Memorial Day is right around the corner.

You know what that means, right?

We are now societally allowed to make presumptuous and brash predictions of the 2018 NFL season without the jeering and ridicule from our peers and brethren.

We can shamelessly make claims of a Blake Bortles MVP run, an Andy Dalton playoff win, or maybe even a Mark Davis hairstyle change without the fear of any blowback from the precarious Twitter mob.

The unpredictability of the NFL is what draws us in week after week, but I am king of spoiler alerts. The island in Lost is some sort of purgatory and they were dead the whole time (I think…in fact, it is incredibly confusing. Now that I think about it, were they dead? Was it some kind of zombie thing? I take it back, I am not sure I can spoil something I don’t understand myself). Ned Stark doesn’t make it out of the first season of Game of Thrones. U.S. Marshal Daniels is really actually a patient in the film Shutter Island.

Oh shoot, SPOILER ALERT.

For those of you that have no desire to know what happens this football season, please close out of your browser and continue clapping every time your airplane lands. The rest of you, join me for this prophetic journey of epic proportions.

Week 1: Seattle Seahawks at Denver Broncos

The only reason the Seattle Seahawks were within spitting distance of a playoff berth last season was due to the miraculous play of Russell Wilson. Truthfully, “miraculous” may not even be kind enough to describe Wilson’s play. He was phenomenal last year.

Wilson accounted for 4,569 of Seattle’s 5,608 yards from scrimmage and finished the season with 34 touchdown passes to only 11 interceptions. He bolstered his statistics by rushing for 586 yards and added three more scores. Not only were the Seahawks’ struggles in large part due to the revolting play of their offensive line, a nauseating 27th ranking by Pro Football Focus, but also by the loss of star cornerback Richard Sherman to an Achilles injury in early November.

So what did the front office of the Seahawks do to help Wilson out? They got rid of nearly all his weapons, tight end Jimmy Graham and explosive wideout Paul Richardson, and added almost no one to their offensive line, determined to let Wilson continue to be a one-man show in Seattle. With the loss of Sherman to the divisional rival San Francisco 49ers and defensive end Michael Bennett to the Philadelphia Eagles, the ‘Legion of Boom’ appears to be a mere shell of what it used to be.

This is why the Broncos will open up the 2018 season with a win.

As good as Wilson will play, the Seahawks’ offensive line will struggle more than comedy in a Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer flick. Denver’s defensive front will wreak havoc and force quick decision-making all afternoon, and newly acquired punter Marquette King will send one, if not two, balls onto Colfax Ave in the thin Denver air.

Seattle Seahawks – 19

Denver Broncos – 24