Give Me Back The Superbowl

Yes, I watched the Superbowl on Sunday.  No, I was not happy about it and no, I didn't enjoy it.  While the game ended in exciting fashion, it never truly grabbed my attention at any point.  The game was marred with mistakes and generally unexciting football.  Watching Superbowl XLV was no more scintillating than week one of action.

And that wasn't even its biggest problem.  The problem with the Superbowl is that it has outgrown the fame that surrounds it.  Originally, the Superbowl started as a chance for the league to make a few extra dollars by extending the season and crowning a champion.  But the title of Superbowl champions, the de facto world champions, morphed into something significantly more important than the additional revenue that the game produced.  The more significant the games became, the more that the media wanted to suck from the breast of the game.

This is precisely why the Superbowl has lost its mystique in my mind.  The Superbowl is no longer about determining the best football team in the world; it is about the funniest commercials, the singer of the Star-Spangled Banner, the halftime performance and the best snack dishes that viewers can create.  Entire shows and websites are dedicated to commercials.  Recipes appear in the sports section for delicious snacks.  People wait with more angst to watch the halftime show than they do the final two minutes of the game.

The Superbowl has become a social requirement, a ritual that all "true" Americans must participate in for acceptance.  In my 100 person class this morning, fewer than ten people raised their hands to answer that they did not watch the game.  Probably 80% of people I know said they watch the game "just to see the commercials."  There was a time when the game was watched for quality, suspenseful football; now the game has mutated into simply a public spectacle.

The attention that the game receives has now pushed true football fans out of the equation.  Do game attendees even care about the Packers or the Steelers?  Could the majority of the people in that stadium name more than five players from each team?  I'm going out on a limb and saying no, judging from the raucous applause following the abysmal performance of the Black Eyed Peas.

Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with people liking the Black Eyed Peas.  No qualms here with people who enjoy good commercials.  When real fans can't go to the game because of ticket prices and because of the man in the Visa commercial who has been to every game (proving he clearly goes for the spectacle as I am sure that his team has not played in every single Superbowl), the spectacle must change.  The hierarchy of importance for the day has changed.  Where once football was king, the media and attention has slain him.

The game simply no longer holds the same reverence that it once did.  And it is a shame that the biggest championship of the four major sports has turned into an event, as opposed to a game.