Almost Foobaw Season Again

Your top 10 stories heading into the opening week of the NFL season:

1. San Diego is trying to screw their #1 draft pick out of money they're eventually going to have to pay him anyway because of the slotting system. To assist in this, they've enlisted their former star running back, who once upon a time held out from San Diego to get more money. Apparently, the weather out there is too nice for irony.
2. Tony Romo is hurt. Again. Which means that the 4th round pick rookie everyone is frothing over because he's chewed up some third string defenses will get to start against actual pass rushers. No, the SEC is not the same thing as the NFL. Yes, the Cowboys are going to be trading for Josh McCown very soon.
3. The Browns are trying to trade everyone and acquire draft picks. See also: every post we've made about the Sixers for the last four years. #TrustTheProcess
4. Tom Brady will miss the first four games of the season, but Bill Belichick devil magic is so strong that not only does Brady's backup look good, Brady's backup's backup looks good. They will continue to look good until A)Brady comes back and B)the Patriots trade both Garoppolo and Raleigh hero Jacoby Brisket to, say, the Cowboys, at which point both of them will suddenly turn into the last act of Flowers For Algernon. See also: Cassel, Matt.
5. Contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as a "tough matchup" in preseason football. That's because nobody cares who wins, the best players aren't on the field, the teams are hiding the interesting parts of their playbooks so as to avoid giving potential rivals film to study, and, well, you get the idea. 10 out of 10 for effort to ESPN for trying to drum up interest in this stuff, but, c'mon already.
6. The Raiders, owned by a many-times-multi-millionaire, are still trying to collaborate with a possibly mobbed-up billionaire to get the state of Nevada, which has more urgent matters, to give them three quarter of a billion dollars to build a stadium that would provide the city of Las Vegas with no revenue and that would only be used roughly ten days a year. The billionaire in question, Sheldon Adelson, even bought out the local paper in order to have it drumbeat for the stadium. Oh, to be rich and have such problems.
7. Kirk Cousins still isn't actually that good. Trust me on this one.
8. The 49ers quarterback who has largely forgotten how to quarterback and in the process given back the Triangle its most entertaining sports radio personality (aka last year's Niners' QB coach Steve Logan) is now attracting all sorts of flak for making a principled stand vis-a-vis the national anthem, and in the process revealing the once again most internet commuters don't understand what "censorship", "the First Amendment", or "free speech" really mean. You can disagree with Colin Kaepernick's stance, but you can't deny his right to take it. Period.
9. Everybody's hurt already. Which, in the case of the Cowboys, is kind of hilarious, because the entire narrative all through training camp is "Well, as long as Romo stays healthy..." Yeah. About that. 
10. Someone traded for Barkevious Mingo. So life isn't all bad.