If you didn't have enough reasons to side with the players against the owners in the NFL lockout dispute, consider this theory from Turf Show Times: The owners might finally end the lockout, but only because they're the only people in America worried about losing the preseason. Well, them and St. Louis-bound fans of whoever the Rams are playing in the Edward Jones Dome this year. This is like hearing that your parents might take you to Disney World, but only because they really like to ride that airport tram in Orlando International.

To be honest, they can have the preseason. In fact, if there's a way we could end the lockout today but still cancel the preseason I'm sure every season-ticket holder in the dome would be very amenable. Or maybe we can just pretend the preseason happened already, and then never talk about it again?

If it means the regular season gets players I guess I can't complain, but the owners' love of the preseason is just another example of F. Scott Fitzgerald's dictum that the rich are different from you and me. As the rest of "The Rich Boy"'s often-misquoted opening goes, "They possess and enjoy early, and are stupid, because they like the NFL preseason."