Hmm so ... the ... yes there is a football game today. I have not gone through all the match ups, analyzed the xs and os and how they mesh, given due thought to the intangibles (emotions) -- football is a very emotional game sometimes to the point of BS at some levels, but hey these guys are professionals playing for money in the biggest annual event in the American cycle, so who cares if they are a little fired up for "a game" -- so one would think I am not as qualified, as the dudes on TV to comment, but heck it never stopped me before. And really does it stop anyone else. And hey this is America.
I will not make a social commentary of this piece. What does the Super Bowl say about America? Why do WE get so fired up about a game? Is it really that important too us? Should it be? And, what does it say about us as a nation that football essentially gladiators in Roman like coliseums define our most important day of the annual calendar and we cheer as blood and guts are spilled on the stage beneath us and we turn thumbs up or thumbs down as the 4th quarter and final two minutes begin?
I will say this. You all know what the two minute warning is about don't you? Although it is honored at every level, it was implemented not for football but yes for TV. It is a tv break, interesting though, that it has become a defining point of the game such that offenses and defenses both change their tactics once this milestone is reached. Isn't it? Interesting how this game is not strictly defined in and of it self like say a real sport -- baseball --- honoring life long long held traditions -- save for the designated hitter, but hey I digress.
Football is not pure. It has let Television invade it to the point of not just inserting the two minute warning as a commercial break but affecting the way the game is played. Televisions is part of the game, like an eternal coach, one who never has to worry about it's job being lost. It is because of television that we see certain plays, certain defenses, the no huddle offense. It is because of television that the game is played the way it is with two minutes to go.
And so it is perfectly appropriate that this tawdry affair between the pure bride of sport football and the cheating good for nothing shallow vast wasteland and disingenuousness bastard the groom of television should have their love affair most pronounced on Super Bowl Sunday! Isn't it?
Television defines football, we all know that television is not about the programs for they are and this includes sporting events (I'm coming to it here -- America's biggest day of the year) are wrapped around yes the commercials. Football is about television. Television is about commercials. So therefore America's biggest day of the year is not about the game at all but about television commercials. For this is the day the new ones are unveiled started and proceed through the air. This is the biggest day in America because the new television commercials are unveiled the game is secondary. Reflect on that.
Now. Who will win. I pick the Ravens, because ... well ... I don't like the forty-niners. Never have. And this disdain has nothing to do with the fact that I actually met John Brodie (Montana lite). But Brodie played back in the day when football was football. "Yada yada yada, whatever". It's still football and it's still about television and commercials and that my friends is America.
I never have liked the niners it took me years to accept them as the greatest team of the 80s and Joe Montana as the greatest Quarterback ever. Screw Bradshaw (I'm geting my game face on now -- see complete BS yet having played the game it is ingrained in me). But they were Bill Walsh's or was it Joe? Bill was a genius, Joe Montana a virtuoso. Their games were a thing of beauty, and they were completely dominate using finesse (yes I did).
I don't like the niners because they are arrogant they have a sense of entitlement to the title that is rivaled only by the Green Bay Packers who think the trophy is named for them; they wear pink uniforms; and they play dirty defense. Unprofessional, illegal, injury causing defense that has to be practiced and coached.
This last item from above is serious. The idea of holding people up so that your teammates can spear them is dirty illegal and career threatening. It has no place among professionals. It is strictly semi-pro. It is a technique that has to be coached and practiced, at other levels it is tolerated or understood, or the coaches simply turn the other way. Not at this level. To get away with it during the game, it has to be practiced and coached. It is a part of the niners defensive philosophy. And you can bet if I have noted it since last season that the other teams are aware and looking for that one "clean" shotto send a message and end the practice.
This is how it works usually in football, clean play at all levels. If you see the guy with the ball you get in position and you tackle him. That is how the game is played and it is dangerous and violent enough played that way. What the niners do is get into position hold the ball carrier up and let teammates have shots at him while he is helpless or in their grasp. To play this way takes skill and practice to hold someone up instead of making a clean tackle has one purpose and one purpose only and that is to injure the other player It is way beyond the game and it defines this era of niners and it casts a shadow a pall on their past glory.
I hope and pray Ray Lewis and company send a message by playing hard and clean and putting the valued QB on a stretcher, because eventually that will come. That is what comes from his sort of thing. it is that serious and the niners are bringing this on themselves.
So, I am against the niners and for the Ravens. I don't like the niners. They haven't been there before with this group, and I think the stage will overwhelm them.
So, why do I like the Ravens? Well the Ravens got cheated out of their Super Bowl trip last year. They won the AFC championship and had a touchdown taken away from them. They beat the patriots last year and didn't get the win. This year they came back with the same strong defense and a greatly improved offense lead by their star quarterback Shane Falco. He threw the pass last year that was caught for the winning touchdown that got taken away by a bad call. He has a great story a walk on from the strike season scabs or replacements, who was able to stay in the NFL and lead his team to the Super Bowl. And it doesn't hurt that he looks like Keanu Reeves. He has something to prove and so do the rest of the Ravens. It is Ray Lewis's last game and he has something to prove. So offensively and defensively they have more experience and more motivation than the forty whiners (I don't like them).
So, the Ravens sill win because they have experience something to groove and motivation. With Shane Falco their offense has greatly improved and augments one of the great defenses in NFL history. The niners are dirty, they are out -classed and they will be blown out. The only drama is will capochneck the niner QB walk off the field or be carried off like Montana when he ran into his Ray Lewis "LT".
