Hate, hate, hate!
2. Enough with all this 12th Man bulls***. Yes, Seattle is loud. It’s a very cool stadium. Northwestern people go nuts for their sports. Stop telling me about the significance of the fans at the neutral site Super Bowl and the significance of the Seahawks scoring 12 seconds into both halves. Stop it!
3. I’m still not sure why so many of ESPN’s talking heads picked Denver to win. I'm not saying everyone picked them, but it seemed like there were a lot. Maybe they were wishing it instead of actually analyzing the teams…or history even. If anything, it should have been split closer to 50-50 I think (For the record, I picked Seattle). But the old adages of defense wins championships and great defense beats great offense have become old adages for a reason: because a great majority of the time, they hold true. And I think people gave Seattle a chance to win, but I think out of the possible outcomes people thought that if one team had the potential to deliver a blowout, it would be the Broncos with their high-powered offense. The Seahawks could win, but their style of play would probably make it a close win. Historically though in the Super Bowl, if great defense plays great offense in the Super Bowl, it’s the team with the D that does the sha-lacking. (The game that immediately comes to mind is the whooping the Buccaneers put on the Raiders in 2003.)
4. The outcome shows us that at the end of the day, talent and athleticism still trumps almost everything else in sports. Denver had a very talented corps of position players on offense this year, highlighted by Peyton Manning. That talent combined with Manning’s ability to read a defense and dissect the area of weakness made them almost impossible to defend this season (hence, the numerous offensive records). But none of that matters when the pocket collapses around the quarterback before he has a chance to throw or when a receiver can’t get separation from a defender or when the offensive player is hit and tackled immediately after getting the ball. The Seahawks aren’t the Pittsburgh Steelers or New York Jets. They didn’t give the Broncos a bunch of exotic looks or go blitz-crazy. They did pretty much the same thing every play, and yet there was no play Denver could call to make Seattle change their scheme (or even make them feel threatened). When you have athletes as good as that, you don't need to get all fancy.
A common theme from last night...
5. Finally, this almost certainly seals Manning’s fate as 1 of the all-time greats, but definitely not the greatest ever. As great as his numbers are going to wind up being, he’s just been too mediocre in postseason play. I’m not saying to discard all of his other accomplishments, but you can’t overlook his playoff record either.
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