Imperfektion

The Super Bowl is the quintessential American spectacle. It's Christmas and the World Series rolled into one. Instead of rushing home with gift-wrapped presents for loved ones, people rush home with nachos, salsa, pizza, and beer, and settle in front of the flatscreen to see a winner-take-all extravaganza. One game. One winner. One loser. The hype is beyond anything in American sports, probably even in global sports, save soccer's World Cup, which virtually no one in the United States cares about. The Super Bowl is our World Cup, and it's beyond huge. Even the multimillion dollar Super Bowl commercials attract oversized attention. It's said that some companies spend more money on Super Bowl ads than all their other ads combined during the course of the year. Wowza.

This year was no different. Except this year, the hype was even bigger, if that's possible. This year, one of the teams playing in the Super Bowl, the New England Patriots, came into the game with a perfect 18-0 record. They hadn't lost a single game all year. Not one. That incredibly difficult feat has only been accomplished one other time in the history of the National Football League, by the 1972 Miami Dolphins, who went 17-0 and, most importantly, won the Super Bowl that year. That's once in 42 years. The Patriots came into this game needing only one more win, a Super Bowl win, to make history. No team has ever gone 19-0.

But they couldn't do it. They came close. Verrrrry close. Incredibly close. But in the end, they couldn't get it done. Why? Lots of reasons, most of which have to do with the New York Giants defense. There was zero pressure on the Giants in this game. They were huge underdogs and weren't expected to win. All the pressure was on the Patriots to close the deal on a perfect season. So they not only had to contend with the Giants, who, notwithstanding all the prognostication, were formidable, having nearly beaten the Patriots six weeks ago, but they also had the pressure of history working against them. The pressure of trying to be perfect. The pressure of not losing. The pressure of virtually the entire country outside of New England and maybe Michigan, rooting against them. The unwashed masses hate perfection, don't they? Nobody likes a know-it-all. Somehow, by having won 3 Super Bowls in the last 5 years, the Patriots have become football's version of the New York Yankees in the minds of most people. Everybody hates them now. Myself, I think that's kind of funny, since when I was growing up, the Patriots were abysmal. I remember lots of 2-14 seasons and a colossal blowout loss to the Bears in the Pats' first Super Bowl in 1985. As previously related, they sucked so bad, I abandoned ship for the Oakland Raiders when I was only six years old. Now the Patriots are the Yankees? Brotha please!

In my mind, karma is the culprit behind tonight's Patriot debacle. First, in week 1 of this season, in a game against the New York Jets, the Patriots got in trouble with the league for videotaping the Jets' defensive coaches in the first quarter of the game. That's illegal (even though plenty of other teams probably do it). The Jets caught the videotaper in the first quarter and threw him out of the game, but the damage was done. The Patriots tarnished their reputation and embarrassed themselves. The NFL fined the coach $250,000, the team $500,000, and stripped them of a first round draft pick. And as they kept racking up victories, the jealous and the petty (i.e., New York fans) kept insisting on an "*" next to the Patriots' undefeated record, to footnote the fact that they cheated in that one quarter in their first game. (I wonder if the New York Post minds if we put an * next to all those World Series Championships the Yankees won with their steroid-infused players.) But the karmic capper for the Pats came a few days ago, just before the Super Bowl, when some idiot in the Patriots organization decided to trademark the phrase "Perfect Season." Now THAT is fucking stupid. Everyone knows you don't screw with the sports gods this way. You just don't.

And so, the Patriots lost tonight. They end the season an imperfect 18-1, the New Jersey, I mean the New YORK Giants are the Super Bowl Champions, and the 1972 Miami Dolphins are popping champagne corks.

But don't worry, Tom Brady, you've still got 3 Super Bowl rings, those GQ good looks, and slinky Gisele, who I am sure will, uh, dress your wounds tonight.

We Are (Not) The Champions

I am a bit OCD about reading the New York Sunday Times. It's quite troubling. When I take it in my hands, feel its heft and girth, something comes over me and I feel compelled to read it in its entirety, page by page. Sometimes the situation gets so bad that I can't do anything else until I'm done reading the whole thing. If someone calls me in the middle of my 2.5 hour binge, I get seriously annoyed. Maybe I'm in the middle of the City section reading a little ditty about an old lady who's had two cats as roommates on the Upper West Side for the past 50 years. Or perhaps a story about a nutty miscreant in the East Village who is terrorizing people because he likes jelly donuts. One of my favorite sections happens to be "Modern Love," which contains anecdotes about life and love in 21st Century New York as told by one of my fellow inhabitants. If I get a call in the middle of my Times Trance, I start hopping around like Bugs Bunny over buried gold and my left eye starts twitching. Pity the fool who calls me on a Sunday afternoon and incurs my wrath.

Yes, there is something wrong with me. But if I do not adhere to the calling, I will be left with the nagging sensation that I missed something important, perhaps a story or piece of information that could change my life. Melodramatic you say? Pisshaw!

The upside is that the NYST is a font of inspiration, and there is always something in there that spurs a motivation in me, a blog entry, or the kernel of an idea for future exposition. Today, I came across a story that I found both timely and interesting on this, the Holy Day of Our Super Bowl. Sometime, around 9:30 p.m. tonight, one of the two football teams playing in the Game of Games is going to win. Trust me, it's true. When that happens, an enterprising fellow or feline is going to run out onto the field carrying t-shirts and hats emblazoned with either "Indianapolis Colts Super Bowl Champions" or "Chicago Bears Super Bowl Champions."

We, the viewers and fans, take for granted that Peyton Manning or Brian Urlacher will be wearing a champagne stained version of one of the above this evening. But what of the loser hats and shirts? You see, the NFL has to make both versions, one for the winners, one for the losers. No one knows who is going to win the big game after all, and commercial bets must be covered. What happens to all that useless garb that says "[LOSING TEAM] Super Bowl Champions"?

I always assumed it was thrown away or perhaps torched in a ritualistic bonfire in the parking lot after the game, along with a sacrificial virgin. No, no, no mon frere. According to the NYST, the NFL gives the loser vestments to charity, specifically, to World Vision, a great organization that provides clothing, health care, and food aid to impoverished children and families all over the world. This is why there may come a day when you're watching a Sally Struthers commercial or a 60 Minutes expose on governmental graft in Africa, and all of a sudden you catch view of a young child in Uganda or Nigeria standing in the background, proudly donning a Buffalo Bills 1993 Super Bowl Champions t-shirt or a Seattle Seahawks 2006 Super Bowl Champions hat. (Another thing I have wondered is why the fuck I keep seeing pictures of young kids wearing New York Yankees caps in remote outposts like Namibia, Nepal, and Burma. Before reading this story, it drove me to fits of paranoia -- "Y-Y-Yankee fans.... T-T-They're everywhere!!!") Obviously, these kids know nothing about the Super Bowl, much less who won or lost, so they don't care what's on their clothes. They're probably just glad to have them; they couldn't care less if what they're wearing fails to comport with historical fact.

And therein lies the sad part of the story. As usual, the poor of the world are left with the crumbs off the world's dinner table. They're an afterthought. "Here, don't spend it all in one place. After all, what else were you going to wear? Be happy with what we're giving you, assholes. The historically accurate hats and t-shirts are for US, for OUR stores, OUR people, the righteous and just, the fortunate. Take the loser shit and be happy. You don't have a t.v. anyway."

This is not to denigrate the NFL or World Vision, of course. They are both wonderful organizations and should be commended for doing more than most of us do. At least they're doing something. But what of the moneybag corporations who are spending all that cashola on commercials tonight? How many millions and gajillions of dollars did they spend this year alone? What are THEY doing? Couldn't they pop a couple of bucks to get these poor kids some accurate clothing, or better yet, some food and health care? Just once, I would like to see an ad that says simply: "The money we spent on this ad was donated to X Charity or Y country." That would be impressive. If Tampax put an ad out like that, I would run out and buy myself a box of tampons, I swear.

Until that special day arrives, I suppose it is somehow fitting that the world's "losers," the poor, the dispossessed, are left to wear the unwanted never-to-be-seen-again-except-by-accident apparel of the losers on the world's biggest (second biggest if you count the World Cup) and most expensive stage -- the Super Bowl.

P.S. HAPPY B-DAY, SISTER T.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!