The greatest certainty Thursday night _ as safe a bet as quarterback Joe Burrow going No. 1 overall to the Cincinnati Bengals _ is that the first round of the NFL Draft will generate record television ratings for ABC, ESPN and the NFL Network.
The draft always is voraciously consumed as we watch college stars turn into pros. We are a nation of football addicts, and this is our drug. I'd argue the first round of the draft is bigger than even Super Bowl Sunday in at least one way: It isn't just two teams. It is the entire league, fans everywhere, trafficking in hope.
This year is different, though.
One reason ratings will be through the ceiling is that we are a starved, captive audience. We are hungry for a live sporting event, even one not with a scoreboard, but with draftniks' grades determining winners and losers.
We have been without NBA, MLB, NHL and MLS games for six weeks and counting, since sports and most everything else shut down against the threat of the coronavirus and COVID-19. We're stir crazy. We'll take anything. We'll even watch athletes playing video games or H-O-R-S-E. The draft is real, though, not some lame substitute.
Football to the rescue!
But it's more than that.
Here is the other reason draft ratings will be insane:
Curiosity.
This is the NFL's 84th draft but the first during a pandemic, the first since self-isolation, quarantining and social distancing entered the lexicon.
The draft telecast is expected to begin with football icon Peyton Manning narrating a tribute to front line doctors and nurses _ the new American heroes in a way sports stars used to be.
Nothing about this draft will look or feel the same.
Teams' draft "war rooms" are living rooms now.
Miami Dolphins fans will see general manager Chris Grier isolated at his house and coach Brian Flores in his. It will be thus across the league.
It will be a virtual draft via video, with the people drafting and the players drafted all in their own houses. Even NFL commissioner Roger Goodell will be in the basement of his New York home as he announces each team's pick.
How will this look? How will it work? Will it work _ or will there be technological glitches and gremlins lending elements of chaos and comedy into the proceedings?
I cannot wait to find out, and neither can you. This is thoroughly uncharted territory.
The NFL has made a polished mega-event of its draft. Last year's attracted hundreds of thousands of fans who jammed downtown Nashville.
Now: Isolation. Empty streets. Teams are having virtual watch parties for fans. The Dolphins' will be on their Facebook site.
The mechanics of drafting, a smooth process honed to a science, has been complicated beyond imagination.
Will a team on the clock to make its pick suddenly lose its connection as its video screen freezes or goes black?
Will Giants general manager Dave Gettleman forget to hit his mute button and inadvertently broadcast his draft plans to the world?
I don't even know if Goodell has a dog, but if he does I pray the canine is a yapper heard barking in the background as Roger attempts to announce the picks.
Goodell undoubtedly will be seen in a suit behind a lectern with the NFL shield logo on it. But how great would it be if he were sitting on a couch in a bathrobe?
Fans booing Goodell has become a staple of drafts. Supposedly there might be piped-in booing Thursday night via a Bud Light promotion.
Which is brilliant. It would be the staid NFL trying to have a little fun amid bizarre circumstances.
I wonder if hackers might attempt to infiltrate this virtual NFL Draft? Hey if the Russians can mess with a U.S. presidential election, is not anything possible?
Here's something else I would bet on seeing Thursday night: A house party violating every rule in the Pandemic Handbook. A team will select Joe Linebacker late in the first round and the video feed to his house will show a raucous celebration as 43 of his friends not social distancing are seen doing shots in a serpentine conga line.
(Chances are it will be the Cowboys' pick).
This strangest, most interesting draft in NFL history also happens, of course, to be the biggest, most important draft in Dolphins history.
Barring trades Miami will three first-round picks for the first time in its 55 drafts and a league-leading 14 selections overall, the residue of calculated tanking.
You know from my mock draft I predict the Dolphins will select Alabama quarterback Tua Tagovailoa fifth overall; Iowa offensive tackle Tristan Wirfs with the 18th pick; and Georgia running back D'Andre Swift with the 26th pick.
It doesn't matter if I'm right.
It does matter, a lot, that Grier "et. al" get this draft just right, coming out of it with a true franchise quarterback and an immensely fortified roster ready to win.
That makes Thursday a pivotal, watershed night in Miami Dolphins history.
One that just happens to be in a virtual draft in the middle of a pandemic.
