The Ombudsman has an important Super Bowl message for all of you. I'm already tired of the Pittsburgh Steelers.
First, anytime a team with some history of success like the Steelers reaches a Super Bowl, journalists, like, say David Flemming from ESPN, are roused from their torpor long enough to muster the energy to ask "Is this the greatest team ever?" The same article would have been written had the Cowboys, 49ers, Raiders or Dolphins made the Super Bowl. Had the Patriots made the Super Bowl, the article would be titled "Greatest Dynasty Ever?" and it would be written by Bill Simmons and he would say "Definitely, because they're totally unstoppable something something Manny Ramirez something something Bird's Celtics something something Dave Robert's stolen base." Anyway, Flemming's Bill Simmon's-esque opening salvo is "Since 1970, no one has been better [than the Steelers]. No one." In other words, in order to prove my assertion, I will repeat it...and then just to really remove any doubt, I will add a confident sounding "No one."
As a starting point, if you are making an argument that a team is the best of all time, why arbitrarily choose 1970 as your cut off for stats? Since 1945 (my arbitrary cut off for stats) the Steelers all-time winning percentage is 4th best among NFL teams. While it would not be a tenuous argument that the Steelers, with 5 Super Bowl titles, are the best NFL franchise, it would still be a debatable point.
But Flemming, against all odds, is going to try to prove that the Steelers are actually the best franchise ever..in ALL of sports. Flemming's argument is not actually made with facts. Am I making jokes here? About arguments made with no facts? Here are sentences that appear in this column: "Yes, of course I know the Montreal Canadians have won 24 Stanley Cups...Boston, of course [has] collected 17 titles...The stats definitely favor the Yankees, I know....the truth is math gives me a headache." Stating that facts "definitely" favor a conclusion other than the one currently being advanced is a rhetorical technique that has heretofore never been seen in recorded history.
History-making aside, what really happened here? Most likely, Flemming started writing this article, researched as he went, and when he found, to his horror, that wikipedia didn't back up his findings, had a moment where he pondered scrapping the article entirely. Then he thought to himself "The hell with it - I've written too much to start over now and I'm totally exhausted...I'm just gonna keep writing." Flemming makes a couple of lazy attempts to bring up social responsibility, lists 23 (23?) random things he likes about the Steelers and then falls asleep in his bathrobe. The reader is left thinking - What was the point of this article? Why would Flemming take a position that can't possibly be backed up and of which he has no hope of persuading anyone?
What's reason number 2 I'm already annoyed? The incessant talk (and notice the other team mentioned in the opening line of that link) of how great the Steelers fans are. I'm sure they're fine, but there are factors involved that should be considered. First, their teams are good. Second, a higher percentage of people living in Pittsburgh also grew up there -- so there is less dilution of fan loyalty than more transitory cities like Los Angeles, New York and Washington DC. Third, and maybe most importantly, there is nothing to do in Pittsburgh -- so obviously football games are a draw. To put things in perspective, Paulie Spadafora (at one time Pittsburgh's Oscar De La Hoya and its Mike Tyson) once drew 10,000 people to a Tuesday afternoon slap fight with a homeless guy in a Morningside alley. True story.
Can we talk about the fans specifically for one moment? Look, if New Jersey is the capital of the world for most guys with hair gel and wearing terrible ice, and Florida is the New Jersey of the south, then Pittsburgh is like a satellite New Jersey outpost founded by 17th century pioneers with wispy mustaches who were chased out of New Jersey for not tweezing their eyebrows. Pittsburgh's original name was New Orlando, a related but much rougher version of regular Orlando. You can question my history, but I ask - if thats not true, how did the Steelers' kicker wind up like this?
Prediction: Pittsburgh 30 - Cardinals 13. Kurt Warner is sacked a Super Bowl record 29 times, including twice by the guy pictured above. I will be rooting for the Cardinals upset, however.
In conclusion, Bam Morris sends me facebook messages.
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