There is a line of thinking among sports business executives that whatever troubles the N.F.L. endures during the off-season melt away once the regular season begins.

Scandals linger and even explode, like the spate of domestic violence cases last year that sent shock waves across the nation and embroiled the league in perhaps its biggest scandal ever. But by and large, professional football fans want to watch pro football, as sky-high television ratings attest. When the games start, fans focus more on their teams — real and fantasy — while the scandals, however significant, tend to take a back seat.

This theory will again be put to the test on Thursday night when the N.F.L. season opens at Gillette Stadium in Foxborough, Mass., where the New England Patriots, the team at the center of this off-season’s biggest controversy, host the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Read the article “NFL Season Kicks Off Tonight, and League Can’t be Happier” on nytimes.com.