The Super Bowl has a little something for almost everyone, good and bad. Let’s review.
Loser: Bears general manager Ryan Pace
Every time the Eagles’ Alshon Jeffery made a catch, Bears fans had to wonder why their team didn’t need a receiver like that.
Winner: Prince
Justin Timberlake performed a short duet with the late Prince’s vocal track and larger-than-life image on a curtain during Timberlake’s halftime show, which drew mixed reactions on social media. Some appreciated the tribute while others chided Timberlake for using the Prince’s image and music. But how would the critics have reacted if Timberlake failed to pay homage to the Purple One in his hometown’s Super Bowl?
Winners: Football fans
Unless your team lost, it was a very good game.
Winner: Bradley Cooper
Actor and Eagles fan had nice seats.
Winner: Julie Ertz
The Red Stars midfielder got quality face time during the NBC broadcast after key catches by her husband, Eagles tight end Zach Ertz, in particular that TD catch late in the fourth quarter giving the Eagles the lead.
Winners: Brittney and Jarrett Payton
The Bears didn’t make it to the Super Bowl, but the children of the late Walter Payton did in a pregame ceremony honoring the Texans’ J.J. Watt as this year’s winner of the NFL’s Walter Payton Man of the Year Award. Sweetness, indeed.
Winner: Eagles coach Doug Pederson
That was a gutsy play to call on fourth-and-goal late in the second quarter. Quarterback Nick Foles catch for a touchdown? Way to out-Belichick Belichick.
Loser: Robert Kraft
Asked about all the distractions (i.e. cheating over the years), the Patriots owner replied: “When you’re successful, you become a target. Jealousy and envy are incurable diseases.” Another one is arrogance.
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Winner: Nick Foles
Contemplated retirement a couple of years ago. Wasn’t Eagles starting quarterback until Carson Wentz tore his ACL in Week 14. Sunday night he threw for 373 yards, with three TDs. And he was named 2018 Super Bowl MVP.
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Winners: Rachel Dratch and Tina Fey
In a wicked good “Saturday Night Live” sketch on trash-talking Patriots and Eagles fans, Fey says: “Boston’s not even a real city. It’s a college town with a fishing pier.” Dratch counters: “One if by land, two by your mother.”
Winners: NBC and NFL
Preliminary ratings show the audience was down only 3 percent from last year’s Super Bowl, a relief to the network and the league after a rough season of pro football viewership.
Losers: Taxpayers
A military flyover that the fans and teams at U.S. Bank Stadium could neither see nor hear because the game is indoors? What’s next? A flyover for the Oscars?
Winner: Tide Pods
If every ad is for Tide, no wonder the kids are confused.
Winner: Tom T. Hall
A cover of the great storyteller/songwriter’s 1975 ditty, “I Like Beer,” was appropriated by Michelob Light. The little refrain always helps explain, as a matter of fact he likes beer.
Winner: Dieters
Thinking the human version of an M&M is Danny DeVito makes it easier to snack healthier.
Loser: Cris Collinsworth
For his partisan commentary. It’s one thing to dispute Corey Clement’s touchdown reception or question the consistency of what the NFL considers a catch, but it’s another thing to say if that’s a catch, “I give up.” Then, after the commercial break, he grumbled, “Take what you can get against the Patriots, I guess.”
Winner: Cris Collinsworth
After NBC reminded viewers in the pregame that “Miracle on Ice” coach Herb Brooks hails from Minnesota, Al Michaels remarked: “I can’t tell you how many people this week wanted (me) to say: ‘Do you believe in miracles?!’” Collinsworth replied: “If Nick Foles pulls this off, do I get another one?”
Winner: Eddie Olczyk
The Blackhawks announcer, who’s battling colon cancer, was asked about the Super Bowl during a recent WSCR-AM 670 interview. He advised listeners to take the Eagles and the over. Both were winning bets.
Winner: James Franklin
Maybe the Penn State coach will be mistaken for look-alike Keegan-Michael Key, who came off as the perfect companion in that TurboTax ad. Can he also explain why the three-technique is not a technique?
Loser: Saquon Barkley
Corey Clement wasn’t drafted? James White lasted till the fourth round? This is why NFL GMs despise using a top-10 pick on a running back.
Losers: Harvard nerds
A 2013 blog post by the Harvard Sports Analysis Collective determined that 2-2 is among the worst combinations of numbers for someone in a squares pool. Statistically, this is correct. But the Eagles led the Patriots at halftime 22-12, and so the 2-2 square paid off.
Loser: Unnamed NBC technician
With 30 seconds of ad time going for around $5 million, NBC went to black rather than a commercial midway through the second quarter. “We had a brief equipment failure that we quickly resolved,” a network spokesman said, contending no game action or commercial time was missed. But you know someone got chewed out.
Losers: Ticket holders seen dancing at halftime
The line between professionals and amateurs was never clearer as when crowd members were seen trying to get down in the background during Justin Timberlake’s performance.
Winner: Westwood One radio crew
Kevin Harlan & Co. all correctly predicted that Corey Clement’s touchdown catch would withstand replay review. Michaels and Collinsworth? Nope.
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Winner: The hashtag ads
At least the ones for Doritos and Mountain Dew featuring Peter Dinklage and Morgan Freeman lip-syncing the rhymes of Busta Rhymes and Missy Elliott. In these days when Super Bowl ads underwhelm, it checks off all the boxes: star power, eye-catching special effects, humor and most importantly, a little offbeat originality.
Loser: Digital Tom Brady and Nick Foles
The giant video-game-like visages didn’t look much like either quarterback — Foles looked like Donnie Wahlberg and Brady resembled a young Steve Carell. Next time just call the Madden folks.
Loser: Gisele Bundchen
You gonna call out your husband for that dropped pass?