Daily Loaf

In Lake Tahoe, a casino waitress alleges that a two-time Super Bowl champion quarterback forced himself on her in a hotel room. In another hotel room elsewhere in the country, someone sneaks a video camera through a keyhole to record a female sportscaster as she strolls around her room. In Alabama, a reporter asks a former Heisman trophy winner about his sexual behavior. In Kansas City, a well-respected journalist faults a female tennis champion for being too fat.

Somewhere we have crossed the line.

In this country, as in many others around the world, we deify the modern athlete, often to a fault. Read the rest of this entry »

On 1A of the St. Petersburg Times, sports columnist Gary Shelton trumpeted last night’s game as the greatest Super Bowl ever. It ranks high on my list, but I still have to give the overall nod to last year’s Giants/Patriots juggernaut. Admittedly, I liked the outcome of that game better than this one. I was surprised at how fervently I ended up rooting for the Cardinals, even though I’ve never been within a hundred miles of Phoenix. Something about them coming up short in their first chance for an NFL title since 1947 I found particularly poignant.

Larry Fitzgerald

For awhile, I thought the burgeoning recognition of otherworldly Cards receiver Larry Fitzgerald was going to flicker out like a spent candle. I’ve become a fan of his, and in the first half the Steelers bottled him up. But he busted out late with two touchdown catches and more than a hundred yards receiving. He would’ve been my MVP had the Cardinals won. Endorsements next?

Like the Springsteen halftime performance, I’ve been seeing raves about Jennifer Hudson’s rendition of the National Anthem. I thought it was too overheated and the tempo way too slow.

Was I the only one who thought the pregame on-field appearance of “Miracle on the Hudson” pilot Chesley B. Sullenberger III and his crew was inappropriate? Yeah, he did a heroic thing that shouldn’t be diminished, but his appearance came off like a blatant, out-of-left-field tug at the heartstrings.

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One of the best.

One of the best Super Bowls ever. That’s two in a row.

Pittsburgh Steelers 27, Arizona Cardinals 23.

For a good portion of the game, it looked like it was going to be one of those ho-hum affairs, and order would be restored.

Instead, Kurt Warner and the Cardinals mounted a serious comeback in the fourth quarter, and made it a jump-out-your-seat contest.

I was at a friend’s house in Seminole, with maybe 25 folks, and almost everyone was pulling for Arizona. When Larry Fitzgerald caught a long touchdown pass late in the fourth quarter, it looked like another titanic Super Bowl upset was in the making. Instead, Ben Roesthlisberger led the Steelers on a drive that culminated in an acrobatic catch by Santonio Holmes to take the lead.

A lead that held. With 29 seconds left, Warner took the helm, and Arizona backers fantasized about Fitzgerald making another one of his leaping, circus catches in the end zone for a Cardinal win.

It was not to be.

Still, it ended up being a terrific game to watch, even though it was a bit heartbreaking to see the Cards, who haven’t won an NFL championship since 1947, come up short.

A close-up of Fitzgerald, wide-eyed, saying, “Oh no, oh no, oh no,” told the story.

The game had everything to excite watchers, including a 100-yard interception return at the end of the first half by Steelers’s linebacker James Harrison that proved to be a major swing.

The referees played a big part in the outcome, having to decide several replays, and throwing penalty flags at crucial times. But TV replays showed that they made the right calls, although it was curious that they didn’t review the last Cardinals play, in which it was ruled the Warner fumbled.

It appeared, at the very least, that the officials should’ve looked at the play to see if Warner was in his throwing motion, which would have resulted in an incomplete pass, and one more chance for Warner to heave a hail mary, possibly giving Fitzgerald one more chance.

Instead, the Steelers walked away with a record sixth Super Bowl trophy in a game that will be remembered fondly by football fans for decades to come.

Cards bettors were happy. The Steelers did not cover the 7-point spread.

Talk about your fish out of water.

Take a veteran alt-weekly journalist and thrust him into Super Bowl Media Day. Loaded down with a video camera, a digital audio recorder and a digital still camera (oh, and a notebook, made of paper), the one-man-media-gang that was me joined a sea of others for more than two hours today at Raymond James Stadium.

A zoo. There had to be more than 2,000 media types herding around one side of the stadium, documenting the finer points of Larry Fitzgerald’s hair, Hines Ward’s diet, Troy Polamalu’s spirituality (and hair), Mike Tomlin’s hunger for winning, Ben Roethlisberger’s admiration for Kurt Warner (and vice versa), and more X’s-and-O’s 101 than one could stand.

Larry Fitzgerald and his hair

See more photos below the jump…

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That’s a recent headline from Outsports.com, the always-entertaining site for gay sports fans, and from the video posted on the site’s Jock Talk Blog it sure does seem as if Kurt is awfully concerned about the possibility of friends and family (and you too, probably) heading for eternal damnation.

Even more interesting are the comments that follow the post, including some smack talk about the saintly Tony Dungy and Tim Tebow, countered by live-and-let-live remarks that are yet another reminder that gay opinion isn’t monolithic.

Plus, this bonus for your playoff enjoyment: “Ben Roethlisberger a drama queen?”