It will go down as a "Great Game" because of the finish, not because of the way most of the game was played. Though the now ever-present "Hype Machine" will help that too.
Sure, by now, most of the free-civilized world knows the Giants held off the Patriots and won the Galactic Championship 21-17. And for the most part, for those of us at home it was a decent broadcast.
Before we start our broadcast breakdown, we'll admit we didn't watch the 5-hour pregame show...anyone who did needs to seriously consider making some changes in their lifestyle.
But we did see the last 90 minutes or so...and though long and repetitive, there were things we liked. One- the Steve Gleason feature that Brother Jon mentioned and a solid story on Giants WR Victor Cruz. We did see one blatant act of self-promotion when the "Voice" hosts showed up on a side stage before the Lenny Kravitz song (where's Lenny been the past 5-years?).
The game broadcast was good. Al Michaels and Cris Collinsworth were solid and didn't try to over do it on a game that was chock-full of mistakes and sloppy play early on. And most importantly we didn't get an endless parade of stars for the network shows like FOX does when they have the game. Thank God!
The halftime show was surprisingly good. Madonna was much better than expected and we are always a mark for Cee-Lo. Still have no idea who this M.I.A person is, why she was on stage and what possessed her to give a middle finger salute...
What was seriously disappointing during the broadcast....the commercials. The 1st two were just plain awful, and it didn't get much better.
Sure, there were a few that were cute...(see VW, Doritos Dog) one at the half that we really liked (Chrysler with Clint Eastwood) but by and large, they were overhyped and underperforming wastes of money.
But there were some that just left us scratching our heads. It's like...ok...somebody got paid a ton of money to come up with this idea...and then the company spent a fortune to put it on the Super Bowl broadcast?
This was neither funny nor something that would get me to buy an Audi:
And gosh, we like Seinfeld, but this just isn't funny...at all or an enticement to buy this Acura. And having Jay Leno at the end made it even less funny...
Then this...from Cars.com. Somebody collected a paycheck for coming up with this? And they paid a couple million to air it on the "Big Game"? Seriously? Nothing about this says funny or encourages me to use the product..at all.
So...here's what we think about Super Sunday.
NBC Pre-Game: B+. Solid, didn't go the tacky FOX route and stuck to telling stories and breaking down the game. We grade it down because it was incredibly long and repetitive. Even the 90 minutes worth we watched has us screaming for them to get on with the game already.
NBC Game: A-. Very well done for the most part. Collinsworth still has a tendency to state the obvious and can be a bit goofy, saying things that make no sense, but we like the team. No major mistakes...at all.
Halftime: A. Madonna was excellent. Never been a huge fan, but light years better than anybody since McCartney or Prince.
Commercials: C-minus. Just awful. Maybe the bar was raised too high the past few years, but overall this crop of commercials sucked. Not funny, not creative and in many cases...had nothing to do with the product.
So, we come to an end of this years NFL football season. At least until April and the draft. Honestly, once they got past the labor lockout it was a season much like any other. Some good stories, some bad stories but very typical of any other NFL season.
For those of you suffering withdrawls, go take a vacation, go play golf, go to a beach...do something to get out of your house and experience life, you might find you like what's out there.
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