The Super Bowl has become just as important for entertainment than what actually happens on the field. I think we talk as much about the halftime show as much as the game, especially when it’s so boring as SB XLI. Now you have a pre game show (a big puke for the Cirque De Solie performance), big name national anthem singer, and the biggest single live televised concert. Before other channels would fight for viewers to switch over to their channel at halftime (remember the Lingere Bowl or NBC’s Saturday Night Live?).

Now the NFL gets the biggest star they can get so the halftime show is as eagerly anticipated as the commericals. Since nipplegate (which is a moment in history you’ll always remember where you were when it happened. I do) they’ve rolled out Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, and Prince. Love them or hate them, many forget that the Super Bowl halftime show used to be less than stellar. They were down right ugly.

X, XIV & XX (1977, 1982, 1986) - Up With People. I have no idea who they are and even after Googling them I still don’t know. They must have been awesome.

XXI (1987) Southern California area high school drill teams and dancers. If I wanted to see drill teams and dancers I would just never graduate high school.

XXII (1989) South Florida-area dancers and performers and 3-D effects. I think the effects were you could see pigs flying, Elvis alive, and UFOs.

XXV (1991) New Kids on the Block. Funny enough soon after, its streak of Top 10 hits ends.

XXVI (1992) Gloria Estefan with ice skaters Brian Boitano and Dorothy Hamil. Hospitals all over the country see a spike in people coming in with trauma to the eye with a sharp object.

XXVII (1993) Michael Jackson and 3,500 school children. Almost as good as heaven. O.J. Simpson as the game’s honorary coin tosser. As crazy as that is it cannot be made up. Years later Jacko is a bit too friendly and O.J. turned out to be not friendly at all. (video on Youtube)

XXIX (1995) Disney performance of Indiana Jones as a musical with Patti Labelle, Tony Bennett, Arturo Sandoval and Miami Sound Machine. I do not remember seeing this halftime show and I thank my memory for forgetting something for once.

XXX (1996) Diana Ross sings and then is taken off in a helicopter. I hope one day they launch a space shuttle from halftime. Biggest audience ever. (video on Youtube)

XXXI (1997) The fake Blue Brothers try to get cheap publicity for their upcoming movie. John Goodman played the John Belushi role. Too bad it wasn’t a fake halftime show and the real one was coming up. What a disaster.

XXXIV (2000) Disney at its worse again with a lot of people on the field not having a clue what they are doing. I think they were told to meet there 10 mins before halftime completely shit faced. (video on Youtube)

So next year when they announce some big name aging rocker, just be glad Brian Boitano won’t be doing a triple axel live in person.

If you ask ten people who watched the Super Bowl, you’re unlikely to get more than two or three people who all agree on the funniest commerical during the Super Bowl. For example, I thought the Snickers commercial with the two dudes was hilarious. It was one of the few that made me laugh out loud. I know some who thought it was stupid and uncalled for. Two dudes kissing doesn’t bother me. I’ve seen episodes of MTV’s “Next” when they have gays guys making out with each other on the bus to pass time. It’s not saved on my TIVO though.

I thought the Doritos commerical with the man at the checkout lane and that woman talking about the different flavors of chips was so stupid. I did not really want to assume a fat chick had an orgasm behind the register over some highly fattening Doritos. No wonder she was fat. Yet it rates high on some informal polls. Let me add the Jessica Simpson and the GoDaddy commericals to the ones that I could have done without. Really bad.

Overall, this year’s crop of Super Bowl commericals were disappointing. I know everyone expects the funniest thing they’ve ever seen because a company is paying a ridiculous amount of money to air their commercials. It’s a lot of pressure.

USA Today did their annual Ad Meter, voted by volunteers who I guess had no Super Bowl party to go to. The winner was the Anheuser-Busch commerical with the crabs worshiping the cooler of Budweiser on the beach. Did I miss an inside joke? Were the crabs crushing the nuts of Rex Grossman? I don’t know a single person I talked to that had that one as their favorite commerical. It wasn’t that great.

My favorite commerical of the night? The Bud Light commerical with Carlos Mencia teaching english to his students.

I’d like to hear what was your favorite commerical? I’m not here to disagree with you. Just want to get an idea. But if your favorite was the Sherly Crow commerical then you’re an idiot and I don’t feel bad saying that.

Youtube (of course) has most of the commercials on one convenient page.

I’ll admit that I nearly fell asleep towards the end of the Super Bowl. It was a snooze fest. I think the rain coming down had a calming effect. Don’t we all like to sleep to the sound of rain? The game had become so predictable by then. Grossman was good for yet another interception or their offense would muster another fabulous three-and-out. The Colts hardly had to punt in the second half. They were not going to lose. Plus I stuffed my face with food and all the blood in my body went towards the stomach to help it digest.

Thank goodness this game was not about the referees. It just could not get worse than what we saw last season. Billy Joel could have officiated drunk and Prince with lipstick on and it could not have been as bad.

I thought it sucked to pay $2000-$3000 for a Super Bowl ticket and have to sit in the pouring rain the whole time. Yeah it’s the Super Bowl but dry clothes, a hot shower, and no lines to the bathroom must have sounded real nice. Just think the Bears fans were thinking “I paid to see shit like that?”

Peyton Manning can now never win another Super Bowl and no one can talk about him not being a big game quarterback. I also heard his endorsement income should double to about $30 million per year after winning. As long as they’re funny commericals I don’t mind.

Tony Dungy is a classy guy and deserves this. Who cares what color his skin is?

Didn’t the kickoff seem eerily similiar to the Ohio State/Florida BCS national championship game? That’s what I thought when Hester ran it back. It turned out about the same in the end with the Bears not having an offense. I enjoyed that Gator game five thousand times more.

Rex Grossman played like he felt the pressure of every reporter reminding him of how much he sucks all week long. How about that one play where he scrambled in the pocket better than Michael Vick only to throw it in double coverage and nearly had it intercepted? He could have easily run it. I do not doubt he did lines of cocaine in college, like I mentioned in my previous post. How can he not handle a good snap from a center he’s rubbed up against all season? I thought he should have gotten an honorable MVP trophy. His lofted interception returned for a touchdown deflated all hopes. He’ll probably be the Bears quarterback next season but they’ll never win a Super Bowl with him so that’s fine with me.

I truly hope he gets the Ebola virus through his cock. I have my reasons.

My favorite commerical of the night? The Bud Light commerical where the students are learning english. Some other ones were funny but most of them were ho-hum. I would run out of room to name the stupid commericals I saw but I will mention the Jessica Simpson one.

I liked Prince at halftime. I thought we’d get a closeup shot of his makeup running in the rain but he must have had some good waterproof shit on. How does he NOT age? He’s 49 this June (thanks Google) yet he looks 30. Just wondered why he did a cover of a Foo Fighters song (The Best of You)? It’s a great song and he did a nice rockin job but Prince has more hits than a freshly packed bong. I wanted to hear “1999″ even though…wait…that’s like 8 years ago now…shit time flies.

Just like this football season which has concluded. I feel like it was yesterday I really thought the Jacksonville Jaguars were going to have a great season and I was thinking if I should take L. Tomlinson or Shaun Alexander with the #2 pick in my fantasy draft.

Sadly I think those two kids (above) have tickets to the game and I don’t. But I’m not going on national television to embarass myself. I do that enough just trying to act cool all day long.

Game? What game? Nah, I only care about the Super Bowl for the party. I’m going to have a dirty martini drinking everytime Peyton Manning bends over. For the others who really care about football, I think people from around most of the country are sick and tired of seeing how warm and sunny it is in Miami while they’re freezing their ass off. I live in north Florida (7 hours from Miami) and it was the coldest it’s been in two years this past week.

I’m hoping for a great game. Fun. Exciting. Someone streaking. Maybe Borat if possible. Or the game could unfold as I imagine it below.

Remember how Leslie Nielson murders the national anthem at the LA Dodger baseball game in “Naked Gun”? Yes that will be Billy Joel, who swore he had only a Zima in the green room. Later he will try to drive away only to end up on the shores of Cuba.

Peyton Manning gets knocked out in the 1st quarter. Yeah no what we wanted. The thumb he injured? Yep re-injured again. He lost in thumb wrestling to a mouse trap. In comes Jim Sorgi for the rest of the game. He doesn’t throw up on the field from nervousness. He pees in his pants, which is actually pretty cool.

Rex Grossman, throws his 6th interception, in the first quarter. You could count #7 but Tony Dungy was not standing on the field of play. He just can’t stop thinking of the huge party that will happen in Miami when Fidel Castro dies. Brian Griese enters the game. After some excellent punting from both teams, Griese tries to run for a first down. He stumbles and knocks himself unconscious. An injury eerily similar in May 2002.

So Kyle Orton comes in and he breaks a sweat just putting on his helmet. Actually I would not doubt if it did not fit him. That fat boy has not missed a meal in a year. He might be on the eat-6-huge-meals-a-day plan replacing all water with beer. Orton vs Sorgi. The odds on that must have been staggering. If you bet $5 on it you would probably be driving away in a Ferrari. It’s just as humorous as watching bad auditions on American Idol, except people would probably watch bad auditions over bad quarterbacks. If this game was the regular season, people would immediately turn away. Instead it’s the Super Bowl, so people drink more to think the quarterbacks are really good!!

Game comes down to a game winning field goal opportunity for Vinateri. If Tom Brady didn’t lead a comeback in a playoff game for New England two weeks ago (I’m still pissed over lost money), Vinateri has got to finally miss in the Super Bowl. Even God misses some things too. Cockroaches? Foot fetishes? My Super Sweet 16? Paris Hilton? Clearly missed the uprights with those. So I say he misses a chip shot field goal from 25 yards away. Bears win and Kyle Orton wins Super Bowl MVP and proclaims he’s going to eat Disney World.

(By the way, was talking to a good buddy tonight and he said his brother would party with Grossman all the time in Florida. Said Grossman was the biggest coke head. Line after line after line. I know his brother and he’s not the type to make up shit. If Grossman is/was a huge coke head, it explains a lot. Damn maybe it made him smarter. You know how drugs can do some crazy stuff. )

What to do to make time fly by until kickoff? You could go in a self induced coma but gotta pray you wake up or else it’ll be a Super Bowl that Chuck Bundchen-Brady is starting when you wake.

Follow everything in Miami from a professional standpoint with the Miami Herald’s coverage.

If you haven’t read Deadspin “correspondent” AJ Daulerio’s experience in Miami, go there and read it now. He’s got the molester moustache going on that is a bit creepy. But the writing is sharp and he keeps running into celebrities. Some who run when they hear the word “Deadspin” being thrown around.

Jamie Mottram over at AOL who is doing the whole media thing on radio row. I think he’s promising them free AOL for life because he’s getting big name athletes coming on his show.

I love getting these random emails from companies promoting something for the Super Bowl. One I got from www.buttercast.com. They are running a contest for your commentary for the ENTIRE 2nd Quarter of the big game. This includes commercials. Talk over them, make fun of them, they don’t care. You submit it. They’ll listen to them all. I’m sure they’ll know in the first 30 secs if it’s worth listening to the whole recording because no way they listen to all the entries. Winners get a big ass TV. Second and third place get a Nintendo Wii and a Ipod respectively. So if you thought Joe Buck or Joe Theismann sucked doing football, let’s hope you’re not worse.

Have a great weekend and Go ______ (insert your rooting team)!

Super Bowl hype week. It’s great news and it’s bad news. The great news is that we get the biggest game in the NFL this Sunday finally. The sad part is that after Sunday, millions of fans will wander aimlessly on their remote on Sundays wondering what the hell to watch.

It also means the biggest sports betting event of the year. Football is the most popular sport to bet on and it culminates with the Super Bowl. People who may not normally bet on football feel the urge to put a little cash on this game. The regular gamblers might put a little extra cash on this game because it’s the last one. All in all Las Vegas takes in a lot of money.

Along with betting on who will win, it’s the time of year for proposition bets. These are like side bets. You don’t need to know about how many sacks the offensive line has given up per game. You don’t even need to know what a field goal is to wager on a prop. That’s what makes them so fun and unique. There are so many different ways to bet the Super Bowl that it’s crazy. Reading through the long list makes me want to rip my eyes out. It’s that long. Just like Super Bowl media day has become a circus. Super Bowl prop bets have a sideshow that you have to at least look at.

Here are some of the most interesting prop bets that you can actually win money on.

How long will it take Billy Joel to Sing the National Anthem?
Over 1m44s
Under 1m44s

What will Prince’s first song of the Halftime show be?
Let’s Go Crazy 1/3 (bet $3 to win $1)
Song of the Heart 3/1
Purple Rain 4/1
When Doves Cry 6/1
1999 5/1
Little Red Corvette 4/1
Kiss 6/1
Field (Any Other Song) 7/2

Most Passing Yards between Peyton Manning in Super Bowl XLI vs Troy Aikman in Super Bowl XXVII

Who will have more on Feb 4th?
Bernard Berrian Total Receiving Yards
Tiger Woods 4th Round Score

Who will have more?
Mary J Blige Total Grammy wins
Marvin Harrison Total Pass Receptions

And of course one of the most popular bets.

Will the coin land on heads or tails?

So many chances to win money or have your ass handed to you. Alot of them are so silly that it’s just fun to throw a little money on certain prop bets.

Have I made a wager on a prop bet? Of course I have. I won’t divulge it yet because I don’t want to jinx myself. If I do win it, I will mention it in my Super Bowl write up. It’s just not one of the ones listed above. If you do decide to bet on the Super Bowl, I wish you good luck and win some damn money. Don’t be embarassed what you actually bet on to win money.