Another football season dawns on us, mercifully, but Idaho State fans will have to wait to feel its warming rays.

    Head coach Mike Kramer has decided to close fall camp this year — including scrimmages — from the public and media. The first time we will see the Bengals do anything football related is Sept. 7, their first game of the 2013 season.

    By my count, that’s 29 days away. Twenty-nine long, football-less days for the ISU crazies to build up what is sure to be an unhealthy amount of clammy anticipation and unbridled excitement.

    It’s also 29 days for those media members who cover the team to be left out in the cold.

    Yes, I will be there after practices to ask Kramer how things went, and I will have the chance to talk to players (no one on defense, however). It just won’t be the same as seeing the action on the field.

    Honestly, coverage of the team as it prepares for the season will suffer. That personal, eye-witness touch of anecdotes and impressive plays will be missing, not to mention photos and videos.

    The worst part is even scrimmages are closed. That is a pretty crummy deal for the fans who will be buying tickets to consume what will become an unknown product.    For a football team that has struggled to come up with wins, any sort of positive exposure or fan interest is a good thing.

    ISU, however, is not a trend-setter when it comes to closing fall football activities. Many colleges — a growing number, actually — are doing it. There is so much pressure for coaches to win immediately that they don’t want to heap more on themselves or their teams, courtesy of fans and the media.

    Kramer, now entering his third season with the Bengals, is certainly feeling some of that pressure now as his team looks to have its first winning season since 2003, break a 15-game conference losing streak and win for the first time on the road in 39 tries.

    There’s also the aspect of trying to protect and shield players. Not that Kramer will lose any sleep worrying about this, but coaches don’t want anything Johnny Manziel-like happening where autograph brokers try to profit off a college player’s fame.

    Perhaps ISU is devising new schemes or plans that Kramer does not want leaked. After all, in the age of smart phones and the Internet, everyone is a reporter.

    So while I — and what I assume is a fair number of Bengal fans — are shut out from Idaho State for almost a month’s time, Kramer has his reasons.

    And perhaps this extra long hiatus from local college football will have fans frothing at the mouth and banging on the Holt Arena doors when Sept. 7 finally rolls around.

    After all, absence makes the heart grow fonder.

    Good thing, because this absence is longer than expected.