Thursday, February 2, 2012
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Thursday, February 2, 2012 |
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Community | Obits | Editorial & Columnists | Society | Sports | Education | Classified Ads | Calendar of Events | Features | Newsbriefs | Legals | Archives | Subscriptions | New Photo Gallery |
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Behind The Scoreboard It’s time for the big game Readers be aware, this article just might be a bit statistical. Since I am the writer I will share the brunt of the blame, but you might want to attribute a smidgen of it to Barbara Taylor (the go-to lady at The South Reporter), who asked me on Friday, “Why is there such a ‘letdown’ feeling when football season ends?” I had to assess my many years of following the greatest sport in the world for all of these years. Before the inception of the Super Bowl, there were NFL championship games but they never reached the height of the Super Bowl era. Super Bowl I was played on January 15, 1967, which was won by the Green Bay Packers. But the concept of the Super Bowl mentality didn’t really take fire until four years later in 1970 when Super Bowl IV was played on January 11. Bear in mind that there were many skeptics who felt the “upstart” AFL was not in the same league with the NFL. Never mind that the AFL had won one of the three games played. The Kansas City Chiefs met and defeated the Minnesota Vikings 23-7 in that game which squared the record at two titles each. That game is identified as the “flagship” of all those which followed. It set an attendance record of 80,562 with an earned revenue of almost $4 million ($3,817,872.69). Len Dawson quarterbacked the winners, completed 12 of 17 passes and was the MVP of the game. His 46-yard pass to Otis Taylor sealed the deal. This was the first Super Bowl appearance for the Vikings. This was also the Fran Tarkenton era and the Vikes were tabbed at the time as the “best NFL team” which never won a Super Bowl (they would go three more times, coming up empty each trip). Don’t tag them as the worst entry in the biggest stakes, consider the Buffalo Bills who went four consecutive years (91-94) and didn’t win a single one. And that brings us to the current number (well, skipping ahead a few years, of course), XLVI. The New York Giants made their first appearance in Super Bowl XXI. They won their last SB in XLII (2008). They are tied with their opponents at three bowls each and will resolve that on February 5. Well, one team will. Their opponents (the new England Patriots) won back to back in XXXVIII and XXXIX. The talk is that Eli Manning is probably rated somewhere with the top 15 quarterbacks in today’s NFL. Eli stated this past week that he ranked himself within the first five. He has solid ground since he broke his brother’s and John Unitas’ (this writer’s favorite of all time) record of touchdown passes (14) in post season. Kudos to Eli and all the Giants, but this hack has to go with the Patriots. The Kool-Aid made me do it. |
     
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