Ever been to an NFL stadium a few hours prior to when the game begins? It’s a truly bizarre scene. Men who are preparing to play an utterly violent game that hinges largely on their ability to hurt or intimidate their opponents are just out there, warming up and — at times — mingling with those opponents! It’s a wonder that there aren’t more pre-game shenanigans than the relatively few we see.
But today brought us a unique intersection, and it is, I’m not afraid to say, perhaps the most lopsided in the history of the league. It involves a punter and a lineman, and while that punter, Bradley Pinion, is not exactly small (6-foot-5, 240 pounds) the lineman is Quenton Nelson, who I and everyone else should be afraid of because he’s clearly one of the toughest guys in football.
Look at Nelson stalking over there, already sweating through his shirt, wider by a good few feet than anybody else on the field! Pinion is going to shank every punt today. I’m convinced he shanked the subsequent punt that came near Nelson — there’s no way he was foolhardy enough to do that on purpose, right?
Good news is the Colts have found their backup punter.
