You weren’t imagining things while watching the Vikings-Saints, Cowboys-Redskins, and Ravens-Jets all slog through defensive battles in primetime games.
Scoring really was down sharply in the first week of the NFL season.
The 16 games totaled 585 points, or 36.6 points a game, according to the Elias Sports Bureau via Judy Battista of the New York Times. That’s the second lowest scoring opening week since the league expanded to 32 teams.
21 teams scored less than 20 points, which was the most amount of teams under 20 in an opening Week in 40 years. (Of course, there have only been 32 teams the last eight years.)
There are a ton of theories of why this may have happened. But we’ll save those for a month from now, when we know whether this was just a trend or a blip on the radar.
Say it with me, 49ers fans: It’s only one week.