Old School Super Bowl

I'm getting old. I admit that. That means I spend far too long fondly remembering the good old days. You may remember my recent post about This Week In Baseball. Today, I got the NFL equivalent.

ESPN classic was showing Super Bowl highlight shows. I was watching some of the early Super Bowls. I'm talking about those in the single digits. Or, in Super Bowl terms, games below X in Roman numerals. The voice of John Facenda romanticizing the story of the games when the Super Bowl was all about football.

That's my biggest problem with football, in general, and the Super Bowl, specifically. It's equal parts game and hype. Hype translated not only in terms of over analysis, but in terms of pre-game show, halftime show, post-game show, commercials, gambling, drinking, counter-programming on other networks and mass marketing campaigns involving nearly every product known to man.

Anyone remember when we just cared about the game? At one time, the Super Bowl was all football and little of anything else. They had college bands perform, in part, because halftime was just, well, it was just halftime for crying out loud. No need for Janet Jackson or Paul McCartney, for that matter. We were watching to see who would be crowned champions not who sang during the time reserved for sandwich assembly and bathroom breaks.

Now, the Super Bowl has become a holiday. It's been watered down to make itself interesting to everyone. Some watch the game just to see the commercials. This is the same train of promotional thought that brought us Ferris Wheels and merry-go-rounds at Comerica Park. It's no longer enough for sports to be about sports. These events have to supply entertainment to all. The Super Bowl has led that transition from sport to entertainment.

I cannot say that the change has been all bad, if the Lions could actually make the Super Bowl I would be eating up all this ancillary nonsense, but I miss the way pro football used to be. I think lots of others, even those who still follow the sport with great passion, miss the old school days in the NFL, too. Thankfully, NFL Films has kept that part of history alive. It's all we have left.