Make no mistake. They’ve done it. For the Denver Broncos, the 2019 season will represent one of renewed hope, fostering in the next generation of competancy, albeit in a completely new form than anything that they have ever understood. Indeed in a different form than any football fan has ever understood. The Denver Broncos no longer have a perceived Quarterback problem. Because the city of Denver has collectively decided to change their perception.

They’re decriminalizing shrooms.

Will their quarterback play actually improve? Perhaps. Perhaps not. They did make actual roster changes. But your perception will change once you realize that possession is a construct. In fact, it’s an impossibility within the medium of football, where defense by it’s very nature is what keeps the game in balance. Much as death is a part of life, transitioning units is an inevitable part of the game. In actuality are touchdowns fundamentally different than turnovers once you accept the plastic value we assign to numbers? Either way, the opposition is getting their turn with the ball? The drive ends, but in a sense it also begins anew from the other point of view.

What even is football? Did you ever ask yourself that? It comes once a week when the weather begins to turn. Is it a game? Or is it a community where the true believers gather on Sundays, drink the sacrament of overpriced cheep beer, and devote themselves to a new faith, be that whether a linebacker blitz is the true answer, or if they need to lean on the slot receiver. It’s a secular temple. It’s all a community. Or a sub-community, part of the brotherhood of football fanaticism, within the fraternity of sports fandom, on this planet as we hurdle through the solar system at 67,000 miles an hour. And what does winning even achieve? Can the Denver Broncos eat their Super Bowls? Can they love them? Are they still happening, or did they immediately vanish into the ether of time?

Is this bleak? Or are we now free? Free to explore beyond the sidelines and into the stands. Can football be contained to just a game, or can we create something new? Now that we are unburdened by the expectations of winning and losing, we can transcend competition. We can become art. Let’s explore a future where teams deploy nothing but gadget plays. Let’s see them hire sumo wrestlers for the offensive line. What if they played a game with nobody in the seats, while The Marriage of Figaro blares over the PA system? Can games be played at Red Rocks?

Of course there are rules, only the rules are new and must be mastered to prevent the inevitable madness.

Don’t use the moment as one of reflection. Don’t look into the mirror.

Bring water.

Don’t think about Blucifer.

Bring orange juice.

Don’t stare into John Elway’s teeth.

Bring chocolate.

And don’t wonder what might have been.

Don’t attempt to capture this for posterity. The moment is fleeting and will not survive for long in your blog. You are not a thought that needs to be preserved in amber, but a worthless speck of dust who will be soon forgotten, and need not worry about being correct in the uncertainty of the future.

And never forget that this is exactly where you want to be.

This can be ugly, but it can also be beautiful.

What happens when the fans begin to understand that there is no competition, that we’re all part of a living organism, and instead of stressing about the state of being we could just be? Be a part of it. Be apart of it. Watch it not dispassionately, but alternatively. What if there are moments that we can freeze in our mind. Where we can pause life as the ball hovers in mid air, 20 feet above the field of play, perpetually in flight not spiraling but lying still with it’s grass stained laces exposed to the camera of our memories. How quickly does that moment die?

Did it ever exist?

None of this is to imply that the City of Denver has actually legalized psychedelic mushrooms. They have decriminalized it. RJ Reynolds or Phillip Morris can’t fly their corporate branded freak flags. You can’t find these tickets to enlightenment in a cannabis shop, and you’ll still need to know a guy. But you won’t get busted for possession, and the substance is no longer a taboo.

This is more than any simple roster constriction. This is greater than any playcalling philosophy. The drives will no longer be associated with the rat race of competition, but ones to the center of your mind. They’ll list them as THE DENVER BRONCOS on the programs this year, because this first season is going to feature nothing but caps. It won’t be good. It won’t be bad. It will all simply be.

Happy trails.