Super Bowl Observations

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Published on February 6, 2012

I watched the Super Bowl at home by myself in the dark yesterday for reasons I detailed on the SXM show. I was sober, and after a large meal at 1:30 pm PT, didn't eat anything. I didn't Tweet or blog during the game. Someone across the street had a party, and I found the cheering and noisy drunken idiocy emanating from their house increasingly infuriating.

After the Patriots took the lead at the end of the first half, one largely dominated by the Giants, I realized how much I hate the halftime show. I have nothing original to say about Madonna, and the insults about her age I saw on Twitter were fairly predictable. But I kept thinking "who gives a f|STAR||STAR||STAR| about this?" (I did find the dude in the dress bouncing up and down on the rope seemingly on his testicles to be disturbing.)

For most of the second half, I was nervously alternating between despair and faint hope. The commercials seemed to be more frequent, even more inane than usual and designed specifically to annoy me. When the Giants got the ball on the final drive, it was the first time in the second half I thought they might actually win.

Of course, I was ecstatic when they scored the go-ahead touchdown, even if it was a bad play. In 2007, I would have been beside myself as those Patriots were far scarier. Even so, the Pats 4th-and-16 conversion, and the hail mary getting tipped made it more stressful than it needed to be.

Most of the key plays have been discussed elsewhere, but there are a few that stood out to me:

Chase Blackburn's interception was a great play. Tom Brady escaped what looked like a sure sack, bought a lot of time and saw Rob Gronkowski standing by himself far down the field. While Brady's pass was short, Blackburn was nowhere near Gonkowski when he released it and somehow got himself into position and made a nice catch. Blackburn is a middle linebacker with average-at-best speed, but it showed incredible alertness to stay with the play and get into position. Of course, had Gronkowski been healthy, you have to think he would have at least broken up the play. And while the result was like good punt for New England, it was a first-down throw, so it was essentially worth two incomplete passes.

The Giants were lucky to recover both of their fumbles (the Victor Cruz one was a non-event because the Pats had 12 on the field, and it's not clear that he wouldn't have been more open, or someone else wouldn't have instead if there were only 11). They should be expected to recover only one.

The Wes Welker drop was huge. Granted Tom Brady threw the ball a little behind him, but Welker usually makes that catch. It would have given the Pats the ball on the Giants 10 yard line with four minutes left. The Giants would have had to keep them out of the end zone (otherwise the game was over), and even so they would have been down five with no timeouts and two minutes left.

It's understandable why Ahmad Bradshaw couldn't stop himself from scoring the go-ahead TD, but why weren't the Giants kneeling on it twice there anyway? Does it really matter if they kick from the 1-yard line or the 8? The Pats would have gotten the ball down two with 17 seconds left and no timeouts. Assuming a touchback on the kickoff, a FG is impossible, so NE would still have needed a TD to win. Also if Hakeem Nicks sits down after the first down, the Giants could kneel three times and run the clock down to three seconds and kick the FG. Of course, Nicks might not have known he had the first down.

Some other notes

The Giants defense held Brady to 6.7 YPA. They held Aaron Rodgers to 5.7 and Matt Ryan to 4.9. Somehow Alex Smith got 7.5.

I had Justin Tuck at 50:1 to win MVP. He had two sacks, three tackles and caused a safety. After the game, I knew Eli would be part of the equation, but thought they might be co-MVPs as a make-up call of sorts from 2007 when Tuck should have won.

I didn't understand how the Patriots were able to take away the deep throws AND double Victor Cruz. And even Hakeem Nicks wasn't running around wide open most of the time. Even the deep throw to Manningham was into perfect coverage.

I didn't like seeing Aaron Ross celebrate a tackle after an 11-yard gain, or Victor Cruz doing a salsa dance after a short completion. Focus on the war, not the minor skirmishes.

The Giants FG drive down 17 - 9 seemed futile at the time, but it was actually huge. The Pats offense had the Giants defense on its heels for two straight long drives, and it gave both sides just enough of a break to reset.

Eli Manning seemed less nervous than Tom Brady. In fact, Eli is as calm as any quarterback I've seen in the Super Bowl. (Aaron Rodgers is similar in demeanor).

The Giants are in good shape heading into next year with Manning in his prime, Nicks and Cruz returning and Jason Pierre-Paul and Tuck on the defensive line.