QUICK: Spot the error!
The worst part about the Super Bowl isn’t when they trot out the washed-up and/or hardly appealing “stars” for the halftime show…
Nor is it the desolate stretch of barren time between the conclusion of the conference championship games and the spectacle itself. It’s not even the fact that, often times, you’re forced to watch the game in a room full of people who you barely know—among them, many of your wife’s friends who know nothing about the actual sport. (“DID HE SCORE A TOUCHBACK ON THAT? WHY DIDN’T HE JUST GO AROUND THAT BIG PILE OF MEN? CAN WE WATCH THE PUPPY BOWL? LOLZ.”)
No, the worst part is “media week,” a turgid span of auto-fellatio wherein a bunch of hacks endlessly try to one-up each other with BREAKING, EXCLUSIVE NEWS, whiny, contemplative missives about what a circus this has all become and their hot-take on the feel-good pieces that have all been covered elsewhere, ad nauseam.
The deaf guy.
The player with an incarcerated grandma.
The player who BROKE THE CHAINS of the XFL to become a real, actual sports-player.
The one whose dyslexia made learning a playbook “especially complicated.”
It’s tiresome.
Look, I get why we like these stories. We’re human. It’s often a fragile, perilous condition fraught with insecurity. When we hear about a puppy pulling a toddler from a burning Dunkin’ Donuts, it validates our belief that the world isn’t inherently evil. (At least not all the time.) A legless refugee from a war-torn land we can barely pronounce finding a cure for the hiccups allows us to believe that we too can be worthwhile human beings who make valuable contributions to society. (Especially because the great majority of us have at least one leg… probably even two.)
It’s human nature.
It’s compelling.
And so are the various afflictions that befall these athletes. The crack addicted mother. The cleft palate. The crippling allergy to soy. But you know what’s even more compelling than these adverse truths?
THE FUCKING SUPER BOWL.
That’s right, the actual game that these “heroes” will play on Sunday. The contest that pits the two best football teams—in the ENTIRE WORLD!—against one another in a winner-take-all, physically and emotionally brutal battle for supremacy.
Can’t we make THAT the story?
Isn’t that exciting enough?
But I digress. It’s going to be a good game. I’m pretty sure about that much, at least. I’ll not bog you down with advanced analytics that most of us will only pretend to understand. (I’m sure Bill Barnwell on Grantland will give you 3,300 words about how “Seattle’s pass defense is ranked 1st in Field Adjusted Value matrices on attempts over 20 yards, but only 15th when accounting for Wind Speed Variance in excess of 10mph, and so therefore, Denver holds a considerable advantage because of the Eastern United States Air Quality Index.”)
Here’s what I know:
Peyton Manning is really good, Russell Wilson is good (but not as good, obviously), the Seahawks have a terrific defense, the Broncos have an amazing offense (maybe the best ever), and both teams have respectable, evenly matched running games. Oh, weather may or may not be a factor, and they’ll play for at LEAST 60 minutes. (Of this fact, I am absolutely certain.)
Come on… try and argue with me on any of that.
Therefore, all things being equal and all accounted for, this game will definitely take place on Sunday, February 2nd.
Oh, and the Broncos will win.
Until Peyton Manning retires—or the scientists who engineered him are unable to adequately repair his replacement parts in the offseason—the Broncos will continue to win every Super Bowl, ever. It nauseates me to write that, but I’m afraid it’s true.
Oh well.
It’s the Super Bowl. It’ll be fun.
Broncos 38 Seahawks 30
Funny stuff.
Bill Polian, who loves Peyton like a son, picks the Hawks. Weather and wind will force interceptions.
Nope. Weather was an absolute non-factor, but there were still interceptions. Yes there were.
History tells us the Super Bowl is more apt to be a bore than memorable.
Agree the whole media circus is salt petter to the football fan but it isn’t the football fan who brings in the do-re-mi for the non-profit NFL.
I’ll DVR it and watch it sans the commercials unless a gun is put to my head to go to a Super Bowl party.
Best part will be seeing the homeless people dragged into the stadium to fill the seats they cannot sell. Priced out of the game are the fans and the Beautiful People aren’t going to sit in the cold.
Seahawks 23 Broncos 21
Actually, I think it is usually better to DVR it and then ONLY watch the commercials. I still worship the Budweiser Frogs.
+1
Wow… nice job.
Three scenarios: Broncos win, Broncos win, Seahawks win; thus, I put the odds a DEN win at better than 2-1, or 67% (it’s called ‘new math’, and I just invented it. )
Scenario 1: DEN wins a close game by 4 or 5 points, which is what my gut is telling me; course, that rumbling could also be my own trepidation at having to suffer KCinderella fandom jubilance at machinations theirs realized – many seem to want DEN to lose just because KC wasn’t good enough to either get there or win it, the Superbowl.
[ DEN 24 SEAT 20 ]
Scenario 2: DEN wins in a pseudo runaway, momentum gained after SEAT mistakes, latter due the pressure brought to bear, not so much via DEN’s defense as their own relative youth/lack of big-game experience compared Manning’s.
[ DEN 34 SEAT 17 ]
Scenario 3: SEAT defense proves too quick/too fast for DEN, and forces Manning into uncharacteristically for him errant throws – what is known as ‘QUACKS’ the parlance.
[ SEAT 20 DEN 16 ]
The real question be: when do the Chiefs begin again to let down the locals, start their 7-9 2014 campaign?
Don’t hate Kerouac because he’s prescient (as well beautiful)…
🙂
wrong all over
Kerouac nailed it his scenario #3 – SEATT was quicker & faster, nothing more or less. The teams play 10 times, I felt DEN would win 7 of them – aft today’s game, I would call it a 5 game split 10 games played. SEAT prevailed Sunday, nothing more or less.
(PS) It’s a good thing KCinderella didn’t make it to the Superbowl: SEATT would’ve likely won by a score of 100-0.
🙂
1. Good lord, how does that man fit in that pony barrel ice holder.
2. I am tired and too lazy to remember what I wanted to put in #2 so there.
🙂
1) Now he fits in a pony barrel coffin, barrel man has been dead for a few years
I’ll take the frickin donkeys.
They are -2.5 (-110) at the Las Vegas Hilton right now I would take that, even if it drifts up to 3.
Best idiotic prop bets that only a mongoloid or a KCMOSD student would take but just for funzies:
Russel Wilson over 210 yards passing (-135 sucker bet)
Russel Wilson over 2 TD passes (bet pushes if he throws 2) (pays off 2:1)
Robert Turbin (Seattle Backup RB) over 3 rushing attempts (-105)
Peyton Manning over 290 Passing Yards (-105)
I want Peyton to win, he is everything you want an athlete to be, but I think the Hawks take it by 6.
Hope I am wrong.
you had the Turbin bet right. nicely done.
Orphan of the road, did you stop watching the Super Bowl in about 1998? The past 15 or so SB’s have been pretty competitive, almost maybe even exciting, if you cared about who wins. The last true blowout was the Ravens over possibly the worst SB team ever the ’01 Giants and since then there have been more exciting games that not. If you think I am Roger Goodell writing, wouldn’t my pen name be Ginger Balczak?
Seventeen games with winning margins of seven points or less out of 48.
Recent games have been competitive so maybe the tide has turned. But historically they are let downs if you don’t have a dog in the fight.
And I’ve watched the dog games to the end often to the bewilderment of the Super Bowl party crowd.
We can all have our opinions but not our own facts.
Orphan knocked this one out of the park.