Fake It ‘Til You Make It: Super Bowl XLVIII
That’s Super Bowl 48, for those of you that aren’t from the Roman Empire. Honestly guys, I don’t want to write about the Super Bowl. I mean, I love football and everything, but the Super Bowl isn’t really about football. It is about queso and commercials, nip slips and uplifting stories about athletes overcoming adversity… and there is also a football game.
It’s the last game of the season, so in a way, it should be my favorite thing. But my team isn’t in it this year. They didn’t even make the playoffs! And what makes it an extra bitter pill to swallow is the game is being played on MY team’s home field… in the city I JUST moved away from! So you will pardon me if I am a little snarky and annoyed at the whole thing.
But it is football, after all, and it’s Bruno Mars and it’s New York City (technically East Rutherford, New Jersey). And these are all things I love. Besides, I’m here to help you carry on a Super Bowl conversation that isn’t about how cold it’s gonna be (predicted 34 degrees at kickoff). Or give you the skills to either console or rejoice with your cubicle mate from Seattle the morning after.
Here are eight pieces of trivia, conversation starters and a little bit of smack talk for the last game of the NFL season.
The last time the top defense played the top offense in the Super Bowl, the defense won.
“Offense wins games, defense wins championships” is a quote that will probably get thrown around A LOT by commentators this Sunday. The Seattle Seahawks have the top defense in the NFL and the Broncos, the top offense. The last time that happened was when the NY Giants played the Buffalo Bills in 1990. And the Giants won. I remember because I was 10 and my mom got us little NY Giants football cakes to celebrate. So it explains why the Seahawks are a 3-point favorite.
I’ve got a prop bet that one of the members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers takes off their shirt during the halftime show.
Super Bowl betting can be a great way to get into the game. You can buy a square in your office pool, but an even better way to get into the whole Super Bowl experience is getting in on some prop or side bets. There are actual lines in Vegas on things like “What color Gatorade will the winning team pour on their coach?” and “How long will it take Renee Fleming to sing the national anthem?”
With Seattle and Denver in the Super Bowl, the halftime show should be Snoop Dogg.
Some people are dubbing this the Weed Bowl since Washington and Colorado are the only states in the union that allow recreational marijuana use. Bruno Mars and the Chili Peppers will be great, but I’d love to see them cover some Cyprus Hill or Phish.
New York may be making a lot of money off the Super Bowl, but Omaha is the city trending on Twitter because of it.
“Omaha!” is Broncos QB Peyton Manning’s pre-snap call. You can hear him yell it generally before he throws a pass, but sometimes it’s a fake, so he has time to read the defense. There’s a prop bet on how many times he says it. The Omaha Tourism Bureau called it “the least expensive Super Bowl commercial of the year”. And some airlines are running deals to Omaha, Nebraska based on the city’s new found celebrity because ya know… how else are you gonna get people to come to Omaha?
It just has a better consistency.
Y’all, I’m not sure if you know this, but we are in a crisis. A Cheesepocolypse. There is a shortage of the perfectly melting Velveeta that goes in most dips. A recall on the “cheese food stuff” is causing a gap in all your Super Bowl snack tables. Sure, you could use real cheese, but the dip will turn out lumpy and gooey. Your best bet at this point is to make some Spinach Artichoke dip or another dip that is supposed to be lumpy and gooey.
Yea, Richard Sherman might be a showboating moron, but he did graduate Stanford with a 3.9 GPA
At this point we’ve all seen the Erin Andrews sideline interview with cornerback Richard Sherman where he trash talks 49’ers receiver Michael Crabtree and generally acts a fool. But what you may not know about the 25 year old player straight out of Compton, is that he is a graduate of Stanford University with a near perfect GPA. While he may technically be a smartypants, he did get one thing wrong, he’s not the best cornerback in the league, those honors officially go to Patrick Peterson of the Arizona Cardinals and Joe Haden of the Cleveland Browns, although neither of them are playing in the Super Bowl.
I want to root against Richard Sherman, but I want to root for Derrick Coleman.
Rooting against Sherman, means also rooting against one of the most inspirational stories of the Super Bowl. Fullback Derrick Coleman has been legally deaf since the age of 3. He played football for UCLA, but then went undrafted in the NFL. He bounced around a little from team to team, and then landed with the Seahawks. He will be the first legally deaf player in the Super Bowl. The story continues when a 9 year old fan, also deaf, wrote him an adorable letter, and he answered. You can see his inspirational story here.
You hear so much about Peyton Manning, what about Russell Wilson? He’s got two straight seasons with a 100 passer rating!
Peyton Manning will go down in the books as one of the greatest QB’s of all time whether he wins or loses on Sunday. His jersey is the most popular of all NFL jerseys. He makes the most money. And is part of a fricking football dynasty. But let’s talk Seattle’s Wilson for a sec. The guy, in only two years in the NFL, has a perfect passer rating and has over 1000 yards rushing…as a quarterback! As a football fan, I’m excited to see what this guy does by the time he’s Peyton’s age.
Bonus: This year marks the 10th anniversary of Nipplegate.
It’s hard to believe, but 10 Super Bowls ago, we were all doing double takes during the halftime show and asking each other, “Was that Janet Jackson’s nipple?!”. The answer was yes, that was Janet Jackson’s nipple.
FOR MORE INFO
Check out these sites for ALL the Super Bowl XLVIII news, stories, and tidbits.
NFL.com (obviously)
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