It took me a week to finally reflect on the Super Bowl. Here goes nothing.
That normal sadness that follows a Super Bowl usually has to do with the season being over. The normal depression after the game usually has to do with me incorrectly assessing the wagers I made on the game (New England, I'm looking at you in your last two appearances).
This year, I had no such thoughts. No lamenting that the last game of the season had just been played. And no sadness about wagers lost. I only had one wager that was directly tied to the game with a friend, but I didn't care if my San Francisco -3.5 bet lost. Winning by 1-3 points would have been ok with me too.
Instead, the Niners left me with a hole in my heart that I tried to preemptively fill with close to a dozen craft beers. I missed the halftime show as I stood outside in the cold drinking a Gumball Head. My appearance in the frigid air would have a repeat performance, right after Jacoby Jones opened the second half with a kickoff return for a touchdown. I went outside again, trying to keep myself composed as my favorite team was in the process of getting demolished.
Then, the infamous power outage, which served to drag on the pain and provide false hope at the same time. When the outage was fixed, the Niners stormed back but couldn't finish the deal. Yes, there was a hold on the Niners' last offensive play, but that wasn't what caused the game to be lost.
After all, a 28-6 deficit entering your first offensive play of the second half isn't exactly something you can pin on a missed holding call. Chris Culliver became a trending name earlier in the Super Bowl week for his comments denouncing the idea of having and playing with a gay teammate. On Super Bowl Sunday, Culliver trended for a different reason - #HorribleCoverage. He was burned on Flacco's TD to Boldin to open the game and on his last TD to Jacoby Jones. Not to mention a costly pass interference that extended a Baltimore drive right after the Niners closed the big gap down to 31-29.
There's many other reasons to blame for the loss: the declining play of the defense (which has quietly been a problem since Kaepernick has taken over), Harbaugh not calling a single running play inside the 10 on that last drive, and so forth.
All the while, when the Niners were coming back, I was acting like a drunken fool and taunting everyone in the basement with random actions that I can't quite even comprehend why I was doing them. It was all the more reason to justify my month of sobriety which started with the Monday after the Super Bowl and continues till at least the beginning of March.
Once I woke up with a little hangover on Black Monday, I was mostly over the loss. The thoughts of a meaningful NFL game not appearing for another seven months were soon the main thoughts.
And they remain my thoughts for now. College basketball is starting to get back onto my sports radar, particularly with March Madness a month away.
Stay tuned for a blog in the near future, where I will simulate the 2013 NFL Draft, but with a little twist.
