We Are, In Fact, Ready For Some Football

It's the time of year where Patrick and Rob have to tell themselves "Okay, maybe every subscriber podcast shouldn't be a two-hour chat about the left tackle situation for the Chicago Bears." But what if it was?

(Patrick actually has a secret podcast idea that's Sports!-adjacent for this year, where he would spend 15-20 minutes talking to a different person in the video game industry who is a different fan of a different NFL team, with the hope of covering most of the league by season's end.)

Ahead of whether or not the Bears are good, Patrick and Rob are happy to settle into the familiar rhythms of the season. Plus, did you know that F1 Rob has been F1 Rob since the 90s? So much lore to unpack...

Patrick: Okay, shit has officially gotten real, Rob. Just prior to opening up this document, I placed a bet that Caleb Williams will throw more than 4,000 yards by the end of the season. (A ton of anti-Patriots bets paid out for me during the Super Bowl.) The fun part is this bet plays out through nearly every possible scenario of how the Chicago Bears could play out this season. If the Bears offense is on fire, Caleb’s throwing a lot. If the defense is a trash heap, Caleb’s throwing a lot. They can offer Caleb a contract extension next off year? Caleb’s throwing a lot.

We’ll have plenty of time to talk about the actual sports part of things soon enough, but truth be told, what I’m excited about the most with football coming back is the ritual of watching football. 

We’ve been on the same block for years and now have the rhythms down to a science. 

Packing up beers into a cooler to take down to my neighbor’s house getting the kids fitted in their Bears gear, loading up the camping chairs, and settling in for an entire afternoon of football. Soon enough, waiting for my kids to ask “did they score yet?” when, clearly, they did not. My six-year-old daughter coming up and asking “Am I allowed to say ‘Fuck the Packers’?” in my ear. Trying to ignore the mass pile of text messages from my friends and family wondering if Caleb is really the guy after yet another drive stalls on its way to the endzone. I miss that shit!!

That pattern—packing up, heading down the street—holds until the temperatures start to drop. Then, we usually swap houses to provide a little variety for the kids while they play. There’s also a pretty good deal at Dave & Busters where the kids can eat lunch and get two hours of unlimited play. One day, may we be lucky enough to have a nearby Cosm for a Bears game.

Soon enough, there will be a Thursday Night Football game whose gross level of athletic play will prove grating. I will reject drinking a beer until the Bears score a touchdown, only to suddenly realize it’s the second half and all they’ve done is kick field goals. The fun hype videos made by fans will break way to the reality of actually playing the crushing sport of football. And a few weeks into the season, I will realize that I don’t actually want to eat wings on every Sunday.

That time is not now. The bet is placed. Hope springs eternal. The rituals are beginning. 

This feeling won’t last, but are you doing any prepping? Any ritual setting? And since we already talk about the way we experience and watch football, is there a different sport you do this for?

Rob: I think the most important ritual around football MK and I have is Thursday night. I've written before about how much I love the Amazon broadcast, from the pregame to the behind-the-QB camera angle on the Prime Vision broadcast. Emotionally, Thursday night is now the start of our weekend even if we both have work. If we are cooking anything, it's going to be easy and fun. Odds are good something trashy is being picked up or delivered. Wings. Pizza. Pizza and wings? The possibilities are endless. And then for three and a half hours we just let massively overfunded Amazon production wash over us while we feast, cuddle the dogs on the couch, and basically just unplug from everything else.

Growing up, my family would serve lunch with the Bear game, which was convenient because the Bears always played at noon unless they were scheduled for ritual humiliation on Monday Night Football. My dad would give himself a break from cooking and it was time for a veritable smorgasboard of the finest delights the Ultra Foods and Jewel-Osco frozen foods sections could offer. Taquitos? Pigs in a blanket? Pizza rolls? Chips and dip? We had it all and it didn't matter that the food wasn't really that good because the Bears would do something to make it turn to ash in your mouth anyway. Like just talking about that mix of frozen foods summons an image of the Vikings just torching a hapless Bears defense. I can't taste a taquito without half-expecting to see Randy Moss or Cris Carter separate from a Bears corner by two, three, four yards and knowing the Bears were about to go down by another seven.

The only other big ritual is we usually have breakfast or a late brunch with F1 races. That's something I've carried from my childhood, when Dad would come back from an early grocery run with pastries and donuts and we'd watch the race first thing.

What I don't have? Rituals for good Bears teams. They play at different times! What am I supposed to do at 4:30 PM? Or 8:20? It's too early or too late to be feasting and drinking. It's harder out here because we're surrounded by Pats fans and so even if we went to friends' houses to make a day of it watching football, it would be like spending all of Sunday attending Protestant services. I need something to spice up this new "Game of the Week" primetime Bears reality we're living in! 

Patrick: Wait, hold on. I figured the whole F1 thing was a product of your own curiosities that became full-blown interests and, of course, a source of profit and content. Perhaps I’m being a little presumptuous and ignorant, but what was a midwest dad doing watching F1 in the 90s?

Sorry, back to pizza and wings. 

Also, dude, your question about the evening is even more important this season. Not only do we have to enter the potential humiliation ritual of playing in the evening a whopping five times this season, but there’s a stretch in the middle of the season—October 22, November 2, November 8—where they play at night three fucking times in a row. Thursday Night Football. Monday Night Football. Sunday Night Football. We’re dealing with a real cursed monkey back situation here.