Ever stub your toe and holler “Ow!” — before you actually know if it hurts?
That is what many have been conditioned to anticipate from the Super Bowl. Someone will make sure they go too far to exploit their biggest audience to make news and noise. It almost has become an obligation.
It could be a player. Seattle wide receiver and Stanford man Doug Baldwin “celebrated” a touchdown catch in the 2015 Super Bowl by miming his defecation of a football.
Naturally, Roger Goodell seized that to loudly and firmly deal with such vandalization of the game on its largest stage — the NFL quietly fined Baldwin $11,000, no suspension, no public censure.
Then there is the entertainment. At halftime of the 1993 game, Michael Jackson repeatedly grabbed his crotch while dancing and singing, though he did cut it out when singing “We Are the World” with a children’s choir.
The 2004 Super Bowl was scandalized by Justin Timberlake’s violent yank on Janet Jackson’s riveted, black-leather dominatrix outfit, causing her right breast to land in our onion dip.
Last year’s halftime starred Beyoncé and her troupe. They ambushed the country’s good senses with a salute to the Black Panthers, who randomly assassinated police — black, white and Hispanic — as an exercise in political sport.
Goodell didn’t bother to address that, to let us know who, if anyone, knew in advance or had bothered to ask why such an act would be performed on his $40 million per watch.
Then again, Goodell’s sense of right from wrong allowed NFL teams to quietly accept $5.4 million from the Department of Defense to stage American flag-unfurling pre-kickoff shows — purchased patriotism to honor those who serve and served.
Last week, the NHL presented the last person a circumspect adult would choose as celebrity host of an All-Star weekend event — Snoop Dogg, the vulgar rapper and pornographer who needs no introduction to make bail.
Dogg stayed in character, treating a Saturday family audience to the sounds of a vulgar, name-calling, N-worded, women-degrading, boastful number.
Here it is, a week later, and we still haven’t heard from the NHL, not a word of remorse, regret, apology — as if what couldn’t be missed never happened. Under Gary Bettman, no public accountability for engaging a performer who, left to the civil-minded, would appear only on the NHL’s invite list as a sarcastic joke.
So who at the NHL contacted this bottom-feeder? Who engaged him? Who gave final approval? Who was afraid to do the right thing? Or should we conclude the NHL would degrade its sport, its stars and its audience to curry such attention?
I’m not being Great Aunt Gertrude here, but what is the upside to all this? Unless falling lower and lower is good for what ails us, there is none.
Sunday? Who knows? What we do know is Lady Gaga isn’t shy. And her outrageous side, as much as her considerable talent as a singer, is why she is famous and why she was engaged. So, like stubbing our toe, we’re conditioned to anticipate pain before we know if it even hurts.
Super Bowls that once featured entertainment by the reliably clean and talented have been replaced by “edgy,” let’s-risk-it talent. Up With People replaced by Down With Pants. That’s the bag we’re in.
Either TV has no dignity or believes we have none. Or both.
The latest ESPN hire is Rex Ryan, ex-Jets and Bills coach who went out of his way to deface football. That Ryan selected Bills linebacker IK Enemkpali, the ex-Jet with a criminal record and who months earlier broke Jets teammate Geno Smith’s jaw, to further rub it in by assigning him his team’s coin-flip captain before a game — against the Jets — is hard evidence of an adult who acts like a creep.
The NFL Network, sustaining its habit of putting the league’s worst-feet-forward by hiring those whose gross misconduct as players would sensibly disqualify them from such TV rewards — Warren Sapp, Michael Irvin, to name two — has added ex-Panthers and Ravens wide receiver Steve Smith to its talent roster.
Smith’s professional résumé — fighting with teammates, including breaking Ken Lucas’ nose with a sucker punch, suspensions, fines, threatening trash-talk and even an ejection from a 2015 preseason game — clearly meets the NFL Network’s standards.
ESPN has added Odell Beckham Jr., quickly and widely known to be among the NFL’s most attention-starved, selfish, team-killing showboats, to its pregame show.
Odd, ex-ESPN and current FOX Sports analyst Cris Carter — FOX eagerly recruits the worst of ESPN — and the ex-NFL receiver, now credits himself as Beckham’s new “mentor,” you know, to help him in his “maturation process.”
Carter’s previous mentoring projects included Randy Moss, who this season switched to ESPN from FOX. As a receiver, Moss’ extraordinary talent was usurped by his relentless malfeasance, making him unwelcomed by six teams over eight seasons, thus a must-get for TV!
After failing to successfully mentor Moss, Carter mentored a room of NFL rookies, advising them to find a pal to take the fall for them after they’re arrested. As a guidance counselor, perhaps Carter’s a parole model.
But why would Beckham think he is in need of guidance when his behavior leads to commercial endorsements and selections to appear on TV as a special guest on Super Bowl Sunday?
Hey! What a coincidence! Both perps in that repulsive, me-first, all-game 2015 uncivil war — Beckham vs. Josh Norman — have landed national TV postseason gigs as active players. Norman, speaker of bad-dude threats and assorted garbage, last year was hired by FOX.
So, with TV’s persistent help, our sports keep sliding lower. The right-minded are the last served, the first forsaken. It’s crazy; no upside, none at all.
What is sillier than reporting whether teams about to play in the Super Bowl talk smack, providing “bulletin board” fodder for opponents? Teams that need motivation to win the Super Bowl wouldn’t be playing in it.
As a receiver at Rutgers, Mohamed Sanu was fun to watch. He ran good routes, made good catches of bad passes, no showboating. Now that he is a pro — he will play Sunday for the Falcons — he showboats at every chance. At Rutgers he acted like a pro; as a pro he acts like a fool. He hardly is alone.
If/when FOX posts fourth-down conversion success rates for either Super Bowl team, know this: Both finished well behind 1-15 Cleveland.
Wanna bet? Take the over on FOX’s shots of Robert Kraft, the AFC’s Jerry Jones.
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