Daily Loaf

Does Friday the 13th equal a freaky news day in the music world? Find out here.

The Who are scheduled to perform at Super Bowl XLIV, which will be held Feb. 7, 2010, in Miami. This will be the band’s first North American performance since 2008. The biggest night in pro football and the Who? My dad (and probably yours, too) can now die happy. (But let’s hope they don’t! Die now, that is.)

How do you pack the worlds greatest rock and roll show into 12 tight little minutes? Perhaps you need to ask The Boss. When Super Bowl 43 took over Tampa this past winter, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street band wowed the millions of Americans watching as only they can. Working on a Dream: Bruce Springsteen’s Super Bowl Journal, which airs tonight (Monday, September 7), is a fantastic look into how the rock show spectacle was put together. The Rabid One was a part of Bruce’s stage crew for the show. Let’s see if the documentary tells the whole story.

Read the rest of this entry »

Okay, it’s been awhile since the Buccaneers’ Super Bowl victory in early 2003. But if you’ve spent a long time in Tampa, you remember all the years before that—orange uniforms, jokes and double-digit years of double-digit losses. Right now the team is competitive and missing the playoffs last year was a disappointment. I remember when a winning record—playoffs or not—was grounds for a parade. Expectations are higher because the team is better.
So if you’re ready for some football, the team’s annual Fan Fest event is this Saturday. Read the rest of this entry »

The only time I ever seriously considered becoming a vegetarian was when trying to impress a vegetarian love interest. Perhaps PETA had this in mind when it produced its latest commercial for a red-blooded Super Bowl audience. NBC rejected this clip via email, listing the following concerns

‘Veggie Love’: PETA’s Banned Super Bowl Ad

-licking pumpkin
-touching her breast with her hand while eating broccoli
-pumpkin from behind between legs
-rubbing pelvic region with pumpkin
-screwing herself with broccoli (fuzzy)
-asparagus on her lap appearing as if it is ready to be inserted into vagina
-licking eggplant
-rubbing asparagus on breast.

If there isn’t already a term for sex with vegetables there needs to be one. Suggestions? “Salad tossing” is taken. Smashing pumpkins… Salad shooting… Broccoli banging

New Lost tonight, and here’s a sneak peak at tonight’s episode. Don’t tell me what happens in it. I’ll wait to find out.

• Obama caps executive pay at $500,000. Let the cries of the apocalypse begin.
• The President continues his bipartisanship attack by appointing a Republican to the Secretary of Commerce post.

Much more news is one click away …

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Brian Ries recommended some sports-bar alternatives where the crowds wouldn’t be on Game Day, and he was right about the attendance. At the start of a Super Bowl that would turn out to be one of the best ever, Ybor City (hung over from the night before, perhaps) was very quiet. But if nothing much was happening yet in the bars themselves, the denizens of the bars were happy to talk to Creative Loafing’s camera.

Alton Isings of L’Olivier’s Restaurant (and Miami Modern) asks a key question:

More videos after the jump:

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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.

Read the rest of this entry »

Here’s a great piece on the impact of the recession on this year’s Super Bowl. (From Al-Jazeera, no less!) Tampa looks great in the video, and looked stunning in all the overhead shots during the game. Nice job, Bay area. See you in 2014, NFL.

• The Steelers win one for the other thumb.
• NBC does a super job with the Big Game.

Lots more after the break…

• Super Bowl excitement taxes cell phone systems to the limit.
• Jennifer Hudson nailed it.
• Incidentally, I paid no attention to the ads this year. Guess what: I don’t feel like I missed anything.
• Hot Obama nominee trend: screwing up you taxes.
• OMG, Michael Phelps smoked some weed! The whole fucking world is going to end!!!!
• Over the weekend, Google decided every other website was a virus.
• A new iPhone in the wild around San Francisco?

If that was lip-syncing, she’s an even better actress than I thought she was. But that was apparently the case, at least according to this passage from a HuffPo report (Minor is pre-game show producer Rickey Minor):

Although entertainers can perform live, Minor insisted that Hudson and Faith Hill, who sang “America the Beautiful” before the national anthem, use the tracks the NFL requires them to submit a week before the game.

But even that explanation’s unclear. What “tracks” does this statement refer to? Background tracks? Were some parts lip-synced, some not? Whatever. To quote a HuffPo commenter: “That Lady can flat out SANG!”

Judge for yourself, below the jump:
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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.

10:15 Stay tuned as we live blog The Office. Just kidding. Goodnight, everybody!

10:12 After many years of snoozefests, we’ve had two great games in two years. This probably doesn’t top the Giants/Patriots, or does it?

10:10 Pittsburgh 27 – Arizona 23 – FINAL

Valiant comeback by Arizona, but in the end their defense could not hold.

10:08 Hail Mary, full of grace…

Omar Epps or Mike Tomlin. Can you tell the difference? Read the rest of this entry »

Going to the game? Watching it (or ignoring it) at a party or a bar? Settling in with some nacho chips and a six-pack to watch it from your couch?

All good, and we can help.

First off, you can join us here to live-blog the big event. Root for the Steelers and trash-talk the Cardinals, or vice versa. Rate the commercials, review the half-time show, tell us what you’re doing instead of the Super Bowl. We want to hear from you, whether you’re in RayJay or your living room.

If you’re looking for a great game-watching spot, try one of the sports-bar alternatives described in this story by Brian Ries. And look for a Creative Loafing crew while you’re out; we’ll be roaming from L’Olivier in Ybor to Wine Exchange in Hyde Park Village to Partners in St. Pete — and…? Got any other recommendations for places to watch the game?

The Tonight Show’s Ross the Intern was identified in Eric Snider’s NFL Media Day post only as “the queenie guy.” To be fair, no one is queenier than Ross the Intern, aka Ross Matthews — that’s his schtick — but he’s also got balls. (Pink balls, to be exact, but we’ll get to that in a moment.) The footage from Media Day he showed on Friday’s Tonight Show was seriously hilarious, partly because of the incongruity of that helium voice and fluttery persona on the loose in football world, but also because he was fearless. Take that pink ball — a pink football he was carrying around, trying to convince players they should switch from brown to pink: “It’s the color of pig!” Some players didn’t know what to make of him — “Don’t be throwin’ me no pink balls,” growled one — but most were disarmed, even charmed. He even got one guy to do a pretty creditable version of the wiggly “Ross victory dance.” The NFL ought to start inviting him to all their press conferences; I’d like to see what he’d do when players and commentators throw around classic sports cliches like the Madden-attributed “He sees the hole, then runs through it.” I can hear him squealing already.

For most of the Tampa Bay media, it is all hands on deck for Super Bowl coverage as we near the game on Sunday. This has been building for weeks, with the crescendo in newsprint, online sites, video and audio over the past week.

The Super Bowl website on tampabay.com

Overall, though, my main thought about the coverage is: Damn! It would take a normal human being 237 years to read all of this. Most of it is ephemeral; on a blog or website front one minute, lost in the archives the next. You imagined that if the local media paid this much attention to our economy and government we would be the only metro area in the nation not suffering from a recession or corruption.

Given that caveat, here is a look at how they did, from worst to best, among the major media players in the Tampa Bay Market:

Read the rest of this entry »

Super Bowl Weekend at Jackson’s Bistro: “Leather and Laces”
Carmen Electra, Jenny McCarthy and Kim Kardashian (left to right in the photo) co-host this Super Bowl kickoff bash at Jackson’s Bistro, Harbour Island’s high-end pickup joint. There’ll be live entertainment by Cirque USA performers and spins by celebrity DJ Tendaji Lathan, with proceeds to benefit Generation Rescue, an autism research and treatment advocacy organization headed by McCarthy. Admission is $275 general/$550 VIP (includes passed sushi and hors d’oeuvres). And since it’s for charity, you can write it off.
601 S. Harbour Island Blvd., Tampa, Fri., Jan. 30, 9 p.m.-3 a.m., 813-265-1234, leatherandlaces.com.

Pepsi Música Super Bowl Fiesta The second of two Pepsi-hosted concerts at Ford Amphitheatre (last night’s rain-soaked Rihanna bash was the first), the Friday Fiesta features Enrique Iglesias and Belanova. The concert will be taped to air on Telemundo Sat., Jan. 31. Jan. 30, 7:30 p.m. Ford Amphitheatre, 4802 U.S. 301 N., Tampa, $20- $45 per concert, nfl.com/pepsismash.

Lights On Tampa 2009: This weekend’s your last chance to check out the installations in Tampa’s  illuminating public art display.

King Hedley II and Picasso at the Lapin Agile: Two good reasons to get out and see a show tonight, the former at American Stage and the latter at Jobsite Theater. The acting in both productions won raves from CL theater critic Mark E. Leib. Check out our ArtsSpeak interview with Hedley star Postell Pringle, aka Playboy X.

Tim Dorsey: Safeguarding our region’s reputation as a mecca for wack jobs and illicit entertainments, Tim Dorsey’s Nuclear Jellyfish brings us another installment in the hilarious adventures of everyone’s favorite serial killer, Serge A. Storms, and his stoner pal Coleman. Dorsey reads from his new novel twice today, first at Haslam’s Book Store in St. Pete at 4 p.m., then at Skipper’s in Tampa at 7:30.

After wandering around Media Day at Raymond James Stadium, squeezing my way in front of the stars while reporters shouted inane questions, I made my way up into the bleachers where it was less frenzied. That’s where I saw a good-looking large fellow sitting all by his lonesome. It said “Spaeth” on the back of his jersey and judging by the No. 89 I figured he was a tight end, maybe a guy who played on special teams.

I sat down behind his left shoulder and said told him I wasn’t a sportswriter, more of a “lifestyle writer.” He replied, “Perfect, I’m more of a lifestye guy anyways.”

We had a leisurely chat for a little more than 10 minutes, talked about what was on Matt’s iPod, then moved onto … football. But not X’s-and-O’s football, more about football from Speath’s perspective, from a lifestyle perspective. I found him to be a thoughtful, interesting young man. As it turns out, Matt’s on the field about 40 plays a game, as part of the Steelers’ two-tight-end sets. He caught touchdown passes in his first two games as a rookie in ‘07.

Here’s an audio recording of highlights of our interview, which was much like a conversation. Download.

Matt Spaeth

With the big game just around the corner, here is an informative video that should help ticket counterfeiters make more realistic facsimiles to sell to the helpless rubes around Ray-Jay. Thank you, St. Pete Times!

• We’re live-blogging the game on Sunday. Won’t you stop by and give your $.02?
• Be careful driving this weekend. There will be road closures to contend with.
• Good news Steelers fans, Hines Ward looks like a go.

More news (and Blago!) after the break…

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Arnett welcomes those with “nothing to do on the Super Bowl i.e. losers,” including, apparently, Andy Richter and “YouTube’s most famous celebs.” The irony quotient suffers somewhat when you find out the party’s being hosted on refresheverything.com, the website of Pepsi. There’s a clip promoting the party in which Arnett welcomes all, including “nude dudes,” and Richter wanders in muttering something about there being a wig stuck in the toilet. Your basic nervous straight-guy quasi-gay humor (c.f., any given monologue by Conan O’Brien), but it might be fun to watch, nude or not.

At Super Bowl Media Day, the star players sit at podiums and take questions from a throng of reporters, while the lesser names sit up in the stands and do interviews. Cardinals wide receiver Anquan Boldin is a podium guy.

Reporters practiced in the art of gang interviewing (or those with high-profile TV faces) get to ask most of the questions, but I did manage to fire a query at Boldin (after the media horde had thinned). I wanted to ask if he studied Marcel Proust at Florida State, and, if so, what was his favorite part of “Remembrance of Things Past.”

I got this instead:

Having a Super Bowl party? With the Bay area hosting the big game, you’re going to have a lot of competition. If you don’t serve more than the usual finger sandwiches and frozen wings spread, you might not get the attendance you’re looking for.

Thankfully, the blogosphere provides you a full array of ideas and recipes to amp your snack table for the big day. And we pulled a lot of them together for you, after the break: Read the rest of this entry »

Common wisdom would tell you that the big game and the sudsy brew go hand in hand. Sure, up to a point.

But when it comes to holidays and events, Super Bowl is way down the rankings in terms of beer sales, eighth on the list.

Why? Well, most Super Bowl celebrations don’t start until just before kickoff, probably not before 5 or 6 p.m. Holidays are day-long celebrations. Heck, our family Easter tradition is to tap the keg when we start the egg hunt and keep it flowing until we pass out from ham and beer overload. On Christmas, we drink to deal with our in-laws. On Father’s Day, well … that’s just depressing.

Check after the break for the complete list of top beer holidays:

From Kasper on Tap -

According to data from the Nielsen Co., consumers bought a mere 51.7 million cases of beer in the two weeks surrounding last year’s Super Bowl. That trails the 68.1 million cases bought during the top beer holiday, the 4th of July.

Our nation’s top beer holidays are as follows:
1. July 4
2. Labor Day
3. Memorial Day
4. Father’s Day
5. Christmas
6. Thanksgiving
7. Easter
8. Super Bowl

I’m real picky when it comes to pop stars singing the National Anthem at sports events. Too many artists tend to oversing, over-emote and occasionally turn it into a Patti LaBelle-esque shriek-a-thon. That said, I don’t expect everyone to sing the song exactly note for note — as a tune, it’s pretty  lame — so it’s cool when performers take a certain amount of license.

Last Sunday, I saw pop star/American Idol winner Jordin Sparks tackle the anthem at the NFC Championship Game. She nailed it, gave the song just the right amount of extra oomph, hit some stratospheric notes, bent a few phrases gospel-style and generally raised the hairs on my neck. Right after she finished, play-by-play announcer Joe Buck let out a “Wow!”

Sparks is in town for Super Bowl week, and last night I had a chance to do a quick interview with her as makeup and hair artists dolled her up for a charity performance at Roy’s restaurant in Tampa. The bubbly 20-year-old gave me a panicked look when I asked if we could talk a few minutes about her approach to singing the National Anthem in cavernous stadiums.

“What?” she asked. I repeated my request, and she said, relieved, “Oh, I thought you said you wanted me to sing the National Anthem.”

Sparks agreed that some artists overdo it. “Sometimes I’ll see it and I’m like, ‘OK, it’s not about you,’” she said. “If you’re out there singing the National Anthem, you’ve got enough talent to do it, so just go out there and sing the song as best you can — without butchering it.”

Her approach: “I remember when I first started doing sports events, I thought, ‘When I sing it, I don’t want to make it into a pop song,’ but I did want to put emotion into it — like how I would feel if I was the one standing there seeing that flag still standing amid all the bombs, feeling that sense of pride. I try to emote that, to get that in there.

“But it’s not about me, not about me at all. I always feel so honored to sing the National Anthem. It’s our national song. I think I get the most nervous when I sing it, because if I suck, noboby’s gonna let me live it down.”

I told Sparks about my favorite rendition of the Anthem: Marvin Gaye’s re-imagining of the song during the 1983 NBA All-Star Game. She fairly shrieked and said, “Oh, I have to put that into my phone right now.”

Sparks sang “The Star Spangled Banner” at last year’s Super Bowl. (Jennifer Hudson gets the honor this year.) Here’s a video of Sparks’ performance last Sunday at the NFC Championship Game.

President Obama tried again yesterday to get Republican lawmakers’ support for his economic stimulus package. The Republicans seem determined to oppose it. So, Mr. President, we going to do this thing or what? (On a side note: Happy Birthday Mom!)

• A few choice Blago tapes get a public airing.
• Unemployment is up everywhere. Everywhere!

More news after the break.

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Some roads are already closed and others will close over the next few days as Super Bowl fever, activities and traffic peak. The city of Tampa today announced the following road closures in Channelside, Ybor, around the RayJay and beyond:

January 30, 2009 beginning at 6 p.m. through February 1, 2009 at midnight, the Transportation Division expects increased traffic in Downtown Tampa and Ybor City for the following roads: Dale Mabry Highway, Himes Avenue, Hillsborough Avenue, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, Columbus Drive, Armenia Avenue, Platt Street/Channelside Drive, Tampa Street Morgan Street, 21st and 22nd Streets, and 7th Avenue. The Tampa Street extension from Brorein Street to Franklin Street may be closed based on traffic flow, if so please use Meridian Avenue to access Harbour Island.

Road closures around Raymond James Stadium include:
• January 7, 2009 (already in effect) – Tampa Bay Boulevard between Dale Mabry Highway and Himes Avenue is closed to all traffic and is expected to reopen on February 10, 2009.
• February 1, 2009 – Beginning at 12:01 a.m. Dale Mabry Highway North between Columbus Drive and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard will be closed to traffic and is expected to reopen on February 2, 2009 at 4 a.m.
• January 31, 2009 – Beginning 10 p.m. Himes Avenue between Columbus Drive and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard will be closed to traffic and is expected to reopen on February 2, 2009 at 6 a.m.

Road closures in downtown Tampa include:
• January 29, 2009 – Beginning at 6 p.m. the northbound lane on Franklin Street will be closed from Harbour Island to Old Water Street (formerly St. Pete Times Forum Drive) and is expected to reopen on February 1, 2009 at 6 p.m.
• January 29, 2009 – Beginning at 6 p.m. Old Water Street (formerly St. Pete Times Forum Drive) will be westbound only from Channelside Drive to Florida Avenue and is expected to return to two-way traffic on February 1, 2009 at 6 p.m.
• January 30 and January 31, 2009 (two nights) – From 6 p.m. to 12 midnight, Channelside Drive between Meridian Avenue and Cumberland Avenue will be closed.

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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What a bargain. Reuters reports that “tickets for the National Football League’s Super Bowl could be the most affordable in years as a recession drives down prices.”

How affordable? Overall average per ticket is $3,100. And get this Wal-Mart-worthy doorbuster: “The maximum price paid for a ticket so far this year is $5,250, down from $9,850 last year.”

Grab the kids and head on over!

Obama’s first day in office was a success. Business was done. Executive Orders were released. A BS church ceremony was attended. I didn’t think about Bush all day. Damn, now I ruined it.

• Caroline Kennedy pulls out of the race to be appointed to Hillary’s old Senate seat.
• Barack Obama is sworn in … again. (Just to be safe.)

Click below for more news.

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The historic angle for the Super Bowl that Tampa Bay will host in a couple of week is probably not as compelling as most. The Arizona Cardinals improbably won the NFC Championship 32-25 over the Philadelphia Eagles. It’s the first Super Bowl for the long-suffering Cardinals, who won their last NFL championship in 1947 — against the Philadelphia Eagles. Other than the Chicago Cubs, no other professional sports franchise has gone longer between titles than the Cardinals.

Arizona will play the storied Pittsburgh Steelers, who beat the Baltimore Ravens 23-14 in 25-degree Steel City cold and light snow flurries.

The Super Bowl will pit the flashy, pass-happy offense of the Cardinals — which dominated the NFC-best Eagles defense for most of the game — against the more complete Steelers, who were the No. 1-ranked defense in all the NFL.

Read the rest of this entry »

Drew Magary’s Jambaroo, published every Thursday on sport blog Deadspin, is a must read for serious football fans who also get the absurdity of their favorite sport. This week, Drew is sounding off on championship Sunday when he takes time out to address a potential Super Bowl crisis:

And so, if the favorites hold, we’ll end up with an all-Pennsylvania Super Bowl that will take place in Florida. People, I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I say this kind of mass influx of Pennsylvanians into the greater Tampa area will result in A FUCKING DRIVING HOLOCAUST.

Read the rest of this entry »

The new nightclub at Channelside called Aja is blowin’ it out for Super Bowl with three parties featuring celebrity hosts and entertainment. Here’s a rundown:

• Thursday, January 29, Super Bowl Kickoff Party Featuring a 4 Turntable Set with Sounds from DJ AM and DJ Jazzy Jeff, $50.00 — Thursday kicks off the weekend with the sounds of Celebrity DJ AM (Resident LAX Las Vegas and PURE Las Vegas) and hip-hop great DJ Jazzy Jeff. This will be a 4 turntable performance.

• Friday, January 30, Friday Night Blitz Super Bowl Party Hosted By Holly Madison & Kendra Wilkinson, $300.00 per person (includes premium open bar from 9 p.m.-3 a.m.) — Friday Night Blitz Super Bowl event hosted by the stars of E! Entertainment Television’s hit reality series, The Girls Next Door, Holly Madison & Kendra Wilkinson. Along with Alex Smith (Tampa Bay Bucs), Greg Camarillo (Miami Dolphins), Drew Carter (Oakland Raiders) and Brendon Ayanbadejo (Baltimore Ravens). Music and entertainment by Celebrity DJ Scene (Resident Studio 54 and Wet Republic Las Vegas, XM Radio DJ).

• Saturday, January 31, Athletes and Angels Super Bowl Party Hosted By Pamela Anderson, $300.00 per person (includes premium open bar from 9 p.m.-3 a.m.) — With sounds by DJ Vice (Resident Tao Las Vegas). Additional hosts include Simeon Rice (Retired Tampa Bay Bucs), Shaun Phillips (Chargers), Stephen Cooper (Chargers) and Vernon Davis (49ers).

Open to the public; advance tickets available here

Aja. 290 South Meridian Avenue; Tampa, at the Towers of Channelside, just around the corner from the St. Pete Times Forum

How does an Arizona Cardinals/Baltimore Ravens Super Bowl sound?

I’m tempted to say that NBC, which will broadcast Super Bowl XXXXIII from Tampa , is shuddering at the thought of those two non-marquee teams clashing on Feb. 1, but really, isn’t the Super Bowl so ginormous that it transcends the matchup? People tune into the Super Bowl no matter what, right? We’ll find out.

Of the final four teams in the NFL Playoffs, only the Pittsburgh Steelers have a national following. I think it’s safe to say that folks in NBC’s executive offices are probably rooting for them against Baltimore next weekend.

Any way you cut it, this year’s game cannot approach the broad appeal of the ‘08 battle between the New York Giants and the New England Patriots. And you know what? That’s OK with me. And I suspect it’s cool with most other hardcore NFL fans. As far as I’m concerned, if it can’t be the Bucs (or the Colts) in there, then let’s throw the thing wide open and make it Cardinals vs. Ravens.

A sling-it-around-the-park, wide-open-offense team vs. a gouge-out-your-eye-defense team (with the Cards winning 37-35). The Cardinals have been so down for so long that I can’t help but push for ‘em.

While the matchup probably doesn’t influence the TV viewership that much, I wonder what effect it will have on Tampa Bay, and the supposed economic boon that a Super Bowl brings. In that sense, I’m guessing that the host committee, business interests and local muckety-mucks are hoping for a Steelers/Eagles tilt. Two storied franchises, both from Pennsylvania, makes for a good storyline:

Read the rest of this entry »

Obama talks the sinking economy in the latest “Message From The President-Elect” posted to YouTube.

• Obama’s not even officially the Prez, and already he’s caving.

Lots more news after the jump: Read the rest of this entry »

Since the mid-1980s, I’ve owned Electric Football, which is little more than a vibrating metal board painted to look like a football field. Switch it on, and watch in dismay as your little plastic running back nudges forward a half inch before doing an about-face and flutters toward his own endzone. Good times.

While surfing the Internet to learn more about this classic boyhood game, I came across this video, which I hope will lighten your mood this NFL Sunday as you fall farther behind in your fantasy and pick ‘em leagues.

We’ve been told for the last year how much the Super Bowl is going to boost our economy. But, as some have reported before, that’s largely bullshit. The money coming into the Tampa Bay area usually leaves the next day through corporate chains’ profits. Besides some double-shifts, residents don’t see much from all the sports fans staying at Holiday Inns and eating at Applebee’s.

Except for one group. The hustlers.

Con artists, scammers, counterfeiters, panhandlers and other underground entrepreneurs have always done well at large sporting events, especially the Super Bowl. Their profits, however distasteful, often go right back into our local economy (although sometimes through other black market economies like drugs).

I, for one, was looking forward to spending the day circling Raymond James Stadium and talking to vendors selling hats and shirts quickly stitched with one of the battling teams or picking out the best con artist scheme.

But the city of Tampa doesn’t see it the same way and tomorrow the city council will debate (and most likely pass) an ordinance that creates a “clean zone” encompassing several blocks around the stadium and downtown hotels. They’re even saying a house party that charges at the door could be subject to fines.

What ever happened to the “free market?” If I want to buy a $20 Super Bowl XLIII T-shirt that mixes up the roman letters a bit (”Super Bowl XIIIL!”) over a $75 NFL-licensed shirt, isn’t that my right? And where else but on the streets would you find live turtles with NFL logos emblazoned on their shells?

(The city will allow vendors to purchase special permits to sell items, though

I’d like to hear from readers on the best unlicensed vendors you’ve bought from and your thoughts on the “clean zone.”

While you think about it, some other Super Bowl links to the underground:

How to spot fake tickets.

Tricks on how (not) to get into the Super Bowl for free.

In 2006, Canadians saw a spike in their underground economy.

St. Petersburg is following Tampa’s footsteps by creating a “Clean Zone” around Tropicana Field for the anticipated World Series.