Ready for some (more) football games that count?

[September 05, 2008]  RYE BROOK, N.Y. (AP) -- A better question than "Are you ready for some football?" on the opening week of the NFL season might be how soon you're ready for some more games that count.

Commissioner Roger Goodell knows the answer to that one, too, and depending on how much heat he feels, he might do something about it sooner than you think. It's no coincidence that several times in the past month, Goodell has floated trial balloons about shortening the preseason by one and possibly even two games -- as the Canadian Football League does -- and tacking them onto the 16-game regular season.

There are TV contracts and collective bargaining agreements to be reckoned with, but he threw out 2011 or the year after as a possible starting date. Goodell hardly needed reminding the league does itself precious few favors with four preseason games -- and in a few cases, five. But this year, he got an earful, anyway.

Fans of the defending Super Bowl champion Giants were steamed about losing their best defensive player, Osi Umenyiora, and the Colts' faithful about losing one of their offensive cogs, All-Pro center Jeff Saturday.

Just as telling, the game's two best quarterbacks, Tom Brady and Peyton Manning, skipped the preseason altogether rehabbing injuries and the passer many would rate No. 3, Brett Favre, probably spent more time studying New York's traffic patterns than the intricacies of the Jets' playbook. As was the case with Michael Strahan last season and dozens of others before him, nobody expects to see their learning curves dip sharply as a result, least of all their opponents.

The dollars flooding into pro football have made staying in shape mandatory the year-round, but it's generated more fan complaints about paying full price for exhibition games with fewer and fewer stars on the field for shorter periods of times. Goodell has also heard from some front offices that their clubs regard the preseason as overly long and overrated as both a conditioning and evaluating tool. Fully staffed, full-time scouting departments have taken much of the guesswork out of the equation, not just for guys on their own squad, but other squads, too.

"We go to preseason games all around the country and prepare for guys who we probably won't see ... who don't have a chance to play without an injury or two to the guys in front of them," said Chargers general manager A.J. Smith, a former scout himself.

The outrage over injuries sustained during preseason games waxes and wanes from year to year depending on how many "name" players get hurt. But players get hurt during mini-camp and the Super Bowl, too, and all the time in-between; a few even while dancing in the end zone. Teams go through so many bodies over the course of a season that Goodell has already signaled his willingness to discuss expanding rosters if the regular season gets longer.

"That would probably be something that would be attractive to the union," the commissioner said in an interview posted Thursday on CBSSports.com. "So you'd likely have to revisit the idea of an expanded roster at some time."

What he doesn't plan to negotiate is when the season starts: "when we come back from Labor Day and everyone's done with summer vacation," he said. Nor does Goodell seem overly worried about when it ends. Rather than being worried about bumping heads with NASCAR's showcase event, the Daytona 500, he sounded almost eager for the chance.

"Our view is, when we're getting into that late season, we really own that calendar," he told The Wall Street Journal, "and that's an opportunity for us to continue to build our game."

That will require having enough bodies available -- from stars like Brady on down to the kamikazes that fill out the practice squad -- to play two more games at a competitive level high enough where charging full price won't be an embarrassment. One look at the injury reports for Week 1, when clubs are presumably at their healthiest, suggests that won't be an easy task.

Then again, the weekly injury reports have read like fiction for years now. Just Thursday, for the first time since the 2005 Super Bowl, Brady was not listed on the New England Patriots practice participation or injury report. For each of the previous 56 games, he was listed as "probable" with a right shoulder injury, but started each one.

"You look at what each team handed in and whether it's true or untrue doesn't matter," Chargers GM Smith said. "Should you speculate? Or play doctor? No. ...

"You prepare as if every person that doesn't have the word 'out' next to his name is going to play," he added. "Everybody has their own feeling about the list, but I've said this often, 'The only time I like to be surprised is on Christmas morning.'"

[Associated Press; By JIM LITKE]

Jim Litke is a national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at [e-mail].

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