I’m in an office NFL survival pool, so (because I take such things far too seriously) I mapped out my picks through Week 15, and in the course of doing so came across some particularly bad news for the Seattle Seahawks that, were I a Seahawks fan, would make me very put out.
This year, the Seahawks have FIVE 10am PT games. That is, they travel eastward and play at 1pm ET. In comparison, the San Francisco 49ers, their primary rival in the NFC West, will play TWO such games this year. For what it’s worth, the Oakland Raiders play four such games, and the San Diego Chargers play six(!), including two instances of back-to-back early games.
I couldn’t find anything about it, but I suspect the Seahawks will stay somewhere in the Central time zone between Week 4 and Week 5, since they play back-to-back 10am PT games in Houston and Indianapolis. That would mirror what the 49ers have done in recent years, staying in Youngstown, OH, between games in unfavorable time zones.
The entire problem stems from a stupid NFL rule: teams are required to arrive in the host team’s city on the day before a game. I’m not sure what the rule accomplishes, other than institutionalizing a home-city advantage. It’s not designed to keep team personnel in their home cities, because otherwise the 49ers couldn’t go to Youngstown.
Why not liberalize the rule and allow teams to arrange for themselves where they’re going to practice in the week before a game? If, after their Week 3 home game against the Jacksonville Jaguars the Seahawks want to fly out that night to practice at the University of Houston facility, or Rice’s fields, or at any of the FCS schools or junior colleges or high schools, what’s the problem with that?
There are plenty of reasons not to operate that way, I’m sure, but let the team decide that.
(Image cc-licensed: "12th Man Mural… GO SEAHAWKS!" by Joe Kunzler)