Ask The Old Guy: Preseason can be deceiving

——————————————————

First off, tell Ickey [from a State ’83 grad] that I had patellar replacement surgery just a couple of months after Wesley Walls. It took a year to heal, but it did. Nic Scourton and Chris, hang in there. I lost count after a dozen knee jobs and three replacements [I’m 73 now], but I get around fine — doing the PT is the key; no pain = no gain is true!

My question comes up again after that travesty of a TV broadcast of the Bills game [they forgot to mention the Panthers!]. I know it is a great new stadium, but is there any way the NFL can pressure these home TV broadcasts that go national to at least mention who is catching or running with the ball or making tackles? It would be nice to know who is in the game, too, if it isn’t too much bother! What really irritates me is when they show some bozo yakking away while several plays happen, yet they don’t even mention the action on the field.

I have to say that the Bills are far from the only team that is guilty of this! I think our crew is much better at being balanced, but I am far from an unbiased observer in that regard.

Can anything be done about this? Since the TV broadcast was held until late night, we had to DVR the thing to watch Sunday afternoon when my wife could be up to see it — no way she could stay up that late at night. So as not to spoil anything, I didn’t listen to the radio and ignored/tuned out any score listings so we would have a “new” game. Might as well have had the sound off and the stereo on! — Clay, Kingfisher, OK

There you go, 73-year-old Clay bounced back. That’s all the comfort anyone needs.

First off, thanks for wanting to follow as an out-of-market fan. That takes as much dedication as coming back from all those knee surgeries.

Preseason broadcasts are tricky because the league always takes the home-team versions of games to broadcast on NFLN. And all home broadcasts tend to skew toward the home team, even ours.

But there are a couple of options for you, as outlined in our weekly how-to-watch post that tells you how to watch.

For fans outside of the primary broadcast area, NFL Game Pass is offering a free seven-day subscription for fans to watch preseason games live! Click here for more information on how to sign up.

Fans can also watch live out-of-market games on mobile devices through NFL+. Click here for more information on how to sign up for NFL+ and access it on your device with a free seven-day trial.

And not that I’m telling anyone what to do with their money, but the Panthers are closing the preseason at home next week, with that sweet, sweet Steve Smith and Jake Delhomme analyst crew being shared with a national audience on the replay. So a seven-day trial to cover this week would technically be all an out-of-market fan might need.