Why I love the Super Bowl
February 6, 2008It was a great Super Bowl this past Sunday. The fact that the game was so good was icing on the cake though.
I’m not that jazzed about the commercials, I don’t have too much interest in the game itself. I like all the food usually associated with the Super Bowl, but that’s not it either.
I love the Super Bowl for a reason most Americans don’t: It’s the end of the dag-blamed football season! Baseball, in some form or another, is just eight days away (pitchers and catchers report to spring training on Feb. 14). I can’t wait.
I know football has become the most popular sport in America, and I like football just fine, I guess. But the NFL’s ad campaigns over the past few years really leave a bad taste in my mouth. The idea that you’re somehow less masculine if you don’t like football is a little more than annoying and seems to be behind many of these commercials. That coupled with things like fantasy football and ESPN’s 24-hour-a-day backrub to pro football have kind of turned me off.
I have this argument with my editor Billy all the time. He’s one of those people who says he enjoys baseball but can’t really watch it on tv. This is the kind of statement that makes me so angry that I want to cry. I think he knows that, and repeats it often.
Anyway, the coming months are some of my favorite of the year. After a brief appetizer of college hoops (I admit to letting March Madness grow on me in recent years), the sports gods let me loose at the all-you-can-eat buffet of baseball. Baseball, baseball, baseball!
I love how long and leisurely the baseball season is. There’s a deceptive speed to it, as well, though. One minute it’s mid-April and you’re at home in the early afternoon watching the Cubs lose on WGN (sorry, Alex) and the next it’s mid-September and you’re up until all hours of the night watching two teams you can’t stand (I’m looking at you, Yankees and Red Sox) battle for one playoff spot (except by that point, ESPN is paying more attention to days-old highlight reels from the third week of the NFL season). It’s beautiful, the way it all unwinds.
You can tell I like baseball. Does anyone else like baseball? Like football better? Basketball? Tell me why. Fair warning: I reserve the right to disagree with you. C’mon. I’m rarin’ for a good debate.
I’m talking with Alex and Randy about cutting back on baseball coverage this year. Sorry … you know how it is, budget and everything.
Next week: Pro Bowl
March: NFL combines
April: NFL Draft
Late July: Training Camp begins
August: Preseason
September: Football! Football! Football!
I guess it’s like they say: “As goes ESPN, so goes The Herald.”
Wait, nobody says that. Who am I talking to?
I’m definitely more a football fan than a baseball fan, but I love baseball. Football to me, seems easier to follow with less games, no minor league systems, yadda yadda. Baseball is a commitment and takes a lot of patience.
THIS IS GONNA BE OUR YEAR!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sorry, us Cubs fans are required by law to recite that every February.
It’s football for me. Maybe it’s because I grew up in Knoxville, Tennessee. Born at Baptist Hospital, right across the river and in the shadow of Neyland Stadium, in the heart of SEC country.
While I enjoy the game of baseball, watching it on TV is akin to watching paint dry. I’ll watch a couple of the early season Braves games and then pick it back up during the playoffs some 160 games later.
To me, baseball is a game that has to be enjoyed live. The crack of the bat, the vendors, the person (or computer nowadays) playing the organ, all combine to give you the Great American pass time experience. All you see on TV is “pitcher, batter, catcher.” You don’t see the outfield and infield shift, depending on who steps up to the plate so, you can’t really see the entire play unfold, pitch by pitch, as you would while sitting in the stands.
Football, on the other hand, can be exciting with every snap of the ball. Whether your in the stands or in front of your TV, the physicality of the game can get your heart pumping and your emotions flowing. It’s more fast paced and the momentum can shift from one team to the other, in one play.
Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy baseball. Especially youth baseball. Nothing welcomes the arrival of spring in our area better than opening day at Dalrymple Park. After the opening ceremonies that celebrate past Little Tarheel League players and the National Anthem, the sound of “PLAY BALL!” brings a smile to my face.
But football. There’s something you can sink your teeth into and savor the flavor. The committment by the players to the weight room, hours of practice in the unrelenting August sun and the breath sapping gasers, all come to a head just before the opening kickoff when that whistle sounds to get the season underway.
There’s football and then there’s everything else.
Terry-
You write that “football, on the other hand, can be exciting with every snap of the ball.”
Baseball is also exciting with every movement of the ball. A ball can fly out of the park. It can be driven to any part of the outfield. It can be smashed toward the third baseman’s face, who might catch it at the last minute. It can seemingly go right through the batter’s swing as he tries his hardest to knock the cover off it. It can nibble the outside corner as the batter elects not to swing, going for a called strike three that the batter watches sail by him. It can hit the batter in the head. It can end up in the dirt and go past the catcher, letting two runs score. You get my point.
The beauty of baseball is that it’s the only team sport that’s really a one-on-one sport. Every game, every inning comes down to the face off between the pitcher and the batter.
You make some good points about football, too, but baseball is gonna get me every time!
Thanks for reading.