Ya just gotta laugh.
CBS waited for the crescendo to the National Anthem to show a sideline close-up of Ray Lewis? Yep, he’s what makes America great!
Two weeks to prepare, and on the first play from scrimmage the Niners are called for an illegal formation.
Then Phil Simms says of the play, “Yeah, Jim, I could see it when they came out.” Then how ’bout sharing that with us before it’s called?
Anquan Boldin catches a 13-yard TD pass, then Simms says, “I heard it 1,000 times this week, when the Ravens get inside that 10-yard-line, or near it, they’re looking to throw the football to Anquan Boldin.”
Is that right? So why not tell us — just once — before the play?
Niners tight end Vernon Davis catches a pass, runs to the Ravens 8-yard line, gets up, does a me-dance … then leaves the field, injured.
Lights go down, early third quarter. On CBS, the question from the sideline and studio guys became, “How will the players cope!?” Well, they just coped with an extended break at halftime, didn’t they?
In the first half, with the Niners down big, Jim Nantz reminded us about the Niners’ ability to come back from way down, as they did in the second half in their last game in Atlanta.
But later, when the Niners began their second-half comeback, Nantz kept referencing their play after the power outage as if that was the key! Nurse!
* When does what’s pitched as great news — as come-on — look, sound, smell and quack like a turn-off? That’s right, always satire-proof Super Bowl Week! A time when otherwise hard-earned news media credentials can be obtained by Artie Lange and the casts of MTV shows.
Consider that as of last Monday, ESPN boasted it would have “over 120 hours of TV and radio programming throughout the Super Bowl XLVII week from the heart of the French Quarter in New Orleans.”
But it’s often hard to choose between ESPN and water-boarding.
NFL Network, in big, bold headlines, sent a release boasting its pregame show yesterday would begin at 7 a.m. and run “10 1/2 hours”! That’s a good thing? It seemed more like a trespassing warning.
Perhaps such excess would be watchable if certain matters were addressed, rather than carefully ignored.
For example, reader Don Costello, in view of next year’s Super Bowl at PSL Stadium, wonders how Roger Goodell knows that it won’t be too cold given that he seats himself in climate-controlled luxury boxes.
And isn’t it time to work on pitch slogans for the NY/NJ Super Bowl? How about, “You’re gonna love our $80 breakfasts” and, “Take the Verrazano, Still Only 15 Bucks.”
Marc Sheris has a good one, too. He wonders why Niners cornerback Chris Culliver, University of South Carolina student-athlete, can one day talk tough about gays (“No, we don’t got no gay people on the team. They gotta get up outta here, if they do”) then issue an immaculately written apology as if it “were something out of ‘Flowers for Algernon.’ ”
Could it be one of these Chris Cullivers wasn’t being straight with us?
A-Rod changeups on deck
A Spokesperson for Alex Rodriguez says the latest PED allegations against him are “untrue.” Given Rodriguez’s past truth-telling, the spokesperson should have added, “for now.”
The casual, easy notion that the Yankees simply will collect insurance on Rodriguez if he doesn’t play this season implies an insurance company will just as simply fork over millions to satisfy an on-the-job health-impairment claim on a fellow who may be found to have used illegal substances and medications.
Reader Bruce Christoffersen: “If they put a player who did steroids in the Hall of Fame, is the bust of his head bigger?”
* Colin Kaepernick’s arm is so strong that 20-30 yard passes shown in slow-motion arrived like lasers.
I guess it would ruin a nice family story if someone noted what’s impossible to miss: The Harbaugh Brothers have some public comportment issues.
* Unreal. Warren Sapp makes the Pro Football Hall of Fame while Michael Strahan doesn’t. Perhaps if Strahan had talked more trash, been flagged and tossed more for rotten conduct or instigated a few midfield, pregame brawls.
* Though it appeared 4 1/2 hours before kickoff, CBS had a neat feature: Dallas’ Leon Lett and Buffalo’s Don Beebe, seated together, remembering Beebe chasing down Lett, causing him to fumble as the defensive lineman showboated his way to the end zone, late in the Cowboys’ blowout win in the Super Bowl 20 years ago.
* Stat of the Week: Half of the Knicks’ 86 field goal tries in their blowout win against the Kings on Saturday were 3-point shots (19-of-43).
Hoops too cool for high school
Anything wrong with this picture?
St. Anthony (Jersey City) High School’s basketball team had its win streak ended at 83 on Friday night by St. Benedict’s Prep (Newark). Then again, St. Anthony was playing its fifth of six games in nine days.
And St. Benedict’s is pretty good. It’s previous game was a two-point win against Blair Academy, which has a student body of 452, a sweet scholarship program and a basketball roster including five out-of-state kids, one from Canada and one from Zimbabwe.
* All we wanted to do late Saturday morning was sit down to watch Cincinnati-Seton Hall on ESPNU. But ESPN, as is its habit, made that almost impossible.
First, the game seemed less important than the fact that sideline reporter Paul Carcaterra planned to fly west to be at other games this day and night. Why we were supposed to be drawn to and enthralled by such a scheme and activity, well, beats me.
As for the game, what game? At one point we heard Beth Mowins’ live play-by-play — “The dish to Johnson and another block for Cincinnati! The third, already” — while footage appeared of Seton Hall and Cincy from past, unidentified games.
And that Seton Hall was in a full-court, effective press defense didn’t deter ESPN from going, here, there and everywhere — as the Bearcats tried to in-bound after Pirates baskets. Standard ESPN treatment.
* Shame on me for looking forward to what Texans star J.J. Watt had to say Thursday from New Orleans on WFAN. But after Mike Francesa interrupted him six times in the first few minutes, it was time to go.