Reasons Why We Love You: Welcome Back Football

Football season in Louisiana is one of the more prominent aspects of Louisiana culture, and some people, including myself, could even make the argument that it is perhaps THE best time of year in The Boot.
The memories and feelings that this time of year brings to the state of Louisiana are some of the main ingredients to what I might call Louisiana culture.
Numerous examples of such occurrences have transpired in our state’s rich history, and for any sports fan in a hundred mile radius, many of these memories have long since tattooed themselves onto the recesses of our memory.
Who can forget the Heisman campaign of Tyrann Mathieu during his 2011 sophomore season, when the media ordained “Honey Badger” led the then Les Miles coached LSU Tigers to an 11-win season before his untimely departure from Death Valley?
What Jaguar fan worth their metal doesn’t remember the sheer pandemonium that erupted in the Superdome during the 2014 Bayou Classic when the the Jags defeated the Grambling Tigers in dramatic fashion against the then-electrifying Grambling offense with a stellar goal-line stand?
Or perhaps the crowned jewel of the moments that football gave us was the iconic Tracy Porter interception of Peyton Manning in Super Bowl XLIV that earned Louisiana its first professional sports championship in our state’s history.
Regardless of which moment in Louisiana sports history makes your heart beat the fastest, the fact stands that football, at its basis, is responsible for some of the best memories that Louisiana natives are in possession of.
In a way, it’s only fitting that the most hard-hitting and gritty sport in America would create such a kinship in the most hard-hitting and grittiest state in America. While some would find issue with that claim, the reality is that Louisiana was made to be a football state because more than anyone else, we have a football mindset.
With wind-stealing humidity, constantly changing weather conditions, and the spiciest food known to man, kids in Louisiana are born ready to hit the gridiron and embrace the challenges and work that the sport demands while other future ballers are playing with parachutes in gym class.
Basketball season is great, and the Pelicans may have the best player on the planet in Anthony Davis. That being said, there are levels to the sports hierarchy in Louisiana, and if it’s not football, everything else is just in a race for second-place.
So for the rest of year, basketball, soccer, baseball, and all the rest can cover the tv screens and magazines with their pretty boy All-Stars and competition-shattering superteams, and that’s perfectly fine.
However, when August ends and the first kickoff takes place, the radio waves, television networks, and streaming apps of all shapes and sizes allocate the throne to what Louisiana knows to be the GOAT sport, and that is football.
It has been a hot summer where our state and our city has faced many hardships that have come in many different forms. From natural disaster, to political unrest, and all the way down to yawnfest that most summer sports are, we have been patiently waiting for the return of the one sport that matters the most. Welcome back, football, and we hope it’s a long a long season before we have to see you go again.