top 10 pre-season NFL telecast time killers

Ah, preseason football. It's the best time of the year, provided you are dying of a dread disease, and you are hoping to slow time to a crawl. So why not sit back, pop open a cold one and snooze your night away with these time-honored ways of getting through it?

10) Sad pre-game hype efforts. Do these teams have a history? No, of course not, otherwise they wouldn't be playing each other in the pre-season; there's a reason why division opponents don't get to usually go against each other. Instead, you get inter-conference games between total strangers, except for the odd free agent who used to wear the laundry, or the ex-coach who now plies his trade for the other side and aches for vengeance. Honestly, you've seen better plots in pro wrestling. On the indie circuit.

9) Over-dramatics about the first quarter. The starters are in! People are actually watching! It resembles football after six months of not football! So let's all lose our fudge over whether the starting defense plays well in its 25 plays, despite not really using any blitzes, or whether the offense can convert in the red zone while using a scheme that's so vanilla, you might lose your ability to dance on the 1 from watching it. Feel the importance!

8) Puling about injuries. Gosh, it's terrible that football players get hurt, isn't it? It's almost as if they are performing an inherently dangerous profession in which powerful men are constantly hitting each other, and many of them are doing so with particular desperation, because they don't want to go back to the loading dock. And if we talk about them long enough, maybe the league will actually stop committing fraud by playing these games in the first place. Whoops, that last part never gets out, because we must not bite the hand that feeds...

7) Sideline interviews with starters. Hey, why should you watch the game, when the teammates of the guys who are on the field don't? It's much better to stick a mic in the face of some prima donna wideout -- gosh, can you somehow get one of those guys to talk to you? -- and let them tell you about their new nickname and/or elaborate handshake rituals. Because we care so much about the players as human beings!

6) The all-important film! Yes, this fourth quarter is almost entirely composed of guys that will be lucky to be in the UFL next month. But every play is on tape, dammit! If Player X can't stick with this team, there are dozens of others of teams that might need someone to play almost exactly like their own guys to cut. And these tapes go on their Permanent Record, you see...

5) Sad fantasy football advice. Oh, nerds. Aren't you sad that the world knows about your game? Becuase now that means that out of touch ex-jocks in the booth, the kind who secretly think you are a first-class rube for caring so much about the league without getting a pay stub, feel compelled to say how some fourth-string back that lines up in four positions is your perfect sleeper. Just go back to talking about hustle, or Brett Favre, or what you ate, OK?

4) Coach wash. It's preseason for the announcers as well, which means that they need to set up a season filled with inside info and cliche quotes by saying what they want, about who they want. Just in case you weren't aware that you are listening to media with the integrity of Pravda...

3) Local yokels. If you hate network talent, there's nothing like seeing just how much worse it gets in the sticks. Especially when the blow-dried head from your local Action News affiliate has to show that he or she is right for the big time, because they are just so gosh-darned enthusiastic and LOVE FOOTBALL SO, SO MUCH. Go team go!

2) Alumni sadness. Ready to stare into the abyss of your own encroaching mortality? Then it's high time that you see Beloved Superstar From Your Youth as he shambles his way through what preseason games were like in his day, how much kra-zee money they make now, and how it's just a blast to hang out with all of the guys who are wondering who the old dude is. Where are my pills again?

1) The training camp battle that even the announcers can't pretend to care about. These usually come down to a back up punter or some fourth quarter kick returner, and after a number of other over-hyped life-and-death moves. There's a reason why you need to watch the fourth quarter, really.

Feel free, as always, to add yours in the comments...