photo by Kirby Lee from USA Today Sports
Super Bowl number six is in the books for Tom Brady, Bill Belichick, and the New England Patriots. Their greatness—their dynasty—only further cemented, undeniable by fans of the game. They’ve now won six Super Bowls in the 21st century, nearly a third of all that have been played, and have appeared in nine of the big games over this same span of time. It’s the most watched sporting event in America, slowing down Dominos delivery time to nearly an hour for just five medium one topping pizzas. It asks over $5 million for a 30 second ad and attracts the attention of global superstars. But man, it was boring.
Sure, Patriots fans who are too jazzed up about winning again to admit it wasn’t the perfect game can say it was a “defensive masterpiece” or a “classic gridiron smackdown for the ages.” But when the third- and fourth-ranked offenses come together for the most important pro-football game in the world, we expect a halftime score greater than those put up by Atlanta United in that very same stadium this past year. The NFL 100 commercial was more exciting than the game, and probably logged for more total yards too.
Few bright spots were found on the field from the 3 point Los Angeles Rams, but one was punter and runaway team MVP Johnny Hekker, who punted the ball 9 times for a total of 417 yards, pinning the ball inside the opposing team’s 20 yard line five times. Most impressively though, he put away the longest punt in Super Bowl history: 65 yards. Other brights spots in the game include the brand new Fast & Furious: Hobbs & Shaw trailer, which will certainly not disappoint come August 2nd, as well as the Burger King commercial featuring Andy Warhol quietly eating a Whopper and commenting on the difficulty of getting the ketchup out of the bottle and next to his burger which he has needlessly removed the top bun from, before replacing it and dipping the Whopper in said ketchup.
But credit where credit is due. Brady may have thrown the third fastest interception in Super Bowl history and not logged a single touchdown pass, but he had a solid completion percentage of 60% and made it happen when he needed to, like that beautiful pass into triple coverage snatched out of the air by Gronk. Julian Edelman also put up quite the game, bringing in 10 receptions on 12 targets for 141 yards. His performance may have earned him the second greatest individual award a player can receive at the Super Bowl, the Super Bowl MVP, but the greatest award seems to have eluded him yet again—a kiss from the ageless wonder Tom Brady.
Another Super Bowl is behind us, so now we may begin looking forward to next season. Mahomes will look to improve on his MVP performance of this past season. Ben Roethlisberger will attempt to end his Super Bowl drought and return to slinging that pig skin on the big stage. And most importantly, Tom Brady will continue to perfect the TB12 method while also perfecting his body and ruining Rob Gronkowski’s, eyeing yet another Super Bowl run next year.