For entertainment value, last night's Saints/Packers game blew the Vikings/Saints opener out of the water. It also yielded very few surprises: Aaron Rodgers was dominant, both teams are vulnerable on special teams and defense (at least at this point in the season) and at the root of it all it's good to have the NFL back. However ...
Even if it was everything the NFL bean-counters could have wanted as everyone involved with the league tries to wash away the bad taste of the offseason labor mess, we could still detect some of the rusty residue on our palate.
We can't even exactly put our finger on it other than to say parts of the game felt cartoonish -- touchdowns that were way too easy against defenses that were behind the curve ... complete confusion over schemes and assignments ... and a strange speed that just felt slightly off.
Maybe that's to be expected in opening week regardless. Maybe we were simply watching to elite offenses and shouldn't read more into it than that. But while our eyes told us we were watching the NFL opener, and our being felt the warm glow of football, our head told us we're still paying -- even just a little -- for the lockout.
