This morning I heard some Lions fan kvetching over their unexpected season opening win over the defending Super Bowl champs. This wasn’t the usual garbage one expects from a fan of an historically jinxed franchise bemoaning unexpected success. It was literally a guy with too much time on his hands.

From the way this cat was slouching and moping, I knew his friend/therapist wasn’t easing the angst. Rather than curse this poor sap, I recognize half of Chicago will suffer the same affliction after Sunday’s Bears-Packers opener. It doesn’t matter if the Bears win or lose. Everyone will replay the game 3,276 times between then and the next game. For those of us that don’t live and die with football teams, these 7 days are excruciating because it’s all anyone is talking or thinking about.

It’s far worse than listening to an amateur golfer replay every shot in a recently played round of golf. At least there are only 18 holes on a course. With football, doubts after victories are as certain as questions after losses. Given too much time, one can work oneself into a frenzy.

Save for an interminable offseason (filled with more football talk), the time between regular season professional baseball games is usually one day at the most. While a loss may be as painful as swallowing a stale tortilla, you only have 24 hours of suffering. One also doesn’t have as long to savor a sweet win.

Case in point, the consternation over Friday’s Cubs loss and David Ross’s postgame press conference is already old news. I don’t think there are any proper media outlets still talking about today’s loss. Besides, they’ll be back at it in less 18 hours.

Side note: Not every NFL game is that exciting. Sitting through TV timeouts at an NFL game is brutal.