Ten ways to tell it's almost football season

I refuse to let the NFL sneak up on me again.

I stopped paying attention to football a few years ago. Every season since then, I’ve been surprised anew by how early the NFL starts up.

Football is the fall sport, of course. Hockey is winter, basketball is spring, baseball is summer — we all know this!¹ But even though it still feels like the dead of summer to me, football is suddenly on TV in every bar and restaurant. What’s more, while nearly every other mode of traditional entertainment is in slow-motion collapse, the NFL’s popularity continues to grow, so the season only figures to expand further from here.

I find it all very white-after-Labor-Day. How uncouth, NFL.

I refuse to let them sneak up on me again. I put together this list so that next year I won’t be surprised when the first preseason game kicks off on-or-around Juneteenth.