Wind the clock back a few years and we would be just getting into the provincial championships.
A hiatus after the league would have seen teams head off for several weeks of rediscovery or topping up, depending on how their early spring campaign had went.
The big team would be eyeing up a potential three-game push to reach provincial glory and from that a quarter-final berth. Others would have to survive the weekly Russian roulette of the qualifier draw and the corresponding straight knockout game.
By the time you we were waiting on provincial finals, the jeopardy and the gradual culling of the qualifiers was already in full swing. Each week saw another collection of teams packing up their bags for the summer. It wasn't exactly a tidy format, but it sure kept things interesting.
A clear benefit could be seen from remaining in your provincial championship and away from the qualifier trapdoor.
Now? We go from a league into a knock-out championship that doesn’t knock anyone out, or really do anything at all.
They all end up in the group stage anyway with a tiny bit of wheat from the chaff sorting in terms of the final Sam Maguire and Tailteann Cup places. Are Donegal better off than the two teams they vanquished in Derry and Tyrone? Are Galway and Mayo better off than Roscommon?
It might feel like it now, but in several weeks’ time I'd very much doubt it.
In our very tight calendar, with all the apparent pressures it puts on players and the schedulers, we have ended up with a strange mid-year hiatus where very little appears to happen.
It is an 11-week gap from the end of the league until the next period of critical action, the third round of the the group stage.
As the weather heats up, our summer enters the championship doldrums. We are left to essentially wait it out, trying to rummage round to find significance in things that likely have little bearing.
Like a child coming home from primary school with their 'star of the week’ certificate, lovely, nice for them, but the grown-ups in the room know the story.
Galway vs Mayo and Donegal vs Armagh are the provincial deciders that will carry the greatest interest. They will matter in the record books, for now anyway, but will they matter?
The story of the summer isn’t written at the start of May, but in July. In four weeks' time, if any of those teams limp home third in a group or get put out in a quarter-final (preliminary or otherwise) - will they count for much? I’m not so sure.
Maybe for a challenger like Clare or Louth. Both would be stunning stories that deservedly carry weight, but even that would be a mere novelty line by the end of the summer.
You get the sense the teams know it too.
Kerry are off-colour. For the sake of competitiveness, with Dublin in their current mood, it feels imperative that Jack O'Connor's side find their mojo again. And quick. I suspect there is a mid-season pre-season vibe in the Kerry camp at the minute a la years gone by between league and championship.
The All-Ireland champions meanwhile are busy erecting a supersized aura around themselves, screaming we are back and we're not pussy-footing about.
Derry are licking their wounds and putting the long-grass fertiliser on good and thick. I don’t think any right-thinking footballing person believes for a minute they are not going to have a massive second act this summer.
A host of other teams, especially the likes of Galway, Tyrone and, to lesser extent, Donegal, are nursing injury lists, but their medical teams have been likely told to target the All-Ireland series group stages rather than provincial duties.
At Tailteann Cup level, the main point of interest is which players are heading for the departure lounge rather than their respective county's training session.
Management teams here must create enthusiasm for a competition that up until a week or two ago, they had spent all year saying they needed to avoid.
And so, we wait. We wait for the provincials to be wrapped up and give the winners the nice pat on the back that they deserve.
Then, eventually, the summer winds will start to blow. Coming out of the doldrums though, will take time.
Last year, the group stages were such a slow burner that we nearly missed the most incredible ending by being asleep at the wheel. The memory of that crazy final day should hopefully stoke up the interest levels this time around. Teams now know the value in reaching the quarter-final automatically and buying an extra week's break should result in greater intensity in the initial clashes.
It has led to much of the shadow-boxing we have seen thus far. Timing the players' return from injury, protecting those with niggles and team’s whole training schedules will have been adjusted with the aim to hit the ground running in the round-robin stage.
As it currently stands, the championship is an ill-fitting, ill-logical Frankenstein of a job.
I suspect if the status quo remains, the provincial championship value will continue to be diminished and it could prove death by a thousand cuts like it was for the Railway Cup before them.
For now, like the doldrums, we must just wait it out.
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