Super Bowl 53: My top 10 Whitt-y observations . . .
- The Silence of the Rams. I mean, let’s be honest. There wasn’t a dang thang “super” about that bowl. Not the game. Not the halftime. Not the commercials. Not the pre- nor post-. Had that game been played in early October, we all would’ve switched over to … anything else. If that was the first NFL game you watched, it would also be your last.
- Patriots 13, Maroon 5, Rams 3. Lowest-scoring game in Super Bowl history.
- Biggest drama of the day was CBS’ Tracy Wolfson almost getting swallowed by the Tom Brady post-game mosh pit. The payoff for her patience: “I wish we would’ve played better offensively,” Brady told her, “but we’re Super Bowl champs.”
- Of New England’s six Super Bowl wins, this 10-point margin of victory was their largest. But let’s not even begin talking about this team as one of the all-time greats. The Patriots lost five games in the regular season, all to teams that didn’t even make the playoffs.
- Remember how the Rams’ running game shredded the Cowboys’ defense to the tune of 48 carries for 273 yards in their Divisional playoff game? In the next two games, LA produced 44 carries for only 139 yards including a paltry 18 for 62 against the Patriots. The NFL’s all-time 11th highest-scoring team couldn’t manage a single touchdown against a New England defense that featured one Pro Bowl player – cornerback Stephon Gilmore.
- Like a lot of folks I know, did you boycott this S*per Bowl? Here’s what you missed: Brady hit Rob Gronkowski on a clutch throw down the middle in the fourth quarter. The Rams’ Brandin Cooks dropped a touchdown, and then Jared Goff’s woefully underthrown pass was intercepted late by Gilmore. That’s it. The end. This over-hyped event was the biggest fraud of a flop since Fyre Festival.
- Poor Boston sports fans. They had to wait a whole 98 days between championships by the Red Sox and Patriots. A 17-year-old in Boston has now lived through 12 championship seasons. His 17-year-old contemporary in DFW has experienced exactly one.
- My prediction: The team that should have represented the NFC – Sean Payton, Drew Brees and the Saints – would have scored more than three points. Guaranteed.
- At the beginning of this season, Julian Edelman was suspended four games for testing positive for taking performance enhancing drugs. At the end of the season, he was the Super Bowl MVP for catching 10 passes for 141 yards. Edelman, who had only one reception in college and was the 232nd overall pick in the 2009 draft, has no more natural talent than Cowboys slot receiver Cole Beasley. But while Edelman is now immortal, Beasley may soon be an ex-Cowboy. Frustrating to Beasley and Cowboys fans why he runs off the field screaming, “Am I not part of this f*cking game plan?!”, at Jason Garrett and then publicly claims that Dallas’ front office dictates who passes are thrown to.
- Brady has won six Super Bowls, one more than the Cowboys. But let’s not forget that he wouldn’t even have been in Atlanta today if Chiefs linebacker Dee Ford wouldn’t have inexplicably lined up in the neutral zone for a penalty that negated a game-sealing interception two weeks ago in Kansas City. It’s best to be lucky and good.