Hollow Spectacle: A Canadian Football Fan’s View of Super Bowl LVIII
Congratulations to the Kansas City Chiefs on winning Super Bowl LVIII. Mind you, I don’t have a clue what the goal uprights are doing at the far ends of such a short and narrow field, how one is supposed to return the ball on a missed field-goal attempt, if scoring a safety is even possible, how the clock works, what a ‘false start’ is (Do you mean ‘movement’?), what happened to the white stripes on the ball, or why you need four turns to move the ball a measly ten yards, but congratulations on winning all the same.
The Super Bowl came a week after the less publicised but even more dubious Pro Bowl ‘game’. As I commented on Facebook after suffering a glimpse of the 2022 installment, imagine opening up an anthology of haiku only to discover that every poem in the book is actually a limerick beginning with the line, ‘There once was a girl from Nantucket…’. Okay; now you know what it’s like for a Canadian football fan to watch the American Pro Bowl game. In response to the outright ridiculous 2023 version of the match, I found myself asking, are NFL football fans among the most gullible people on Earth? Are they truly comfortable with multimillionaires playing tag and tiddlywinks on a gridiron? I noted the pathetic nature of the situation, and went on to suggest that the league consider bringing in some female high-school rugby players from Australia the next year to teach these pampered rich fools how to play football. A friend of mine suggested that the ridiculous salaries these people earn should automatically entail them playing with machetes.
The preliminaries got this year’s Super Bowl off on a rather cringeworthy note. For starters, I’m not exactly sure who or what served as Allegiant Stadium’s house announcer. I’m guessing the Incredible Hulk, although his voice denoted the otherworldly authority of a Galactus or an Uatu The Watcher. Fittingly, the Vince Lombardi Trophy was on display in a cloud of mist as if it were Thor’s Mjolnir. A veritable affront to dogmatic patriotism, ‘America the Beautiful’ was performed by some strange man who likes to use his face as a bulletin board or toilet wall. I’m no expert in the ways of US law, but I’m pretty certain his performance of such a song contravened some Truth in Advertising Act or another. Seriously, this ridiculous fellow’s appearance made annoying Reba McEntire’s subsequent rendition of the ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ actually tolerable in comparison.
As for the actual game, the best that can be said for it is that at least it wasn’t a lopsided win from start to finish, the outcome being decided 25–22 in overtime play. For the longest time, I actually thought that San Francisco were going to win it. I guess it’s worth noting that the 49ers’ Jake Moody kicked a 55-yard field goal to set a new Super Bowl record — only to have it broken a quarter later when the Chiefs’ Harrison Butker booted a 57-yarder. Other than that, it was your typical boring NFL game, Super Bowl or not. I do believe I saw only one feeble attempt at a punt return in the entire game, and nobody bothered to attempt a kickoff return at all. Tony Romo or Jim Nantz was heard to comment, “There have been 530 punts in the history of the Super Bowl, and there’s never been one returned for a touchdown.” I can’t attest to the authenticity of this observation, but if it is true, it doesn’t say much for the excitement level of the match, past or present. I can hear the yawning amongst CFL fans from coast to coast to coast.
As I’ve said in the past, it seems to me that more money translates into less real football. In the case of the Pro Bowl game in recent years, there hasn’t been any real tackling or kickoffs, even. I’d love to see some of these overpaid NFL ‘stars’ stripped of their gear (including those helmets, which have been puzzling Brits and Australians for decades) and dropped down in the middle of a Scottish League rugby match. I have a feeling the majority of them wouldn’t make it through five minutes. They complain enough when they come up here and try and play in the CFL. “Oh, the field’s too long and wide, so now I strain my arm when I throw the ball.” These prima donnas should each be paid a month’s rent at the low-income housing unit of their choice for their appearance in the Super Bowl. They should receive a six-pack and a bag of chips for their performance in that joke of a ‘Pro Bowl’.
As for the halftime show, I chose to sit it out altogether this year. More in keeping with my tastes and generation, I listened to the Peter EP (1993) by Eric’s Trip while my partner Jackie suffered the slings and arrows of outrageous Usher overkill. To be completely fair, I should note that I also sat out Green Day’s performance during the Grey Cup’s halftime show this past November. I figured if they couldn’t find a comparable Canadian band to play the event, like Sloan or I Mother Earth, then why bother. Jackie later reported that, while sensational and overdone, the performance was not the exercise in ‘blaxploitation’ that Mary J. Blige’s halftime appearance was in 2022. Yeah. Whatever.
There was also the elephant in the room that no-one could stop talking about — mainly because the mainstream media wouldn’t let them. Of course I’m talking about the Chiefs’ Travis Kelce and his much publicised fling with prefab pop star Taylor Swift. Yawn. Honestly, given his unwarranted shoving and verbal assault of KC coach Andy Reid, and the fact that he once starred in his own dating show, Catching Kelce (2016), the tight end strikes me as a bully and an egomaniacal blowhard. I hope I’m proven wrong, but I fear it’s only a matter of time before the foolish young singer is crying foul on social media and the tabloids and television channels are having another field day.
This brings me to a conclusion that a lot of football fans on both sides of the border have long since reached but don’t want to admit: that the Super Bowl, the Pro Bowl, the US college Bowls, etc. have not been primarily about sport in a long, long time. In the case of the NFL and American college football in general, the actual game is almost an afterthought nowadays — which, along with the various rule changes in the name of ‘player safety’, probably explains why the levels of skill and action have dropped off so dramatically in recent decades. I mean, the mere idea of a quarterback not retiring until the age of 44 (as in the recent case of Tom Brady) is a good indication of just what a cushy and overpaid ride they’re on these days. Whatever the exact reasons, it makes for football that is as dull as dishwater. Watching an event like the Super Bowl is like watching the world’s least bloody accident — completely harmless, but you still feel compelled to watch because you can’t take your eyes off a car crash.
Apparently the 58th Super Bowl was the seventh longest game in NFL history. Yes, it may be hard for a CFL or even a USFL fan to imagine, but there have been at least six games that were actually more boring in the annals of gridiron football.
Personally, I’m hoping that sports fans might be offered a choice next February between the Super Bowl and some equally non-strenuous sports event in the same time slot — like a repeat of the 2024 USCA National Croquet Championship. I know upfront which would be the more intriguing and sports-oriented broadcast — but it’s always tough to turn away from any car crash.
