Blog | Super Bowl recap: Commercials too serious; Seattle lost because it ignored Football 101
The New England Patriots did everything it needed to win last night’s Super Bowl.
They overcame a 10-point deficit in the fourth quarter, the biggest deficit overcome by any team in that game.
They had to stop the Seattle Seahawks from scoring in the fourth quarter, and they did.
Tom Brady had to lead his team to two scores in the fourth quarter against the league’s top rated defense, and did.
Rookie cornerback Malcolm Butler - the first time I heard of him was last night - had to make a great - not just good - play during the final minute, and did.
He had to recognize Seattle’s play call, before it unfolded, on second and goal from the two yard line, and did, which means he was extremely well prepared.
Butler then had to beat the receiver to the designated spot, and he did.
And he had to not just defense the pass but intercept it while being hit, because anything short of that would have given the Seahawks two more chances to score - and he did.
While all of that is true, the Seahawks gave the game away by not simply running the football on that play.
Football 101 dictates that if you can run it as far as you can throw it, you run it. That means if you are as likely to gain the yards needed with the run as the pass, you run.
Running the football cuts down on the ways something can go wrong. Running or passing can lead to a fumble. But if you run, the defensive back has no chance to make a great play - and it can’t be intercepted. Besides that, in the Seattle backfield was maybe the league’s top power back - who had just gotten five hard yards the play before.
Seattle knows it screwed up.
Here is part of the explanation:
Seattle had a timeout left with the clock ticking down when Wilson fired into a cluster of blue and white shirts. Butler dug inside of Lockette and made his first career interception.
"I had a feeling I was going to make a big play today," Butler said. "But not that big."
Give credit where it's due.
But about that play call again:
"Dumbest play call in the HISTORY of NFL football," tweeted former 49ers receiver Dwight Clark, who made a pretty good grab himself: The Catch.
And this from NFL career rushing leader Emmitt Smith: "Worst play call I've seen in the history of football."
It left them speechless in Seattle, too. Well, practically.
"We've got Marshawn Lynch, one of the best running backs in the league, and everybody makes their decisions and unfortunately, we didn't give him the ball," Seahawks linebacker Bobby Wagner said.
Carroll's explanation: He saw the Patriots bring in a goal-line formation with eight big guys and three cornerbacks and didn't think Lynch, who tied for the league lead with 13 touchdowns rushing this season, would be able to bull it in against that defense.
It was a no-brainer of a call to just turn around and hand it to Marshawn Lynch. That they didn’t was simply stunning. It’s possible the Patriots would have stuffed him two times, but that was highly unlikely.
It shows how on a razor’s edge the game is at that level. The Patriots did everything it needed to win the game.
But had the Seahawks simply followed Football 101, the Patriots would have lost any way.
That was the game. The commercials, some of which were well done, were too much of a downer for me this year. I expected a few serious ads, particularly because of the controversy surrounding domestic violence this year. That made sense. After awhile, it seemed as though ad after ad after ad was about a serious or depressing topic.
This is how USA Today broke down the commercials:
We laughed, we cried, we got angry
A few spots brightened things up, like the car commercial looking back to Katie Couric’s “what’s internet” screed from The Today Show from 21 years ago. Overall, though, the commercials felt heavier than was necessary, which is another reason why they should have not banned this GoDaddy cute puppy commercial:
This story was originally published February 2, 2015 at 9:14 AM with the headline "Blog | Super Bowl recap: Commercials too serious; Seattle lost because it ignored Football 101."