Super Bowl XL Preview
Pittsburgh Steelers v. Seattle Seahawks
February 5, 2006.
Ford Field - Detroit, Michigan
HOW THEY GOT THERE:

-    Pittsburgh Steelers (11-5, won AFC Wild Card.  Beat Cincinnati, Indianapolis and Denver on the road in the AFC Playoffs).  Grew sexy beards, ate enormous meals, crippled opposing QB’s in the playoffs (when not just waiting for the inevitable self-destructions of questionable QB’s).

-    Seattle Seahawks (13-3, won pathetic NFC West with best record in NFC.  Beat Washington and Carolina at home in NFC playoffs.)  Forced Ray Rhodes to have strokes so as to not mess up the defense, gave the ball to the lost Barber brother, somehow kept the Hasselbeck’s straight and did not let the Hasselbeck with the hot wife QB the team.

TALE O’ THE TAPE, PART 1:  THE STEELERS ROAD TRIP!

-    Distance between Pittsburgh, PA and Detroit, MI: 284.6 miles
-    Approx. Travel Time (by land): 4 hours, 45 mins.
-    Approx. # of fast food places along the way: 38,932
-    Approx. # of stops through various drive thru windows to keep Jerome Bettis from eating Jeff Reed: 37,846
-    Approx. # of calories consumed by Bettis along the way: 58,973,223
-    Approx. weight of Bettis by the time he hits Detroit: 59,876 lbs.
-    Approx. weight of Bettis by the time he hits Detroit - without the press on his flabby junk: 3,592

TALE O’ THE TAPE, PART 2:  THE SEAHAWKS ROAD TRIP!

-    Distance between Seattle, WA and Detroit, MI: 2350.0 miles
-    Approx. Travel Time (by land): 36 hours, 9 mins
-    Approx. # of times Matt Hasselbeck listens to “Jeremy” on the way to Detroit: 7,350
-    Approx. # of times Matt Hasselbeck tells Joe Jurevicius that Pearl Jam rocked way more before they went “all God” and moved to Florida: 3,229
-    Approx. # of times Joe Jurevicius has Peter Gammons tell Matt Hasselbeck that he has again confused Pearl Jam with Creed: 3,200
-    Approx. # of times Matt Hasselbeck asks Josh Brown do the Bee Girl dance on the trip to Detroit: 2,750

THE ANTI-BETTIS – AKA THE REAL SKINNY

ED:  Let’s face it, the game will be dull.  No one cares.  The Steelers will win since the football gods hate us all.  And the analysis stuff is for people with math skills and/or “experts” who hang out at Hooters.  But YOU want to real poop.  If you’re here, you’re all about the HATE!  Sweet misguided HATE!  So here’s the real poop – REASONS TO HATE EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS GAME!!!

BB: By hang out, do you mean they’re cooks?

HALL OF FAME ANNOUNCEMENT

ED:  Deep in my heart, I wake up thinking that everyday will be gold, I will become a millionaire and life will be grand.  Then my eyes open and look out upon Ohio and reality hits and I hate life all over again.  So while I hold out hope that this is they year John Madden, Lester Hayes, Cliff Branch and Jack Friggin’ Tatum get elected, I know I will be forced to swallow down the bile when it’s a Cowboy lovefest.  Oops.  I mean, when THE ANTI-COWBOY BIAS! rears it’s ugly head again.  But if they get it right with Warren Moon, Harry Carson and Art Monk, life would be a little more bearable – even in Ohio.  Fat chance of that happening.

BB: Maybe they will elect Frank Black.

PR: Aww… did he lay off The Cadillacs? I know the American car is pretty weak but I thought they were boys. And I was so tired when I started this I read “Frank Black” as “Bella Fleck” and then I spent 5 minutes trying to figure out why and another 5 minutes trying to think of a mean Dave Mathews joke. I clearly failed to succeed on either matter.

STEELERS

ED:  They are the Steelers.  From Pittsburgh.  For those not ancient like Phil and Dean and Pieman and I, you have to realize that those facts are quite enough.  The prospect that the citizens of that state are dumb enough to consider Lynn Swann as their governor makes me chuckle, considering that Ohio has had a Taft as governor for 8 year and our neighboring states are doing their best to bring themselves down to our level, but Phil is pondering moving to that state, so…yeah.  Oh yeah, the Browns fans-turned Steelers fans here in Ohio are beyond contempt.

BB: Is Lynn Swann as your governor better or worse than Terry Francona? How about Lou Merloni? If Lou Merloni won, would he immediately abdicate and become Utility Governor so Nomar could take over? Are we past the point where it’s worth signing Lou Merloni because he’s friends with Nomar? Does that mean Lou and Wilton Guerrero and Carlos Baerga and Billy Ripken are friends now?

PR: Are you telling me that Chris Gwynn can’t even hang out with that group? If not, I am sure he can at least hang with Bettis. They do share the same diet.

PR: Oh and would Lynn Swann allocate enough money to the Steelers to allow them to finally put an emblem on the other side of their helmet?

ED:  The Rooney family.  Umm, they’ve won four Super Bowls in my lifetime.  Can people stop with the whole poor Rooney family crap already?  The 50’s-60’s laughingstock Steelers were long-long-long ago.  Christ, no one feels sorry for the Ford family.

BB: Clearly you haven’t read the business section of the newspaper recently.

ED:  Jerome Bettis.  Dear God, the inevitable massive heart attacks cannot happen soon enough.  Oh yeah, and as far as really good big running backs goes, I saw Earl Campbell, and Jerome Bettis was never-ever-ever-ever Earl Campbell.

BB: God you sound old.

PR: Oh be quiet. You and your Barry Sanders love. And Jerome Bettis is far closer to Bam Morris than Earl Campbell.

ED: Ben Roethlisberger.  The lesser-Brady, as life would have it.  He’s not very good.  Has very bad facial hair.  And the whole watered-down white gangsta act really-really-really is far too sad to ponder.  And of course, he went to Miami (OH).  Of course, he’s easier to take than Bettis.

BB: Well at this point he’s either the greater Kyle Orton or the younger Larry Eustachy.

ED:  Bill Cowher.  Other than his stint with GI Joe…whoops.  That was Sgt. Slaughter.  OK.  Umm…no.  Smug, abrasive, idiotic.  But he has better fashion sense than Belichick.

PR: The true question is – does he have better fashion sense than you?

ED:  Troy Paliaeiuomoaeiousomtimesy.  The Samoan John Lynch.  Being on his jimmy is the being on Tom Brady’s junk of the ’06.  If he was white, Chris Berman would have ran to Hawaii with him and legally gotten hitched.

PR: If Chris Berman had run anywhere, he would have had a heart attack and we would have gotten 4 weeks of weepy ESPN coverage.

TEN THINGS YOU DID TO PISS JOEY PORTER OFF

1.    Ordered a half-topping half-cheese pizza and didn’t come at Domino’s straight up with a topping order.
2.    Pointed out that it’s almost impossible for a Steeler OLB to not get 8 sacks a year.
3.    Didn’t wet yourself at the sight of a strand of Troy Polamalu’s hair.
4.    Made eye contact with a Seahawk player.
5.    Didn’t want Mike Jones back then.
6.    Mentioned the name Greg Lloyd.
7.    Asked him when he was going to do another one of his wacky press conference characters until you realized that was a different NFL player’s gimmick.
8.    Implied he went to Colorado State because none of the girls at Colorado would let him rape them on his recruiting trip,
9.    You’re a kicker.
10.    Didn’t give Rodney Harrison any respect.

SEAHAWKS

ED:  I still remember when the Raiders would regularly go up to Seattle once a year and get anally-intruded in the Kingdom.  So I have some misplaced hate there.  Of course, Bo also destroyed the Bosworth myth up there too.  That only sort of eases the pain of losing to Dave Krieg-lead teams.

BB: CURT WARNER!!! You know little kids see a football card of his and they must wonder, “Is his wife ugly too?”

PR: You actually did this and are trying to pretend you aren’t that young.

ED:  Steve Largent.  Oh, he’s not playing.  But I still loathe the man for playing football in a skirt.

BB: Who?

ED:  Paul Allen.  Co-founder of Microsoft, owner of the Seahawks.  Well, that’s about all you need, really.

PR: Aww… so does that mean the entire Seahawk team might be stricken with a virus at anytime?

THE ROLLING STONES

ED:  Keith Richards may have been full of the whole rock star chic back in his day.  But he forgot to die in the 70’s.  And now the only reason to see the Stones is the hope that they will die on stage.  How any one would be able to tell if they are alive or not at this point, is beyond me.

BB: Aaron Neville and Aretha Franklin are also doing the National Anthem. Apparently Shelton Benjamin doesn’t need a mom that night.

PR: Good Christ – Aretha Franklin, Jerome Bettis, John Madden, Peter King and Len Pasquarelli are all going to be in the same building at once. I feel sorry forever has to cater that.

ABC

ED:  I am not legally allowed to hate on John Madden.  But I am just starting the hate against endless promos for Desperate Housewives now.  

BB: Now…if John Madden was on Desperate Housewives…we would be in business.

PR: Well if Madden was on Desperate Housewives I am guessing Felicity Hoffman would be winning some more awards because I am certain she the only one on that set who could feign being interested in John. Of course – Madden would be showing up in the MaddenCruiser and rumor has it that Teri Hatcher likes to bang in a bus. No no no, not that Bang Bus.

BOTTOM LINE

ED:  Since the Steelers have oodles more reasons to be despised than the merely dull Seahawks, Pittsburgh will obviously win by like 30 points.  It's the Tagliabue Unwatchable Super Bowl Rule.  It’s the way the NFL is.  Deal with it.  

BB: I think that should be the motto for the NFL, really. Or suck it up.

TALE O’ THE TAPE, PART 3: THE LIKELY VICTORY CELEBRATION – PITTSBURGH

-    Approx. gallons of Iron City consumed: 3.8 million
-    Approx. gallons of Iron City vomited in the streets of Pittsburgh: 17.8 million
-    Approx. # of cars tipped over and burned in the streets of Pittsburgh: 183
-    Approx. # of people it would take to tip over and burn Jerome Bettis: 983
-    Approx. monetary adjustment to the city if Pittsburgh was razed in the victory celebration: $1.8 million dollars in improvements

TALE O’ THE TAPE, PART 3: THE LIKELY VICTORY CELEBRATION – SEATTLE

-    Approx. # of people who would care: 442
-    Approx. # of people who would riot: 38,926
-    Approx. # of people who would riot, unaware that this riot is not a Tad concert: 38,925
-    Approx. number of Starbucks opened in honor of the Seahawks winning the Super Bowl: 85,926
-    Approx. # times Peter King would try to be hip about Seattle and mention Pearl Jam in the ensuing column: 322
-    Approx. # of albums Pearl Jam sells based on this: 0