The text came through at 8:47 a.m. on Monday, an ungodly time most days of the week, but especially the day after the Super Bowl.
“worst super bowl ever” said the text, because using capital letters where appropriate is difficult in this day and age.
Subsequently, I went online and started reading about how lots of other people thought it was a boring Super Bowl. One columnist at the Globe and Mail wrote about his Super Bowl viewing experience, and provided a valuable anecdote about ironing clothes during the game and having a conversation with his cat.
I got the impression he doesn’t even like football, but he is very fond of the cat.
As an aside, cats are weird – they do strange things and you can never be sure they’re not getting ready to kill you.
But enough about our four-legged, furry frenemies.
Apparently, the following puts me in the minority: I thought the 13-3 New England Patriots win over the Los Angeles Rams was a tense, interesting game. Close until the very end, when every play meant a lot, it was tied 3-3 in the fourth quarter before New England pulled away late, nailing down their sixth Super Bowl title.
I can understand – but don’t agree – why some would find it a dull Super Bowl: a touchdown wasn’t being scored every five minutes, there were no gunfights or car crashes (to use a cinematic reference), and coloured lights weren’t flashing on and off, which would distract those with short attention spans.
It was, however, a display of great defence, of tremendous defensive game-planning (and the execution of it) on the part of both teams.
The Rams’ defence went after Tom Brady and limited him about as well as any team could, while the Patriots were masterful in confusing the Rams’ offence with brilliant disguises. (As much as New England deserved to win – and they did – I can’t get one penalty out of mind: it was still tied 3-3 in the fourth quarter when the Rams got called for a questionable holding penalty. Instead of having a first down in Patriots territory, L.A. was pushed back into its own end of the field, and that was as close as they would get to taking a lead in this game).
It’s too bad – but not completely surprising – that a lot of people didn’t enjoy the game. Defensive slugfests in football are so under-rated.
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(Almost) Non-Sports Thoughts of the Week:
• There is Internet outrage due to the lack of outrage over Maroon 5 singer Adam Levine tearing off his shirt during the Super Bowl half-time performance, thereby exposing his nipples. Because years ago, you see, Janet Jackson had her breast accidently-on-purpose exposed (with a pastie over her nipple, so we knew right there it’d been planned) during the Super Bowl half-time show, and she was vilified for it.
We shouldn’t have to explain why a woman’s breast being exposed in public is different than if it were a man’s, so we won’t.
• Hockey brawl? I didn’t see one, and I watched the video.
That wasn’t a hockey brawl on Feb. 2 between Acadia University and the StFX X-Men. It was a like a pajama party, a bunch of liberal arts students trying to slap the other guy and attempting to pull each other’s hair out. There were a few other players waltzing around the rink with each other, pretending they wanted to fight, but you see livelier brawls on school playgrounds.
Kevin Adshade is a writer with The News. His column appears each week.
