Super Bowl Shuffle

Hey gang,

I'm not going to write too much about the Super Bowl, because I don't have that much to say (unlike last year, when I was trying to argue that predicting a massive upset of an undefeated team was not completely insane) and I have lots of other things I need to be doing. One piece of good news before we get started: After writing about football recreationally for so many years, I'm finally going to have something about the NFL published for the first time tomorrow. I pitched an idea to my editor at the Post-Standard for a short piece about Super Bowl prop bets, and to my surprise he really liked the idea. So in tomorrow's paper, my article will include a few paragraphs about the amount of money gambled on the Super Bowl and all the crazy prop bets that casinos and websites take on the game, then I picked out 10 different prop bets and made predictions for all of them. Good times. I've published five or six different stories in the paper over the past couple of weeks, and I think there will be two more coming tomorrow, plus a couple others later in the week. So the internship is off to a good start. If you want to read my stuff, just go to syracuse.com and type my name into the search bar. You'll see a couple of my most recent stories listed, and if you click "more" at the bottom of the list it should expand to show all of them.

Okay, so the Super Bowl. I'm going with the Steelers. No surprise there. I've been championing Pittsburgh all season long. I think it should be an excellent game, and I'm really looking forward to it. It's just a great matchup of strength against strength, with Arizona's offense against Pittsburgh's defense. Counting playoffs, Arizona has scored 30+ points in 10 of their 19 games this season. Pittsburgh has allowed 30 points only once (late in the season, against Tennessee).

In terms of postseason success, Arizona's offense is among the best ever. They scored 30 or more in all three of their playoff games so far. It is only the 7th time that a team has scored 30 points in three consecutive games in one playoff season. The other six teams all won the Super Bowl (the '78 Steelers, '83 Raiders, '89 49ers, '92 Cowboys, '94 49ers, and '96 Packers-- and by the way, I hope you all appreciate that I actually did research for once, rather than just talking out of my ass. www.pro-football-reference.com is possibly my favorite website ever). Notably, those other six teams all scored their 30-point games in the divisional round, the conference championship, and the Super Bowl. In other words, the Cardinals are the first to ever hit the 30 point mark in the first three rounds of the playoffs, and would be the only team to put up 30 points in 4 playoff games if they do so in the Super Bowl. That seems unlikely against the Steelers defense, but certainly within the realm of possibility.

While Arizona's play has been excellent so far in the postseason, the NFC Championship Game probably gave Cardinals fans reason to worry. The team's defense had been much better than usual in the first two rounds, as they held Atlanta and Carolina well below their respective season averages in offensive yardage. Then the Eagles gouged the Cards for 454 total yards (375 through the air) and Arizona blew an 18 point lead, before coming back to win in the end. Not exactly the way you want to see your team perform in their final game before the Super Bowl.

And what to say of the Steelers? They look like the textbook Super Bowl team. A suffocating defense that forces plenty of turnovers, with an offense led by a smart, talented quarterback who makes sound decisions and enough playmakers at running back and receiver to put some points on the board. Ben Roethlisberger's performance in Super Bowl XL was nothing short of atrocious. Probably the worst performance by any quarterback who won the Super Bowl. (And, for the record, I still think the Seahawks were the better team that year.) Early in Roethlisberger's career, I wasn't sold on him. I thought he was overrated, and that the media drooled over his fantastic won-loss record, when that record was due mostly to Pittsburgh's defense. I thought he was inaccurate and inefficient.

Big Ben still isn't the greatest quarterback in the league. I'm not even sure I would put him among the elite. But he has improved greatly. He's improved his accuracy, and more importantly, he reads defenses very well and takes care of the ball. He doesn't do anything stupid, motorcycle incident notwithstanding. He'll never throw the ball as beautifully as Tom Brady or Peyton Manning, but his decision-making and toughness make him a winner. And, if he pulls through tomorrow night, he'll have one more ring than Manning and only one fewer than Brady.

The Steelers have been steady all season. There were times when they were plagued by injuries to key players, but they kept fighting. They were among the NFL's elite all year long. The Cardinals started hot, went ice cold, then got hot again in the playoffs. Even people who believe the Cardinals will win must be scared that they'll turn back into the team that lost 56-35 to the Jets, 48-10 to the Eagles in the regular season, and 47-7 to the Patriots. (By the way, I still think New England was better than at least half the teams in the playoffs.) The Steelers might struggle, but you know they won't suck. The same is not true of the Cardinals. However, if the Cards play as well as they did against Atlanta and Carolina (and in the first half against the Eagles) the upset could happen.

But I'm guessing it won't. After backing the underdog in three consecutive Super Bowls (and being right only once), I'm going with the favorite in this one. Steelers, 27-21. MVP: Troy Polamalu. I know it's unlikely, since he's a defensive player. But hey, this team is all about defense, and I thought it would be fun to pick a Trojan. And the only other viable way to do that would be to predict that Kurt Warner gets injured and Matt Leinart leads the Cardinals to victory. Which, admittedly, would be sort of awesome.

-Nick