After a long, difficult drought, less than two hours after this post is published the 2014 NFL season will finally be underway. And you know what that means. Ed and I will be back with our weekly open threads filled with prescient predictions and Ed’s charmingly optimistic hopes for the Steelers, balanced out by my well reasoned explanations of why the New York Jets will win the Superbowl this year. (You are, of course, invited to venture your own misguided opinions of why your teams will pull off a miracle and stop us.)

I think this has been a particularly tedious and endless seeming off season, primarily because the World Cup swallowed up so much of the sports news and frequently had my Twitter timeline filled with a flood of people who wanted to briefly pretend that Americans were suddenly interested in soccer. Thankfully that temporary insanity has passed and we can return to normal American affairs. And we can remind everyone else that soccer is not football. What we shall see tonight is football. Soccer is an excellent after school, aerobic activity to keep your kids in good physical shape.

Tonight, the Hall of Fame game will be broadcast on NBC with the festivities kicking off at 8 PM eastern time. The Buffalo Bills face the New York Giants and it will take place at Fawcett Stadium in Canton, Ohio. Even though their own coaches don’t seem very interested in the final score, fans of the two teams should still be interested in seeing how the veterans have fared in the off season and how well the rookies are coming together. Both coaches are anticipating only having their starting lineups in for a drive or two, and then giving the rest of the hopefuls a chance to prove their worth against somebody besides the practice squad, under the bright lights and in front of a live crowd.

Since no Hot Air NFL thread would be complete without it (and given that both teams are from my home state), I’ll provide you with a bit of prognostication. I can’t afford to have the Bills do well in the regular season, since they’re in the same division as the Jets, so tonight I’ll toss them a bone. Sammy Watkins will run up a bunch of yards in his debut, helping to lead Buffalo to an otherwise error filled victory, 24 – 13. Enjoy it while you can, Bills.