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Sun. Feb 06, 2005

A Kinder Gentler Bowl

Last year, I asked, “Question: How much stupidity can form around one simple football game? Answer: In America, stupidity knows no boundaries.”

Well, over the last year, you might say some boundaries were established. The only stupid mishap I saw this year was when Coach Belichick came out of the tunnel at the start of the game, and he went to the wrong bench. Um, other side of the field, Coach. After that, he was fairly flawless.

As always, the game is only a part of the show on Super Sunday. I tuned in briefly to the interminable pre-game show … and they were playing golf. When you include a golf tournament in your football pre-game show, you may need to review your content priorities. But the pre-game show jumped the shark ages ago, and this year we didn’t even get an All-Madden team.

The game itself got off to a slowish start, with maybe two first downs in the first eight minutes of the game. Both teams took a while getting untracked. But for the crucial last third of the game, Philadelphia just didn’t play like a champion should. They were sloppy, turning over the ball too many times. Their clock management in the last four minutes of the game was criminal. Like they just felt no urgency at all, when they needed to score twice in the time remaining. They dilly-dallied their way to a touchdown, but by then, it was too late. They found themselves with 46 seconds to go 96 yards. And no timeouts. They’ll have many long months to replay that in their heads.

Meanwhile, the Patriots just kept on keepin’ on. In the second half, their offense began to consistently ask questions the Philadelphia defense could not answer. Three Super Bowl championships in four seasons doesn’t just happen because you’re lucky. That poise was the difference today.

And of course, half the fun of the Super Bowl is the commercials. Last year, a lot of them pushed the envelope, shredded it, and fell to the floor with an ugly wet splat (remember a farting horse to sell beer?). This year, FedEx mocked the whole concept of Super Bowl advertising, with a clever list showing things a Super Bowl commercial needs to be successful (like “Celebrity,” “Dancing Animal,” “Groin Kick,” etc.). Alone, at the very end … “Product Message (optional)”. That came from the mind of one highly cynical ad person. I’d love to buy them a beer.

I was also quite amused by the McDonalds commercial for the french fry that looks just like Abraham Lincoln. And not only is there a web site, lincolnfry.com, there’s a blog ... and a Yahoo Auction, so you can make the fry your own. It’s kind of like a cross between the Subservient Chicken “promotion” for Burger King, and the recent eBay auction of the grilled cheese sandwich that looked like a portrait of Christ. Or his Mother Mary. Or something. The ad industry exists to regurgitate social trends back at us, in hopes we’ll buy what we’ve already been sold.

The careerbuilder.com ad with the monkeys was good. Putting monkeys in your ad is always a safe bet on Super Sunday. But Godaddy’s “faux Congressional hearing” commercial struck me as bizarre. You’ve got what looked like a refugee Hooters girl spilling her cleavage in front of a committee (and they clearly overdubbed what she said, because her lips said “seven ninety five,” but her voice said “eight ninety five”), and this has what to do with registering a domain? I guess it was supposed to be a parody of our politically correct environment, but I just found it bizarre. It reminded me of the $40 million in ads spent on the 2000 Super Bowl by dot com companies that soon thereafter tanked.

But one commercial for Ameriquest was my absolute favorite, because it mimicked something I’ve seen. I see it all over, but this one reminded me of the time I recently stopped at the convenience store. There’s one other customer in the store, near the rack I need … talking to himself. In a rather agitated way. As I got closer I finally realized he had a cell phone on his hip, and one of those “hip” ear buds with a mic in the cord. But to any passerby, he looks and sounds just like any deranged person you might see walking the streets, the kind you might ought to avoid.

In the commercial, a guy at a convenience store is doing just that. He’s talking to someone about an expensive estimate to build a deck. And by the time he gets to the cashier, he’s saying “You’re getting robbed … no really, I mean it, you’re getting robbed.” He then gets maced, beaten and tased by the store owners. I don’t know exactly what it had to do with mortgages, but it was a piece of creative social vengeance that I found hilariously satisfying.

Another thing I found hilarious (though it wasn’t intentional) was Fox’s use of short video clips of players (even the whole offensive line), rather than still photos. This had to be done during the busy week leading up to the game, and they had to get each of the 22 starters on each team to “just stand there in front of the camera and look pleasant and natural … for ten seconds straight.” The results were slightly absurd at times.

Last year, I tuned out at half time, and missed the big showing, er, I mean, the big show. Not this year. If Paul McCartney was going to bare some breast, I wanted to witness it. Though he took off his jacket at one point, there was no McTitty seen, and no Jessica Simpson style lip synch disaster. His performance was as solidly professional as it was the two times I’ve seen him live. But his choice to do only songs from 30 to 40 years ago just made me look around for the ones who were missing. Not just John and George, but Linda, too. But there was just Paul.

And though this year’s game was a far tamer enterprise than last years, I do have a beef or two. With certain players, after a catch or a sack, their head leaves the game, as their eyes turn upward to the scoreboard replay, so they can watch how studly they were (Terrell Owens did this quite a bit). These guys review game tapes the first of each week. They can get copies of every play they’ve made all year. But it’s important to them to see it immediately, rather than think about what’s next.

And in other cases after a catch or a tackle, they’d play to the cameras in the end zone. Stylin’ and voguein’. There needs to be a rule against that. OK, so you scored a touchdown. Do your little special dance, whoop it up, whatever. I’ll give you that. But when you make a tackle, or a catch, you get up and do the Incredible Hulk pose with a primal scream, or flap your wings like some odd bird? Isn’t tackling and catching what you get paid for?

Commissioner Stott dictates that next season, animal imitations and wrestling poses on the field of play when no points have been scored will result in a 15 yard penalty. Play ball. Football.

Later: You’ll find the Super Bowl ads online here.