10 NFL 2015 Match-Ups With Personal Matters On The Line
Because if winning isn't everything, why do they keep score?
Are you ready for some football? The new NFL season is just over a month away with plenty of personal vendettas needing to to be settled.
Of course, as the season develops teams will begin to formulate some sort of pecking order. Favourites will fall short and dark horses will emerge, but until we see how things unfold, there are always a number of grudge matches that need resolving.
From the annual Thanksgiving triple dose of Turkey games to those three Wembley games in good old blighty, there are a sleuth of bad feelings brewing that'll come come to a bitter head this season. They include the bitterest of old foes; two future hall of famers colliding; rematches galore; two new stars wanting to make a name for themselves, and team wanting to play with fully inflated balls.
Without further ado, here are 10 NFL match-ups with personal matters on the line...
10. Mariota Battles Winston: Tennessee Titans @ Tampa Bay Buccaneers
When: Sunday September 13, 2015 (9:25pm GMT)
This season kicks off with one heck of an enticing battle between the top two overall draft picks in the form of Buccaneers quarterback Jameis Winston and Titans Hawaii-native QB Marcus Mariota. One of these rookie quarterbacks, who’ve both joined 2-14 teams, will start their career 1-0.
Not only will this be an interesting view to see which quarterback gets their first career victory, but both Bucs and Titans are two franchises desperate for a sign of light at the end of the tunnel. It hasn’t been pretty reading for these teams in recent years, especially Titans fans. Have they had anything to shout about this past decade? At least the Bucs, owned by the Glazer family, won the Super Bowl in 2002, although it has gone rapidly downhill from there. Winston and Mariota both signify fresh starts, a shared sense of optimism, and hopefully, a prolonged spell of some kind of success on the field for both clubs.
This game will be ugly, we are talking about the two worst teams in the NFL after all. You almost feel like the NFL preordained this scheduling knowing full well everyone will be eager to see Mariota vs. Winston in week one. Remember, the last time these two studs played against one another was during the inaugural college playoffs. Mariota and his Oregon Ducks got the victory over Winston’s Florida State Seminoles, which handed Winston his only defeat in his stellar 4-year college career. Bad blood already exists.