The Best Thing About the Super Bowl

Look, I'm as excited as the next guy about the big game tomorrow. By all accounts, it should be a tight game with the full complement of jaw-dropping plays by some of the NFL's biggest stars.

But the best thing about the Super Bowl ain't the action on the field. So, like the guys says, who do ya like?

The Pack? The over? First personal foul? Number of coach's challenges? Tails on the coin toss?

Look, you don't have to be a degenerate to get a thrill from a friendly Super Bowl wager and you haven't lived until you've had a C-note riding on the length of the Star Spangled Banner. But the hot action at my regular Super Bowl party the last few years has been on the commercials. And this year, you don't have to close your eyes and roll the dice on best animal gag to win a quick buck on an ad like this one from last year.

Many of this year's much-awaited spots have been leaked in advance and the good folks over at Mashable have a nice catalog of what you might expect to see between whistles Sunday night: sneak peak at the Super Bowl XLV commercials.

So good luck tomorrow night, and don't let them say I never gave you a good tip!

Heresy

The following is Part One of a three-part series by guest contributor Pat Downes.

I’m about to make an outrageous claim:

College football is superior to pro football.

I know my timing is a bit odd. I’m blasting this heretical opinion on the eve on pro football’s highest of holy days, seemingly dissing America’s most popular sport as it continues on its relentless ascent to unprecedented levels of popularity.

And I’m making this claim on the heels of a college football season that began with a rash of agent-driven rule-breaking, saw the deaths of players and student managers at Mississippi State and Notre Dame, and ended with the Heisman and national championship trophies being awarded to an essentially professional team financed by a comically corrupt cadre of crackers.

But even now, with the NFL at its zenith, and college football arguably at low ebb, I’m making this claim: college football is superior to pro football.

I’ve got nothing against pro football. I love the game, watch it regularly, and, like all other right-thinking, patriotic Americans, will be rooting heartily against the Packers on Sunday. And I’m not suffering from any delusions about the relative levels of play. The typical NFL athlete – at any position – is a rare physical and mental specimen in peak condition, and every game is an intricately choreographed wonder. College athletes, on the other hand, are teenagers. Athletically, their skills vary, and ideally (outside of the SEC) they’re part-timers. Moreover, some programs have substantial financial resources and an institutional commitment to the game, and some don’t. You’re simply not going to get the consistently refined product at the college level that you get in the NFL. (There’s also an element of corruption in the college game that threatens the whole enterprise – a subject for another day).

But college football has vast reserves of three things that the NFL lacks: history, variety, and passion.

I’ll deal with the first one today, and tackle the other two in separate posts next week and the week after.

History

College teams were selling out the country’s most important stadiums, inspiring Pulitzer-worthy literature and uniting millions of Americans when the professional game consisted of a handful of dubious characters bumbling their way around near-deserted cow pastures. (I exaggerate only a little).

In the first half of the 20th century, there were four American sports that mattered: baseball, horse racing, boxing and college football. Along with baseball, college football was the most popular. Along with baseball (e.g., Jackie Robinson) and boxing (e.g., Joe Louis), college football had the most significant impact on the culture at large.

The first football game ever played was a college game. It was played just a few short years after the Civil War, on College Field, in New Brunswick, New Jersey. Rutgers beat Princeton, 6-4. The eastern teams, especially the Ivy League, dominated in the early decades. The game moved west as the 19th century progressed and blossomed in popularity.

A squad from the University of Michigan taught the game to a team from a Catholic school in South Bend, Indiana in 1887 and, in short order, the latter team became so powerful, regularly taking on and beating the WASP-dominated teams of the elite eastern schools, that it formed a rallying point for millions of urban ethnic immigrants (and their children) and became a meaningful part of the story of those immigrants’ assimilation into the American culture.

In every part of the country, even in places where the population was relatively sparse, college football programs developed a following beyond their alumni base and formed a focal point for the development of a regional identity. For many people in many parts of the country, for at least a century, college football was the game.

That history matters today because it stays with us. It forms a thread in the narrative of today’s games and connects our experience with our parents’ experience and their parents’ experience. Pro football may, in some ways, connect us with our fathers, but college football connects us with ancestors we never even knew.

When Alabama plays Auburn next year, the game won’t just be about the matchup of two elite modern-day squads, it’ll be about Auburn’s inaugural victory in 1893, and about Alabama coach Doc Pollard infuriating Auburn coach Mike Donahue with his elaborate formations and shifts back in ’06 and ’07. It’ll be about Joe Namath’s furious comeback in ’64. It’ll be about ’71’s titanic battle of undefeated programs, or ’72’s “Punt Bama Punt” classic. Those stories are as much a part of the game as Saban or Fairley or Newton or Chizik.

In the NFL there are a few games like that, but they’re largely of more recent vintage and they’re rarely incorporated into the narrative of this year’s game. The 1958 Championship Game between the Colts and the Giants is one of those games. They called it The Greatest Game Ever Played. Your father may even recall watching it on TV when he was a little boy. But when the Colts play the Giants these days, you probably won’t hear very much about it – the tabloids will be too focused on whether the Manning brothers exchanged text messages that week.

Terence Mann’s soliloquy from Field of Dreams is one of the great passages in film history: “The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time.” This sentiment applies with nearly equal force to college football. Does it apply to pro football? Eh, maybe... get back to me in a century or so and we’ll see.

Check back in next week for Part Two of Pat's "Heresy" series, "Variety."

Rubber Meets Road Today in Pro Playoff Poker

Wild Card weekend is but a memory and the stage is now set for four playoff games which will go a long way to determining SmackJabber's inaugural Pro Playoff Poker Champion. Today at 4:30, the AFC Divisional Round gets under way as the Steelers host the Ravens, who are coming off of a 30-7 road demolishment of upstart Kansas City. And tonight at 8, Green Bay also looks for a 2nd straight road playoff win as the Packers travel to Atlanta to take on the Falcons. The conference title matchups will be finalized tomorrow when the Bears host the surprising Seahawks (1pm) and Super Bowl favorite New England welcomes the Jets (4:30pm).

The Jets and Seahawks dashed many a contestants' dreams last week, not the least of which were aarnn, dmurph and kenscrx, who sit with just 2 points overall and a dreaded Queen in danger of advancing from every divisional round game. On the opposite end of the spectrum, lifted99 and patdownes lead the pack with 14 points.

Looking forward, the only result this weekend that matters to lifted99 (whose maximum score stands at 32) is a New England win over the Jets. From there, he will continue to root for an AA Super Bowl, with Pats either facing the Falcons or getting a re-match of Super Bowl XXXI (when Brett Favre grabbed his only championship ring at the expense of the Parcells-led Pats). Chicagoland native patdownes has a heck of a lot riding on the Bears game tomorrow. A Seahawks win would leave him with a maximum of only 28 points, likely dooming his championship aspirations - the best patdownes can do now is a couple AK conference championship showdowns, netting 4 additional points this weekend leaving open the possibility of 15 more if Chicago reaches the Super Bowl and faces one of Pittsburgh or Baltimore (this would net him his current max of 33).

Sitting in third and fourth place currently are dwfiresound (12 points) and Bowl Game Blackjack champion popchaunce (11). Each assigned Queens to both Chicago and the upstart Seahawks, guaranteeing them a Queen in their NFC title matchup and leaving them with a narrow path to the PPP money. For dwfiresound, it's simple - he will post his max score of 33 if Green Bay reaches the Super Bowl and the Jets lose to the Patriots tomorrow. Even the best case scenario for popchaunce is not so rosy. He cannot score more than 28 points under any scenario.

Here are the outlooks for the six teams currently sitting just outside the money with 10 points:

LuckyPierre (31 max) guaranteed himself pocket rockets in the AFC title game, correctly predicting the Jets (Ace) defeat of the Colts and the Ravens (Ace) over the Chiefs. He needs all chalk on the NFC side though, and will therefore be a big Falcons (King) and Bears (King) fan tonight and tomorrow, respectively. LP will then support the AFC (with the particular team he'll root on depending on which other contestants remain in contention).

Matt (31 max) need not concern himself with today's games; he need only root against the Jets (Queen) and Seahawks (Queen). Assuming those underdogs' hopes are extinguished tomorrow, Matt becomes an NFC fan the rest of the way, as any such Super Bowl champ would earn him his potential (but which NFC team represents the conference in the Super Bowl should matter greatly to him; e.g., he may need to root against the Bears in order to outshine patdownes).

Yours truly (thalernd, 31 max) put too much faith in Peyton Manning last week, and will therefore be among the many PPP Patriots (Ace) fans, tomorrow afternoon (as well those who will root thusly with a finger down their throats). In fact, I will have the same rooting interests as Matt this weekend, with the possible addition of a Packers win over Atlanta, which would bring a welcome detriment to opponents, such as LuckyPierre, who failed to see the potential of Aaron Rogers & company). From there, Matt and I will become natural enemies as I take up the AFC banner.

nschell (29 max), parhangelsky's (28 max), bob (28 max) appear to be long shots at the moment.

Other contestants with a chance to notch 30+ points:

32 Max:
SmackJabber PTB, quazflawless (32 max) would have some serious scratch on the line this weekend if he was not a site admin because he is one of only four remaining contestants with a chance to line up nothing but bullets (AA) the rest of the way. If chalk prevails in the AFC (NE and PIT) this weekend and the Packers and Bears play for the NFC's crown, quaz will be assured of 32 points, and at least a top 3 finish - it appears that an AFC Super Bowl win and/or a Bears NFC title under these circumstances would give quaz the PPP championship.

31 Max:
-SaraReinthaler (31 max) will root for Chicago and Baltimore generally, and needs the Packers to lose tonight.
-nnaislteys (31 max) needs AFC chalk this weekend, followed by a Green Bay run to the Super Bowl to cash.
-thepudge (31 max), another team who can matchup up all four Aces in the conference championships needs chalk in all four games this weekend (NE, PIT, ATL, CHI) to make it happen. His guaranteed 31 points will be most effective if the Steelers (A spades) or Falcons (A hearts) win the Lombardi Trophy.
-custybri (31 max) also has a shot at the 4-Ace Monte, but his magic numbers are riding on the Jets, Steelers, Packers and Bears.


30 Max:
-lbeck needs the Jets to lose tomorrow, Atlanta to win it all, and the Falcons to face Chicago in the NFC title game. And it probably wouldn't hurt her if the Ravens were the AFC Super Bowl rep.
-Becked is another Falcons/Bears fan and could tie lbeck with 30 if he achieves his optimal results (Becked's Ace of Diamonds on the Falcons would trump lbeck's Ace of Clubs on the Dirty Birds should that scenario play out).
-dnoyd07 needs AFC chalk this weekend, along with a Packers or Falcons title run to contend for a prize.
JohnAurora (30 max) prefers the Falcons version of the dnoyd07 scenario, above. Various other tiebreak implications exist.
-TigerLillyLisa (30 max) is likely in need of Ravens Super Bowl title, and would probably prefer Green Bay as their opponent.
-D0LeM1Te (30 max) is the final contestant eligible to Ace out the rest of the game and, like thepudge, looks for all of the favorites (NE, PIT, ATL and CHI) to win their games this weekend. A repeat of Super Bowl XX (Bears over Pats) is likely his best possible outcome.

Good luck to everyone! Enjoy the games!