Super Bowl Thoughts

-The onside kick to begin the 2nd half will likely be the ballsiest thing you'll ever see in a Super Bowl.

-Everyone praised the onside kick because it worked out for the Saints. They would have called it the stupidest thing you'll ever see in a Super Bowl if the Colts recovered.

-Peyton Manning is by far the most valuable player in the NFL. He is the only reason the Colts were in the Super Bowl. There is not a single playmaker on that offense, yet he makes Dallas Clark and Reggie Wayne into Pro Bowlers. The Colts are an 8-win team with, say, Carson Palmer or Eli Manning. With Peyton, they've won at least 12 games SEVEN YEARS in a row.

-Somewhat related to this fact above: if you watched even a little sports coverage in the week preceding the game, you'll hear former NFL players-turned-analysts talk about how Peyton Manning can't be considered the greatest quarterback of all time unless he wins this Super Bowl. How Drew Brees is a very good QB, but becomes an ELITE QB if he wins this game.

It's all about championships for a quarterback.

This one game will determine his legacy.

This argument is STUPID. By this rationale, Trent Dilfer > Dan Marino. (And yes, Dilfer is one of the people making the argument.)

There is no other sport in which a player is more dependent on his teammates. I liken the Colts to the early Broncos teams led by John Elway. Now we can look back and say the Broncos really had no business even being in the three Super Bowls they lost--that Elway incalculably elevated those teams--but that wasn't what people said at the time. The rub? John Elway was no Joe Montana because he didn't win championships.

Let's get real here: Joe Montana was good, but he couldn't hold Elway's jock.

Of course, the whole "Elway can't win the big one" argument has been resolved because the Broncos won a couple championships at the end of Elway's career...but what if Terrell Davis and the rest of the team weren't there? How would we think of Elway today if they didn't win those games?

-I thought the Who had a good showing, which contrasts with a lot of stuff I've seen. I thought they sounded good and looked good. There's never a really good way to do 12 minutes of music when you have the back catalog of the Who, and I'm sure CBS contractually obligated them to play "Won't Get Fooled Again". Still, at age 65, Daltrey has lost only the top end of his range, and Townshend still windmills. They didn't take a single song down a half- (or full-) octave like most musicians fifteen years younger tend to do.

-The commercials, yet again, were meh. I think they've simply run out of ways to surprise us, shock us, or wow us visually.