This year’s Super Bowl presented a couple of prospects
for doing something I’ve never done before.
Having seen every single one of the first 47 Super Bowls I considered
skipping this one altogether, thus making me ‘that guy’ that didn’t see the
biggest game of the year. Then again
perhaps this would be the perfect opportunity for me to place a legitimate bet
for the first time in my life. After all
the Denver Broncos, the highest scoring team in the history of professional
football was playing a team led by a second-year quarterback. The mighty Broncos were led by Peyton Manning,
who this season had passed for the most touchdowns and the most yardage in the
history of the National Football league and been named the League’s Most
Valuable Player for a record fifth time.
The line in Las Vegas was Denver by three points: Hell, I would have
given Seattle two touchdowns without blinking an eye.
So skip the game, or bet on the Broncos? It seemed pretty obvious to me.
I considered my history of watching the first 47 Super
Bowls: The first one in 1967 with my dad in a hotel room in Dallas as we were
driving cross-country before moving to Hawaii; the 1969 game and rushing
outside at halftime to throw the pigskin in the front yard with my best friend,
fighting over which one of us would be Joe Namath; the heart-breaking 1980 game
as the Steelers won their fourth Super Bowl in six years by defeating my
favorite team, the Los Angeles Rams.
(Yes, at one time I actually liked professional football and even had a
favorite team—an odd choice in that I had never even been to Los Angeles before.)
Then I considered my tendency to be compulsive about
things: Running every day since the fall of 1978 (if I considered the equator as
one lap, today I would have been running through Romania—for the sixth time);
my quest to run 50 consecutive Peachtree Road Races (this year will make 36); a
challenge I met in 2013 by writing a story every single day of the year
(published in two books—Parts 1 and 2 of My
Life: Everything But BUY THE BOOK!).
Being only two years away from watching 50 Super Bowls in a row, I
deferred to my other option: Placing a sure-fire bet on the Denver Broncos.
The last time I gambled was during college. Cindy and I used to drive from Gainesville to
the Ocala Fronton to watch Jai-alai, perhaps the fastest moving sport you may
have never heard of. Long story short,
it’s like a gigantic game of handball played on a three-sided basketball court
with the players wearing boomerang-shaped bamboo gloves and throwing a goatskin-covered
ball at speeds over 200 miles per hour.
The players sported names like Chucho #1, Chucho #2, Javier the third
and Ronaldo IV. We would place $2 wagers
on a quinella, meaning we would have to correctly pick the first and second
place winners in any order (for example, if we picked Chucho #2 and Ronaldo IV,
as long as they were the top two performers we would win the bet, regardless of
which one of them actually won the game).
We did quite well; if memory serves Cindy and I tended to be a bit
compulsive when it came to our Tuesday and Friday night trips to Ocala. The people working at the Fronton may have
even considered us as ‘regulars.’
So now, 40 years removed from my last real wager, I was
faced with finding a bookie. That may
have proved difficult, seeing as I’ve never met a bookie in my entire
life. But fortunately I have a friend
who has a friend who knows a guy who knows another guy who has a friend who
knows a guy who knows a bookie. I gave
my friend five $20 bills (the same friend who has a friend who knows a guy who
knows another guy who has a friend who knows a guy who can give my money to the
bookie), confident I would be getting back ten
$20 bills after the big game.
A little background before kickoff: The past seven
days had been pure hell. Atlanta had a
devastating three-inch snowfall (no laughing) the Tuesday before the Super
Bowl. My older son totaled his car after
hitting a patch of black ice and smashing into a high concrete burb (he wasn’t
hurt), my younger son had a similar accident and wrecked the front of my prized
Gator Truck (he wasn’t hurt; I was—emotionally) and Cindy (as well as Justin, since
Cindy made an eight-mile four-hour round trip in a snow and ice storm to pick
him up on the side of the road) had to spend Tuesday night at her law firm
because she couldn’t drive home since Atlanta was paralyzed from the snow and
ice (like I told you before: no laughing).
Then on Super Bowl Sunday our dishwasher decided to call it quits and a
couple pieces of tile broke loose from our newly remodeled front porch. Throw in one of our cats ‘scooching’ across
the carpet and leaving behind a couple of brown streaks for me to clean up and I
had all the proof I needed that Karma simply hates me.
Once toe met leather and the Super Bowl was officially
underway, I had a good feeling about the game’s outcome since I was long
overdue for Karma to pay me a visit. I
should have known better: Seeing my boyhood idol Joe Namath tossing the coin on
the 50-yard line before the start of the game wearing a coat made out of polar
bear (If I had to guess) should have tipped me off on what was going to happen
next. In other words whatever it was, it
was sure to be ugly. On the very first
snap of the game Peyton Manning was calling signals and took a step towards his
offensive line, a split second before the center hiked the ball to the spot
Manning had been standing two split seconds earlier. The ball rolled into Denver’s end zone for a
safety. After 12 seconds of the 48th
Super Bowl the score was: Seattle – 2, Denver – 0. The next time Denver had the ball Manning
threw an interception. Things went downhill
from there: Manning threw an
interception that Seattle turned into a field goal. Manning threw an
interception that Seattle returned for a touchdown. At halftime the score was 22 – 0. Denver had been hapless on offense for 30
minutes, but things had to improve in the second half; they just had to. Karma, are you listening?
Apparently not.
Seattle’s Percy Harvin returned the second half kickoff for a
touchdown. The play took 12 seconds off
the clock, the same amount of time it took Seattle to score in the first
half. Ah, so there’s that Karma I was looking for…
During the week leading up to the Super Bowl the
talking heads of the NFL pregame shows were debating about whether or not
Peyton Manning should be considered the ‘best (quarterback) ever’ if he led the
Broncos to victory in the Super Bowl. Manning’s play on the NFL’s biggest stage
reminded me of his four years playing quarterback for the Tennessee
Volunteers. Against my (and Percy Harvin’s) alma mater, the
University of Florida, Manning’s Vols lost all four games by a composite score
of 161 – 86, including 31 – 0 and 62 – 37 drubbings in his first two
seasons. Ironically, the year after
Manning graduated the Vols won the NCAA National Championship led by
quarterback Tee Martin, Manning’s former backup. Karma can be cruel sometimes.
As the Super Bowl drew to its inevitable conclusion (a
43 – 8 Seattle victory) I was feeling sort of sad I would never have the chance
to meet the bookie who knows a guy who has a friend who knows a guy who knows
another guy who knows my friend who I gave the $100 to wager for me a few days
ago.
As for Karma—well, like I said earlier: Karma hates
me.
As for Peyton Manning: He had a sensational season in
2013, broke a lot of records and earned the love and respect of every Bronco
fan around the world. But when all is
said and done, even though he earns a kazillion dollars a year Peyton Manning
and I have one thing in common:
Neither one of us won a Super Bowl this year.
Karma doesn’t think much of Peyton Manning
either.
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