Think of Super Bowl Media Day as the first reality TV show.
It’s “Jersey Shore” and “Real Housewives” with a dash of “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.” It’s Twitter gone crazy. It’s the day the NFL jumps the shark. And it happens Tuesday in Newark at the Prudential Center.
Anyone and anything can show up. It’s “Look at me!’’ journalism and with all the social media around, which is so often anti-social, it is getting more outlandish each year.
But it is entertaining.
Perhaps that Mexican TV crew with the hand puppets will show up again. There will be tight dresses, crazy outfits and there will be questions, lots of questions at The Rock. Some rockheads, too. Maybe some player will be asked this question again: “If you were a tree, what kind of tree would you be?”
Let’s take a run through the Roman Numeral years.
Super Bowl XV featured one of the classic dumb questions, and it was asked by a sportswriter, not a wannabe personality. Raiders quarterback Jim Plunkett had just told the heartfelt story of growing up in a household with a blind mother and a blind father. His father later passed away. A reporter, late to the scene, was trying to play catch-up and as the interview came to a close he asked: “Jimmy, Jimmy, I want to make sure I have this right. Was it dead mother, blind father or blind mother, dead father?’’
Then there is the person who asked Titans defensive end Joe Salave’a in Super Bowl XXXIV, “What’s your relationship with the football?’’ His response: “I’d say it’s strictly platonic.’’
MTV’s Downtown Julie Brown, playing the goofy role, once asked Cowboys running back Emmitt Smith: “What are you going to wear in the game Sunday?’’ John Elway was asked before Super Bowl XXXII: “Are you going to listen to Stevie Wonder perform at halftime?’’
Elway had other halftime plans.
In its public relations wisdom, the NFL welcomes all media types to Media Day, and that stirs the pot because some media members love attention. How else can you explain this question to Rams quarterback Kurt Warner in 2000:
“Do you believe in voodoo and can I have a lock of your hair?’’
Warner, a devout Christian politely answered, “No.’’
The same year, St. Louis’ Jay Williams was asked: “Is Ram a noun or a verb?’’
Geez, I had no idea my eighth-grade English teacher made it to that Media Day.
Then there was the Media Day in 2012, when someone with a microphone and a dragon doll wrapped around his neck asked one Patriot: “Do you want to grab my dragon, Aaron Hernandez?’’
Hernandez, who has his demons, did take hold of the dragon briefly and after being told it was a “sacred beast,’’ he responded, “a beast like [Rob] Gronkowski.’’
Weather will be a topic for the Broncos and Seahawks in this Super Bowl PV (Polar Vortex) at MetLife Stadium. It would have been interesting to have Media Day outdoors at MetLife, but then you wouldn’t get some of the outfits that some “reporters’’ will wear Tuesday indoors at The Rock.
There may be someone in a wedding dress. At Super Bowl XLII, TV Azteca’s Ines Gomez Mont showed up in a wedding dress and asked Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, and other players, to marry her, saying,
“I’m the real Miss Brady.’’ Brady, who had moved on from actress Bridget Moynahan to supermodel Gisele Bundchen, quipped: “I’ve got a few Miss Bradys in my life.’’
Strange outfits are popular. A young man from Nickelodeon dresses up as a superhero called Pick Boy — with a Superman-type cape — and is a fixture at Media Day. He goes around asking players to predict the outcome of the game and always gets a double take.
Coaches catch on quick to the nonsense. In 2012, Giants coach Tom Coughlin stepped onto his podium at the start of Media Day and said, “Nice to be back in the dunk tank.’’
Then there was this strangeness around New England’s Bill Belichick, who actually seemed a bit amused by the spectacle: A guy from VH1 could not get Belichick to put on a pointy red Revolutionary War hat, even though the “personality’’ said many of the Patriots players had put it on.
Comedian Artie Lange had some fun with the Patriots coach, introducing himself as “Ed Davenport, Minnesota Star,” though Belichick seemed to recognize him, perhaps from Lange’s days on “The Howard Stern Show.”
“How would you fix the Timberwolves?” Lange asked.
“I don’t know too much about that,” Belichick said with a smile. “I’m kind of a football guy.”
Lange then said, “Just kidding. Pam Oliver, CBS Sports.”
One of the most famous Super Bowl questions supposedly was offered up to Washington quarterback Doug Williams, the first black quarterback to play in the Super Bowl.
“How long have you been a black quarterback?’’ he was asked.
The question took on a Media Day life of its own and was cleared up many years later by ESPN.com. The reporter who asked the question knew Williams was tired of hearing so many race questions, and said the question was more along the lines of: “You’ve been a black quarterback all along. When did it suddenly become important?’’
It was important that Williams won MVP honors in Super Bowl XXII, leading the Redskins to a 42-10 rout of the Broncos.
Who dat? At Super Bowl XXIII, a Japanese reporter became a bit confused and asked 49ers quarterback Joe Montana: “Why do they call you Boomer?’’
Don’t know if the reporter followed up and asked the other Super Bowl quarterback, the Bengals’ Norman Esiason, about “The Catch.’’
In the end, it’s all about the accessories. Atlanta’s Ray Buchanan wore a rhinestone dog collar to Media Day 1999, woofing it up with Denver’s Shannon Sharpe, saying of the future broadcaster, “That’s an ugly dude, you can’t tell me he doesn’t look like Mr. Ed.’’ Sharpe fired back, “Tell Ray to put the eyeliner, the lipstick and the high heels away. I’m not saying he’s a cross-dresser, that’s just what I heard.’’
One year earlier, at Super Bowl XXXII, someone did ask Broncos fullback Detron Smith, “What sized panties do you’d think you’d wear?’’
As for me, if I were a tree, I’d be a weeping willow, especially after Super Bowl Media Day.