Got a problem….I think.

I feel like I should be ecstatic. I mean, I’m back to having six-day weeks, eating soup and cornbread for dinner and constantly fantasizing about robust men in tight pants. I love professional football. Waiting for the first Sunday of the season feels like being 11 years old and riding to an end-of-the-school-year party at the water park. Although the road has been traveled before, the expectations are enormous.

But growing up, the first week of football always felt awkward for me. No doubt, the enormity of my expectations had something to do with that. When the first 1:00 pm games got underway (11:00 am where I lived), I often felt like something was off. Of course, something was off. Me.

I would worry that I wasn’t amped enough for the start of the season. Or that I would find that I’d missed something in writing my team previews. Sometimes, I’d even worry that time was getting away from me. After all, there are only 17 True Football Sundays a year (True Football Sunday being when my world stopped rotating around the sun and instead revolved around the axis that is DirecTV’s NFL Sunday Ticket); if I don’t fully enjoy the first True Football Sunday, I figured I was wasting nearly six percent of my happiest days of the year. This kind of thinking once made perfect sense.

Fortunately, as I’ve grown older, I’ve grown out of feeling distressed about the official return of the NFL. Perhaps the Thursday night kickoff specials – a brilliant installment by the league in 2002 – made for a smoother transition. Or, maybe as my writing career has expanded and my team previews have demanded more of my energy, I’ve become jaded to the buzz of the opener. Who knows. I’m just joyful that I can enjoy what I enjoy most. You know what I’m saying?

Okay, so here’s my problem: I think the season’s starting anxiety is back. I’m finding myself in a familiar “worry mode” again. Only this time, I’m not sure it’s entirely my fault. I mean, what if they’re really not healthy? What if this is the beginning of the downslide?

I’m talking about Brady and Manning! What if they really are hurt? What if they really won’t be there this Sunday? I feel like I’m riding to the water park amidst rumors that the biggest two slides are out of service.

Yes I’m worried about Tom Brady and Peyton Manning. Has anybody seen them? Neither participated in the preseason. Brady had a bruised bone in his foot that reportedly may have been cracked. Or may still be cracked. Manning had his bursa sac removed. It’s apparently not a serious procedure, but goodness, doesn’t it just sound bad?

I understand that injuries happen all the time. Osi Umenyiora with the Giants? So it goes. Chad Johnson has an iffy shoulder in Cincinnati? Yep. That’s football. Shawne Merriman is risking his career in San Diego? Cross your fingers. Or don’t – whatever.

But Brady and Manning are above apathy. These are the two biggest stars in the game. The NFL survived the disappearance of Michael Vick – and consequential collapse of the Falcons – because Atlanta is a fairly mundane franchise with limited playoff success. That’s not true with New England and Indy. If Brady or Manning fall, one of the league’s marquee teams goes with them.

I know, I know, both QB’s practiced and are likely good to go. And if either is out, it’d likely be for only a few games. But that wouldn’t matter to me come Sunday. There’d be too much symbolism behind Brady or Manning’s absence. Injuries don’t happen to the players who currently hold the league’s second and third longest consecutive start streaks.

You know what the guys on Pardon the Interruption talked about the other day? Whether we’ve already seen the best of Tom Brady. Wilbon pointed out that the ninth-year veteran is 31. That’s one year younger than Manning. The sane side of me says that both players still have another seven or eight great years in them. But the part of me that can’t help but worry about it being September already says The clock is ticking – with them maybe on the sidelines!

I’m sorry for spilling my unfounded concerns on you like this. The great thing about the NFL is that things always turn out fine in the end. Unlike other pro sports, the NFL does not hang its hat on a handful of big market teams. Or big-ticket players.

And, come to think of it, I guess we have seen the ugliness of a marquee team losing its superstar field general once already this summer. Which reminds me, I cannot wait to see how Brett Favre does in his Jets debut on Sunday.