Preseason Wins Mean Nothing
At least in terms of how good your team is. Preseason is like whose line is it anyway. The points don’t matter.
That’s why it’s really funny when people unironically brag about preseason wins. Preseason is really only worth watching to see the players on the bubble. Starters aren’t playing half the time. Coaches are using stripped-down versions of the playbook so they don’t tip their hands too much and give film for the season. These games are not being operated the way a normal week in the NFL will operate. A late-game comeback in preseason doesn’t even mean that the 4th stringers are better than the other 4th stringers, because everything is mixing and matching and just giving dudes a chance to prove themselves.
There is simply no better way to illustrate the point than the 2008 Detroit Lions. They went 4-0 in the preseason. They became the first team to go winless. That record meant nothing. Those 4th stringers having success meant nothing. It meant nothing for the trajectory of the team. It meant nothing. The Lions operate as a sort of “don’t make me tap the sign” meme for anyone who brags or thinks the final score of a preseason game matters.
Be sure to show this comic to any Ravens fan who brings up the 24-game preseason win streak since 2015. Win the games that mean something, Baltimore.
Also, this is about unironic bragging. If your team beats a friend’s team, you rub that shit in because hell yeah
Sorry Dave, the more people insist preseason wins don’t matter and that ravens fans should shut up about the streak, the more annoying we will be. We know preseason games don’t matterand mean nothing. We don’t care. We love this dumb counting stat and nobody can take it from us.
No, the loss of the streak does not faze me, I will still be annoying about the dynasty come and gone because it makes people who insist that they don’t care about the preseason mad and I think that is funny
The Browns were 4-0 in the preseason in 2017 too.
It’s not just the 2008 Lions, the 2017 Browns also went 4-0 in the preseason lmao
And I’m all but sure the Patriots went 0-4 in one of their Superb Owl seasons.
Like most things around this time of year, the only thing that kind of matters is how your team performs in joint practices, if they participate in those. And even then, you should only take notice if the reports coming from those camps are overwhelmingly negative, not positive, since this is the time of year where reporters are typically going to be stupidly optimistic to a fault no matter the team. I only say this because I remember the coping from Pats fans last year who ignored all of the glaringly obvious signs that the offense was going to be atrocious under Big Matty P only to be dumbfounded when the offense was atrocious.
All that said, I am in awe of Baltimore’s 8 year win streak. There’s so much variance in preseason given the lack of talent on the field most games that it’s kind of baffling that they haven’t lost in so long. I’m almost willing to make them an exception, honestly.
I don’t really like to be *that* guy, but the Bucs were the first team to go winless in a season, not the Lions. Everything you’re saying about the preseason is true though, I have to resist the temptation to get my hopes up from a preseason victory.
Technically, there were 8 winless seasons before the Bucs did it… but to be fair two were in the 20s, 4 were during World War II (including an 0-11 Lions squad), one of the teams folded before completing their schedule, and the other team did tie one game (the 1960 Cowboys). The Lions season was pretty remarkable as it occurred in the free agency and modern salary cap era and because they weren’t an expansion team like the Bucs or Cowboys.
I have tickets to a preseason game tomorrow… worth using?
the bucs went through a 14 game season
I’ve always said, the only thing that matters in the Preseason is the injuries. Nothing rips through depth quite like the first few weeks of contact football, and it’s really tough to see. Also, all these little bits here and there about “X player totally pancakes Y player!!” or “Z player goes up and mosses T player for a TD” in practice are just dumb. So often in practice we don’t know what people are trying to work on. Maybe one rep, the goal is to not get beat on the inside, but the opponent is trying to go outside. Maybe one rep, they’re trying to drill a particular technique, and the other guy is trying something that is completely counter to that. Maybe during a 2-minute drill, the defense is trying out different coverage looks, but the offense is trying to actually score no matter what. NOTHING MATTERS, other than general trends within your own organization. I also feel like generally even joint practices don’t really matter for measuring teams against one another. We have no idea what the training objectives are, because I highly doubt it’s just “beat the other guy” every single time. Offensive and Defensive schemes are too complicated for that.
I love the preseason because it’s completely stakes-free football fun. The scores don’t matter, the plays don’t matter, but you can find fun storylines to follow. The UDFA who’s shocking the word and pushing for a starting spot. The young players looking on the cusp of a breakout. The exciting, toolsy, athletic guys who are starting to put things together. The last-chance journeyman who can’t seem to stave off the younger guys. Football is about stories at the end of the day, and the preseason is the perfect time to follow along.
You’ve said it all very well. My absolute favorite example of how meaningless it all is was last year, when Daniel Jones looked absolutely awful all through training camp and the preseason. And it turns out Daboll scripted everything to ensure Jones would look awful, and that the other qbs would look good, just to see how mentally resilient he was. I feel bad for Jones, on the one hand, but on the other hand, it’s just such a brilliant dick move, I can’t help but laugh at it.
I agree with you on joint practices to an extent. The reason I highlighted them is because they can be an indication if things are very bad. If every report coming from camp is that the team looks awful, it could be something to take note of. Obviously you don’t know what the objectives of camp are, but say, if the offense is screwing up on basic things like lining up correctly or pre-snap penalties, that’s not a good sign.
The one thing that the Preseason does show you is how good your team’s depth is.
If your 2nd and 3rd stringers look terrible, then your team in the regular season is an injury away from disaster.
Fun fact: I once used a preseason game to trick/CONVINCE my son to not be a Patriots fan (I’m a Steelers fan). He was still super young and trying to decide which team he liked, and his grandfather was a Pats fan. Knowing this and being the amazing father that I am, made him watch a preseason game against the Giants where they lost and it was super low scoring (2015 I think) to make him think they were awful.
Well, task failed successfully…he ended up becoming a Cardinals fan since we’re in AZ.
The thing that amazes me more than anything else, is that not only can you BET ON PRESEASON GAMES, which is stupid enough, but apparently there is a non-tiny amount of idiotic gamblers out there that actually do it.
Seriously, how addicted to gambling must you be to bet on something that’s even worse than an All-Star game or exhibition game?
And they’re very unpredictable too.
What else do they discuss in this course?
You know who cares the least about the Ravens preseason win streak? Ravens fans. 😀
I need a “don’t be a dipshit” shirt.
Scared that guy so hard his hat changed colors
Also colts went 0-4 in the preseason and then won the Super Bowl in 2006-2007 season
But to be fair Peyton manning’s first preseason pass was a TD to Marvin Harrison.