by Bob Sparrow
I’m trying to make the transition . . . wait, NO I’m not ‘transitioning’, I’m simply trying to transition from watching football 4-5 days a week to watching football zero days a week FOR THE NEXT SEVEN MONTHS!!!. This is not going to be easy! I thought the college football season ended in Cinderella-like fashion with the Curt Cignetti-led Indiana Hoosiers winning their first ever National Championship behind Heisman Trophy winning quarterback, Fernando Mendosa. Great stuff!!
I’m writing this before the Super Bowl, so I’ll have no highlights of the game (hopefully there will be highlights), the commercials (they could be more entertaining than the game) or the half-time performance (which has already caused some controversy). I will write the end of the blog after the game – I’m sure I’ll have a pithy comment or two.
For me the Super Bowl is less Cinderella and more Ursula, the half-woman, half-octopus, from The Little Mermaid. I know, I’m bummed because the 49ers didn’t make it, nor did any of the other California teams, the Ram or the Chargers. I realize there was a West Coast team in the Super Bowl, and there was a West Coast player in quarterback, Sam Darnold, who is a San Clemente, Orange County guy; but my Pete Carroll hangover, and the fact that the Seahawks kicked the 49ers out of the playoffs this year, made it hard for me to root for them. But I’m not particularly a New England fan either. Haven’t we all been exposed to enough Patriot history this past year with 74-year-old, ex-coach, Bill Belichick canoodling with his 24-year-old girlfriend, plus having to listen to Tom Brady’s pedantic color-commentating? I digress. I do like Patriot quarterback Drake Maye and if the Patriots won, Mike Vrabel is the only person to win the Super Bowl as a player, an assistant coach and a head coach – but you probably heard all that if you watched the game.
The Super Bowl doesn’t just mark the end of football season, Super Bowl parties officially mark the end of my New Year’s Resolutions – way too much eating, drinking and weight gaining! As they say in sports . . . ‘Wait ’til next year’!
My usual remedy for ‘Lackofgridiron’ in my diet or Couch Potato Syndrome, is trying to pretend that PGA golf is just as exciting . . . it isn’t! But this year we have a one-step program to help bridge the gap between football and . . . next year’s football – the Winter Olympics. This year’s Olympics are coming to us from Milan and picturesque Cortina d’Ampezzo, which is often called the ‘Queen of the Dolomites’ – part of the northern Italian Alps. Beautiful! So, forget about ‘Off Sides’, ‘Safety Blitz’ and ‘Roughing the Passer’ and start thinking of Double Axles, Moguls and “Gosh it looks cold over there.”
Much as we try to get away from politics, and one would think that the Olympics should be a good place to do that, this year we find that Russia is banned from competing due to their invasion of Ukraine. However, Russian athletes, who voice to the Olympic Committee that they do not support the war, can compete as ‘Individual Neutral Athletes’ – no Russian flag ceremony if they win, but back home they will face Russian roulette if they lose.
Post Super Bowl notes:
The Game: I can’t really comment on the game, it was so boring in the first half I fell asleep. The Commercials: For a cost of between $8 – $10 million dollars for 30 seconds, I was expecting more – pretty blah. The Prop bets: I had a tip that the Gatorade was going to be purple, so I bet it big . . . it was green. The Half Time Show: My Spanish is a little weak, so I’m still trying to translate Bad Bunny’s song. Nah, I was still sleeping.
