Football, Baseball Rule in September

70-degree weather.  America's most popular sport in full swing.  Our national pastime headed for the playoffs.  What could possible be better than that?

For most in this country, September is a month of many different things.  Summer's exhaustive heat is gone and replaced with fall's refreshing breeze.  That breeze brings with it a sport lover's dream.  Mainly, the best sports have to offer.

When college football starts its season every team has a real opportunity for a shot at the BCS title.  With the ups and downs that college football has, every fan still has dreams. 

It's mostly out of conference play, which can lead to some interesting early season match-ups (USC v. Ohio State last year comes to mind).  Anyone reading spring/summer practice reports will avow that this is their month, their teams time to prove its worth. 

Has your vaunted recruiting prospect shown he'll be the starter he was projected in February?  Has your quarterback grasped enough of the playbook to make a run for the title this year?  Has your coach on the hot seat done enough to keep his job? 

All these things play out through September, and as usual in college football it's never boring.

As the month progresses, we find ourselves getting down to crunch time with the MLB playoff push.  After 130 games behind them, teams find themselves backed up against a wall no matter what they have accomplished thus far. 

This is where baseball becomes intense.  Every pitch matters.  Every ground ball carries the opportunity to win a game.  Every move by every player or manager is microscopic.  It's what makes baseball American.

Which brings us to the most watched team sport in America:  the NFL season.  This is the real man's game.  Million dollar athletes who work practically all year round get a chance to smash heads against each other. 

The speed, power, intellect, and fortitude of these players is on display.  Matchups are much more even in this sport than any other (minus the Detroit Lions, of course).   The possibilities are boundless, and it shows in tv ratings.  It really doesn't get any better than that.

With the fun of summer winding down, it's pretty much imperative that football starts and baseball finds it's champion.  It would be a whole lot more depressing if it were the start of basketball and hockey seasons and their "all indoor" seasons.

We want sun, we want football, and we want the road to the World Series to begin.  After all, we can't get to October without September.