The Press Box - Super Bowl Instant Reaction Show

Episode Date: February 14, 2022

Bryan and David react to Super Bowl 56 featuring the Los Angeles Rams vs. the Cincinnati Bengals. They touch on Al Michaels’s calls throughout the game, the subtle video aspects, all of the Super Bowl commercials, and much more! Plus, the Overworked Twitter Joke of the Week and David Shoemaker Guesses the Strained-Pun Headline. Hosts: Bryan Curtis and David Shoemaker Associate Producer: Erika Cervantes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Listen up all you New York fans. Veteran New York sports talk host, John Dostrompsky gives his unique take on all the big stories in the Big Apple and beyond, including guest conversations, gambling picks, and reactions from you, the listener. Check out New York, New York with John Dostromsky on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. All right, everybody, here we go. David, the Rams just beat the Bengals in Super Bowl 56. What are you going to do now? I think I'm going to do a media podcast.

Hello media consumers, Brian Curtis and David Shoemaker of the Ringer here, along with our producer Erica Servantes. Welcome to our live. I'm putting a little Brent Musburger on that, David, live recording of our post-Super Bowl edition of the press box here on Spotify Green Room to be discussed tonight. That was probably the last Super Bowl, we'll hear called by announcer Al Michaels.

How did Michaels do tonight? Loads of notes on the broadcast on NBC. David and I will tell you our favorite and least favorite Super Bowl commercials. How many freaking crypto ads can One Nation take? Our instant think piece tonight, did the NFL get even bigger over the last month? And finally, the debut of a Press Box Radio Row game. How famous are you really? But David, let us begin with The Man of the Hour, Al Michaels.

was his 11th Super Bowl tonight. He ties the all-time record, which had been Pat Summeralls. Al called the first of those Super Bowls back in 1988. So we're talking about a 34-year span of time. How'd you think he did tonight? First of all, I want to jump in to say, guys, people listening to this, thank you for showing up. The chat is open, I believe.

So let us know that you can hear us and that everything's going great. And ask us questions, and we'll interact a little bit. I thought Al was great. This was a, I think I've probably said before on the show. I tend to be more of a volume down guy than a volume up guy when it comes to sports, when it comes to professional wrestling when it comes to everything else. But, you know, I had it cranked tonight. And I thought Alan Chris, I mean, who I've, you know, listened to with, you know,

great deliberation many, many times. I thought they were, I thought they were really, really on point. You know, we talked about the sort of different roles that announcers can have in numerous times on the podcast. But certainly, like, calling a Super Bowl is a very different job than calling any other NFL game. It's actually probably more like a week one game than it is like a playoff game, right? Because like the wild card round one of the playoffs, I mean, I guess the audience is getting bigger, but it feels like it's targeted more and more towards diehards, right? And then the Super Bowl comes along and you got to sort of explain to people what it down is all of a sudden, you know?

And I thought they did a really good job of getting some of that stuff in there telling the stories without being too, you know, over the top without being too purple about them. And, and, you know, and also breaking down the stuff that really mattered for viewers like, you know, the diehard's out there, viewers like you and me. I totally agree. And I think Al the character who exists alongside Al the broadcaster kind of has to go into hiding a little bit during a Super Bowl because it's not really time to riff. It's not time to entertain unless it's a really, really boring game. And tonight was not a boring game. I think the hardest thing they had to deal with tonight watching that game was that game until the very end had some of the weirdest rhythm I have ever seen from a Super Bowl. And by weirdest rhythm, I mean complete lack of rhythm.

Yeah. I mean, what was going on? And it was almost like they're sitting there and you can tell with Alan Chris, they are trying to figure out the story of a game. That's what they're doing all the time. What is the story of this game? What is the story of this game? And then they're sitting there and they can't figure it out because the game is so weird.

It's so weird. I mean, I have unsurprisingly, I guess. I'm sure a lot of viewers or listeners are in the same boat. I was having the conversation about football time in the living room with my teen and my wife, you know, how it's just like, well, it looks like it's this amount of time, but really it feels, it could be, that could be a lot of time in football. That could be a vanishingly small amount of time in football, which kind of depends on how the first couple of downs go.

But it seemed even more so like that when you were watching, I remember the first half. I feel like I looked up and I was like, man, this game's going slow. and I looked up five seconds later and there was two minutes left. You know, I mean, it was, it's, the rhythm, the little, the rhythm of the clock felt abnormal, even for the bizarre timeline of a football game.

And this game in particular, you know, if you weren't watching the clock, if you didn't see the clock or the scoreboard, I don't know who you would think was winning at the end of the first half, just sort of going by like vibe, but it was, but yeah, it would have been really,

I think you would have gotten a lot of, you know, a lot of different answers. Yes. And then what happens, of course, in the fourth quarter? The Rams are down, four points, and Matt Stafford, who has never won a Super Bowl, and has never sniffed a Super Bowl, gets the ball. And that is a storyline drive, which is an announcer's best friend. Yeah. It's all teed up.

As far as these things go, that, I mean, that was teed, teed up. And I thought, oh, I mean, and listen, he is his, his narrative, after in the post game, interview. with, I don't know if that was with Michelle Tofoya, no, I don't think it was. But in his post-game interview, he said this game was kind of their season in a microcosm, right? A lot of ups and downs or whatever, but his performance was more of a perfect microcosm for an up-and-down season than anything else, right? I mean, there were moments where it looked like, I mean, I saw numerous tweets in the third quarter about how M&M's performance made Matthew Stafford think it was like, you know, mid-2000s, Detroit all over again. And this play was reflecting it.

Our first overword Twitter joke of the evening filed that way. Absolutely. Congratulations. And it was justifiable. Then he got hurt. Then he came back. And, you know,

there's this sort of like moral quandary of like does just like, you know, bulleting the ball to the same dude over and over again, make one a great quarterback or make one just like the ultimate serviceable quarterback. Is it he, yeah, was he, was he an all time great?

Or was he, you know, Trent Dilfer on steroids? I'm going to just keep using. single press box gags here. But yeah, it was really good.

And I think going back to Alan Chris, there's certain storylines that you prep for. There's certain storylines that you hope for, right? And I'm sure no one hoped for injuries to

several of the game's most important players, but for storytelling purposes, it really does sort of simplify things, doesn't it? Because that not only was the biggest thing that we saw on the field, but it was by far

the biggest thing that affected the play on the field. And it informed every single snap that followed, right? So, I mean, it really becomes, like, you could have told a story about how LA's receiving core was kind of depleted even going into the game, right? But when OBJ went down, then all of a sudden it becomes, like, a very visual, a very pointed reference,

and it's, you know, the only thing that really matters is, like, yeah, they're going five out, five wide, but they only have one guy that seems to be able to catch the ball. You know, so I mean, this is, that was, the story, the storyline sort of falls into place. And it, and it becomes a sort of playground for Alan Chris to do what they do best. Absolutely. Like, if you couldn't see the story beats in the first half, they were absolutely in black and white the second half. And David did NBC's producer, director team of Fred Gedelli and Drew Esikoff resist a camera shot of the Burrow family and Joe Burroughs

girlfriend right after he got hurt. No, they did not. Nope. No, they did not because that is good television. And when you say it set up that final drive, it's not just Matt Stafford. It's Matt Stafford feeding the ball to Cooper Cup and feeding the ball to Cooper Cup and getting it to him again. I think Chris said something like they have played as good as anybody has ever played under pressure. I might want to just slow down a little bit on that one. But that was a magnificent drive until the refs decided to get in the way. by the way, great Mina Kynes tweet with 50 cent hanging upside down and she said, these are the refs waiting to spoil the game at the end.

The rest getting in a way throwing all those flags when the Rams are about to score. But then we get that great shot right when the Rams are at the one yard line of Joe Burrow nodding on the sideline because he knows he's going to get the ball back because he always wins the big game. Great shot by NBC there. And then when the Rams finally put him away, Aaron Donald pointing to his finger saying, put the Super Bowl ring right here and then crying and he talked to Michelle Defoy again

as you say, what was kind of hard to figure out in the first half was not hard to figure out in the second half. Yeah, it's absolutely right. I thought that they, I mean, I thought that the overall the story that was told in the game was the story that was told in the field. It's really rare

that those two things sort of coalesce so easily. And I mean, let me said it a hundred times. They're pros, man. I mean, they did, they, they, they made it a pleasure to listen to. And you can't always say that. You certainly couldn't always say that, you know, even over the past several months of watching football. So, I thought it was really good. And like you said, I felt like there were more family shots than normal. Maybe I was just paying more attention to it. It seemed like, at least the family

shots were a little bit more teed up, you know, it was like, usually you see the family shots that look kind of like like J-Lo and Ben Affleck and the celebrity shot montage where it's like they're under kind of a weird color under a weird colored light and not paying attention, you know, kind of looking over to the side, the camera, it's the best camera angle we can get is like between two pillars over from the other sideline. But these, in this case, all the family members were just like front and center, well lit. I mean, it was daylight, you know, which we could probably talk about for a whole 20 minutes, how like the sun affected your daytime feel as feels like it affected at this game. But yeah, the families were maybe a little bit overexposed literally and figuratively.

I'll tell you the moment that Michaels was most comforting to me. It was right at the beginning of the game. And that opening to the game is so overproduced, right? We had Halle Berry doing that thing with the movie stars and the football movies, which we can talk about in just one second. But then Al Michael's voice comes on. And it acts as a counterweight to all the crazy production of a Super Bowl. Super Bowl is going to be wild and goofy and everything and here comes out. And he was almost a little subdued in the first half, but it actually worked because it calmed everybody down. I couldn't agree with you more. I was sitting there watching the pregame.

I ran in probably 45 minutes before kickoff, which, you know, in Super Bowl Sunday, you're not sure if you're there early, if that means you're there earlier, you're there late. I never quite know. But I was like sitting there like like very conscientiously watching. So I would hear the first words that Al Michael. said and I felt like I was like, oh, you know, just like trying really hard to make sure my ears were on and the volume was up. And then the moment he said his first word, it was like the air in the room, the air pressure changed in the room, right? I mean, it was just a very, like, I didn't need

to be listening that hard because everything just sort of changed. And yeah, I mean, I thought it was really good. It did you seem like, I mean, we don't know, you should talk about what you think Ows Future holds. It felt like, well, certainly almost more so in the, in the pregame sort of shot of him and Chris, like two different setups, the one, the studio setup or the, you know, the playing backdrop set up and the field behind them set up. But in both of those, it felt like a person's last game, you know? It did.

Slide on over here one more time, Chris. Do that Collinsworth slide. Yeah. And also, I mean, he, and maybe it's just because we've been talking so much about it. I mean, he's one of the great, he's probably in the top five of like, of like the, like the unaging rankings in the history of humanity, right? I mean, he is a timeless force of nature. Maybe it's because we've been talking about it so much.

Those brief moments, he felt like he was his age tonight. And then the game started and he was just, you know, Al Michaels the machine. But, but I don't know. I mean, what do you think? What do you think the future holds? Well, he's 77 years old. and as far as I can tell, he is getting pushed out

or allegedly getting pushed out of Sunday night football because NBC hired Mike Torrico six years ago. And the idea was, Toriko was going to wait for Bob Costas' job hosting the Olympics every two years and he was going to wait for Al Michaels' job being the announcer of the number one show on television Sunday night football. Now, at some point, everybody,

I think even Al Michaels would admit this, Al's not going to be able to do this at the level he wants to do it at. Sure. But it seems like he can right now. So we're pushing him out because we had a succession plan. And somebody came to me this week and said, why is it NBC is always having the succession plan thing? That's exactly where I was going to go. Are we going to give Al Michaels the 1030 half hour time slot and just see what he could do with it?

Oh, he's going to get football night in America. So he proceeds to Rico? Like, we'll just let him call. a very brief football game before Torrico's full-length game comes on. He was absolutely dynamite with that note. Did you notice that in the fourth quarter?

Tyler Boyd, Bengals wide receiver, drops that huge pass in the fourth quarter. And Al, like a second pass is now goes, that's the first pass he's dropped all year. What a time to do it. I thought that was really good. I thought all this touchdown calls were good. Can we talk about how Al Michaels

likes old-fashioned words for a second, David? We can't. I just want to briefly jump in here to say, uh, listener Andy Vandergriff just came in to say, speaking of old announcers, Berman is recapping the game on ESPN right now.

Oh, wow. We'll talk about that later in the week. We really did go back to the 2003 tonight. Um, somebody ran onto the field during the game. Mm-hmm. And the networks are always very shy about this because we would not want to

encourage people to run on the field. Of course, people will never run on the field ever again if the networks just don't show them running on the field. Yeah, right. Al says he's going to go to the who's Gow. Oh my gosh.

Now, when is the last time you heard Whose Gow uttered in American culture when it was not uttered by W.C. Fields? Whose Gow is such a, is such a, like, a bizarre, like, you know, just a, just a, word of a certain time that not only do you never hear it,

but like, you and I, people who, like, regularly, like, read books and watch movies from, like, the 20s and 30s, don't hear this word. I'm, like, don't know. I'm not, I'm not comfortable. ever using this even ironically. Yeah, way to go out.

Yeah, you and I like to think of each other as characters from Raymond Chandler knows, but I don't think we've ever actually said whose gal, even as a joke. He used the word razzle-dazzle. Our listener, Bruno Ows, points out a lot tonight. He also likes the word kibosh and rascal. We heard the word civvies a bunch tonight.

Odell Beckham, Jr., who got hurt early in the game, was in civvies on the bench. Oh, yeah. Civis is great. Another element I love tonight was Al being bored with the stuff he had to do. This was a tweet from Matt Uffert. Al introed the celebrity B-roll like it was a trip to the dentist.

It's true, it's true, but, but you know, kudos to him because if it really is his last game, and is your last game for a network that's pushing you out the door, I mean, I don't, we, we've both, I mean, you've talked to Al Michaels. I've heard a handful of great podcast with Al Michaels over the years. He certainly seems like the kind of guy that would just be real close to just saying fuck it live on the air, you know, in a last performance.

No, no, not Al the professional, but like Al of the soul, the spirit of Al. It just seems like he's a kind of guy that might be willing to go out in a light blaze of glory. But who knows. Yeah, no, he's, you know, he's, that's the whole thing, right?

And I wrote this in the ringer this week, but there's a human behind the play calling machine. And you and I watch so much sports and so many times it's like, man, that guy's really good at his job, but I don't think I would ever want to go have a beer with that person. And then it turns out you do, right? But they just don't show it on the air, right? That's the thing. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

No, I'm saying, yeah, I think that's it. I think part of what makes out great, the human behind the curtain has a really sort of like healthy, who knows? obviously know him, but it seems like he sort of has like a reasonable grasp of Al Michaels, the media star, right? Like he understands his role really, really well. And so he performs it really, really well. And he's not out there telling like golfing stories about major celebrities during a broadcast or whatever. He can save that for some other interview sometime. But, but yeah, I mean, I think that he's, he's, there is a, there is a humanity to him. There's a

humanity that underlies everything. But I think at the very base of it, there's a human who's just like, I know my job and I know why people are tuning in, right? I know why I know why I'm in this chair. And there's probably a lot of like vanity that goes with that. But that's sort of beside the point, right. I mean, he's not, you, you wouldn't know it by listening to him. And, and he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he's, he mean, whatever he's doing, he's doing it the right way. His partner of 13 years, Chris Collinsworth. I can't believe that. I remember the first time I saw Chris Collinsworth roll into the booth. He was the new guy. He had, you know, there wasn't any gray in his hair.

He was probably a couple pounds lighter because I do remember just thinking, like, he, I was like utterly shocked that this person played football the first time I saw him in a coat and tie, right? I mean, but it does seem like it was not yesterday, but not 13 years ago. I mean, that's, oh, that, I'm just old. Al's longest tenured football partner beating Dan Dierdorf by one year. Dan Dierdorf did 12 on Monday night football. I did not know that until this last week.

I thought Collinsworth had a lot of good moments tonight when he explained why the Bengals didn't pick up that fourth down in the first quarter of the linebacker had accidentally sort of because of the play design was in the way of the ball the Joe Burrow threw. I thought that was really good. We got a you hate to see that from Collinsworth when Odell Beckham got injured, hurt his knee. Announcers David have been saying you hate to see that for my entire life when a player gets injured. Yeah. Just a great announcer moment. I thought the production of the game was also really good. One thing that's interesting about NBC, as I noted a minute ago, is they are always trying to do this thing during a game, which is what is happening in the game?

That sounds really elemental, but the whole thing is like we are figuring out a puzzle here. And we're going to explain it to you. Why is this team beating this other team? And maybe we're going to show a package of Aaron Donald getting stoned at the line of scrimmage like they did in the second quarter. what happened in the fourth quarter, right? Aaron Donald just went crazy and wound up ending the game with a near Sackaburrow there on fourth down. These stuff about Odell Beckham's injury,

the Rams totally unable to run the ball. Collinsworth mentioned that several times tonight, especially on the last drive, right? And by the way, speaking, going back to what I was saying about self-fulfilling storylines, the inability to run, usually when there's an inability to run the ball, the announcers sort of have to go back on their word at some point during the game, right?

Someone will bust off a long run. They'll be like, well, you can just hear, Chris Collinsworth. Well, they couldn't run the ball until just then, right? But tonight, the storyline's all held. That was part of what made it like actually such a compelling broadcast. Also, nice, really subtle thing. CJ Usoma, that's the Bengals

tight end who hurt his knee against Kansas City in the AFC championship game. It's kind of a question whether he would play tonight he did. The first time they showed him, camera shows him, and then camera pans down to his left knee, which got injured. Obviously, that's a setup shot. Obviously, they come in intending to do that, but that is like really subtle, awesome television production.

Yeah. It's one of those things you like even if you don't notice it. A couple notes on the broadcast as a whole, David. Man, we are really leaning into the whole idea of that we are playing the Super Bowl in Los Angeles, California, Hollywood home of movie stars. I mean, from the shots of the Santa Monica Pier to Hallie Berry and Joe Namath opening the game in that little funny sketch, which was actually pretty good. good? Yeah. Did you like, do you like Peyton Manning, by the way, saying he was going to be

Keanu Reeves's backup and the replacements too? But it didn't seem like they had been able to get Keanu. Yeah, there is a lot of confusing parts. I wasn't, I wasn't entirely sure about how that was supposed to go. There was also, by the way, just separate from what you were saying, some beautiful shots of Echo Park Lake. I used to live right across the street. I had some like heartstrings tugging as I saw it. But there was also some weird graphics throughout, one of the most perplexing graphics packages. I mean, like, you know, design packages they had was when they were like comparing Joe Burrow to Joe Namath and Joe Montana. And basically it was as simple as a simple Cairo on the screen and Al Michael saying, you know, there's only been a couple of people

that have won a national championship and an NFL, you know, in a Super Bowl and their name Joe, and here's another one. And is he going to be one? But they had it just set up in this weird, like movie marquee or like they were like they were like posters for movies and then then transformed into a movie marquee and i'm like and i am like struggling so hard to follow the logic and it took me i like paused it i was just anyway maybe i'm just slow to night but yeah i mean there was a lot of the hollywoodness of that was so lost on me until i like pieced it back together afterwards i guess that's what i'm getting at i you know we lived in l a you live in l a I lived in L.A.

When you are in L.A., there's the vast majority of the time, there's nothing, there's nothing stereotypically L.A. about it, right? You can live in New York and feel like you're stereotypically New York, a solid 55 to 65% of the time, you know? But most of the time in L.A. is just like, unless you count being stuck in traffic as stereotypical L.A., you don't encounter a stereotypical L.A.

unless you go looking for it, you know? And I'm sure, you know, for all the L.A. Rams cared. I mean, they're getting paid trillions of dollars, but like they would, they don't, I'm sure they don't like being looked at as like a glitzy, glamy,

Hollywood team, right? They're just like, they'd probably like to think of themselves as a working class LA team. But man, when you're the production department, there's nothing easier to lean into the New York or L.A.

when you're doing these big productions, you know, and it was, and it showed through tonight at all the most bizarre times. Quentin Oram, who is listening to this podcast right now, points me in the direction I wanted to go next.

What do we think of the rock? Yes. the field essentially cutting a wrestling promo to get people fired up for the Super Bowl. For Black History Month, the Rock narrated like a two-minute documentary, whatever. He did a voiceover for a little thing about his father, so old man, Rocky Johnson, that I'm sure we'll run on W.W. Monday night, Rodham or night or something. But I saw it on Twitter yesterday, and the only thing, and I rarely tweet. My only response was, let the Rock narrate everything.

Because it was like the most compelling two minutes I've watched on the, broadcast in so long, or broadcast, but, you know, video and so long. But then when he came out tonight, I mean, no one else could have done that. No one else could have done that. Like, what is the list of people who could have gone out there

and done that with, like, and been, like, so ridiculous with such a high approval rating? I don't know. When the ringer launched, we ran a series of essays on the most, like, like, undivisive people in the world. world, right? The celebrities that everybody can agree on. I wrote a thing about The Rock and I've never felt so vindicated is when I look at him now because he's like, he is the most

undeniable presence in all of media and it's so bizarre. Now, listen, I want you to comment on this because we talk a lot about ethics on this show. What is the ethics of the putative owner of the XFL doing the introduction to the Super Bowl? Should we be expecting a crossover here of some sort? I didn't think we get into the journalistic ethics of the rock tonight. So you certainly hopes they're going to do some kind of crossover. I, by the way, was struck just by like, he is down there doing this live.

And I know he's done in a wrestling ring a million times and all that stuff. But like he is doing this live on national television for a hundred-ish million people. That is more than the millions and millions of the Rocks fans that he usually talks to. Yeah. And to do it off the top of your head, to not drop a word, that was really cool. And remember the Rams had Michael Buffer out there doing the opening kickoff in the NFC championship games. It's not like football needs anything, but they picked a couple of good ones. By the way, players saying their alma moders when they are announced in the starting lineup, which is an NBC game for an NBC game.

I know, I know this has kind of been going on for a really long time. I actually kind of liked it tonight because it's one time where you do kind of want to meet the players. and they got us all the way to the punter and the long snapper. Johnny Hecker punter for the Rams announced themselves as the Oregon State University. I didn't know that Oregon State was one of the these. I don't know. I don't even know if it is. I think Johnny Hecker is making a joke.

Or maybe he's not. Oh, maybe that's a good joke. Trey Hopkins said North Shore High School. And by the way, he went to the University of Texas. And I don't blame him. I don't blame him for not mentioning that he played football at the University of Texas. Anyway, you were saying to him. No, I was going to say, I want to take exception to this practice.

because we're very familiar with it. We've been seeing this forever. But my guess is if you were a, you know, the historian of broadcast sports, you could probably trace this back to an era before free agency was as much of a thing as it is now. I'm much more interested in the previous three NFL teams that all these players played for

than where they went to college slash high school, right? Isn't that a more pertinent story? Like, wouldn't you, I mean, wouldn't it have been much better to hear Andrew Whitworth say, Andrew Whitworth, I used to play for the Bengals? Like what I mean Give us the best copy point you got Yeah, but seriously

But if you, but if someone was like, I played for the Browns, I played for the Texans, I played for the Dolphins, I played, You're like, oh, this guy has a story too, right? It took a lot, it was a long and winding road to get here. It's not like, because somebody might have gone to Alabama and just barely like struggled to get a, you know, to get a cup of coffee in the league.

And you wouldn't really know that from saying they, you know, they went to Alabama. Yeah, and OBJ could have been like, I played for the Browns and they didn't want me anymore. Yeah, they just like, Let me go. Those stupid Browns. Cooper Cup, by the way, said he went to Eastern Washington and he said,

Ew, when it came to his name tonight. I had no idea what he said. And I know he went to Eastern Washington. I thought he was just making like a Star Wars joke or something. I don't know about you, but I blacked out several times. And I mean that literally during the NBC's six-hour pregame show, which was hosted by Mike Dorico, who somewhat impressively flew from Beijing where he was hosting the Olympics to L.A.

to do the pregame and halftime shows. Presumably is now going back to Beijing to finish up the winter games there. If somebody pays for a car service to take me on like a 45-minute drive, I feel like I've made it. You know, I can't imagine. I can't imagine the feeling of being like,

yeah, NBC had to have their private, you know, like 747 rush me from continent to continent. Mm-hmm. Yeah, he and Jason Gay, our old friend, from the Wall Street Journal, the only two people I know who did the double, who did the Winter Olympics, and then were in the stadium at the Super Bowl. Wow. And congrats to the two of them.

I had no idea. Jason. There was a Joe Biden interview with Lester Holt buried in the pregame show there. This is a thing. The president speaks to America. You know, he got some questions about Brian Flores and the NFL and stuff. I did notice a moment where Joe Biden did not seem to remember Joe Burroughs name. called him

This Young Quarterback from Cincinnati Which is that was a nice save This young quarterback from Cincinnati He's inspired us all, David. David and I are going to tell you The best and worst Super Bowl commercials from tonight But first David let us do the overworked Twitter joke of the week Where we celebrate a gag that was so obvious

That all of media Twitter made it at exactly the same time Send your nominees to add the press box pod Where they are always gratefully received We got things started during that announcement round where the players are giving their alma maters. The Bingle's long snapper, everyone said, looks like Diedrich Bader in office space. You know what I'm talking about with a big mustache and everything? I know exactly you're talking to it.

Matthew Zitland, our pal, sent in that the Sopranos commercial missed a chance to do a parallel parking joke. Everyone made that did that bit on Twitter tonight. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And when we got to the Larry David, oh, crypto ad. It was an overword Twitter joke to write curb your Ethereum. Curb your Ethereum.

That is from our friend John Sloan. All right. Speaking of commercials, your best and worst. But let us do this question first. Are we into Super Bowl commercials anymore? Is that a thing? Uh,

part of me feels like I shouldn't say anything because I'm going to pigeonhole myself was either an old man or a Luddite or just a, a person who's not paying enough attention to the things that they're supposed to, you know, do professionally. But from the very beginning of tonight, I was so perplexed by the commercials. Part of it is that, well, I mean, I think the big thing is that I don't watch commercials that much anymore, right?

And I think that most people probably are in the same boat. Most people probably listening to this. Certainly a lot of people watching the Super Bowl are in the same boat. We don't watch a lot of commercials anymore. No. The vast majority of commercials I watch are when, like, my wife is streaming a show that, like, has, you know, that has, like, the mandatory two and a half minute commercial breaks on Hulu. But all of those commercials are, like, for the other shows on that network. So I don't actually see any real commercials, right?

And because I don't watch any commercials, I didn't know which commercials were new, right? So there'd be commercials that, like, seemed like they were well produced and maybe had a celebrity at them. but like I don't like you know 10 years ago I would have been immediately identified that Doritos ad as one that's been running for the past three months right like I don't know now so they don't so weirdly the commercials the big commercials like I like I tune them out like I end up tuning all the commercials out because I don't know which is which and and and they have less impact than they wouldn't now in theory we're all watching tonight so the commercials should be more important but because I don't know which ones are important I don't I don't I don't focus on them. And weirdly, the only commercials that I knew were important were ones that I had seen released on Twitter over the past four days, you know, the ones that like people are like, hey, look, this is going to be the big commercial from so-and-so. I'm like, okay, I recognize this is a Super Bowl commercial. But for the most part, I mean, and then once you get into like halftime, you're aware that these commercials cost so much money that someone's probably not just running a repeat ad or something

like that. But man, it's really weird. And I was having this conversation with my wife. She pointed out, It's like, like for a generation of viewers that are so used to watching things on TikTok and, you know, like quick, like gifts and everything short form, right? I mean, a lot of the times we see, like, before a YouTube video, they'll be like, they'll be like the 12 second commercial because that's one that you won't skip through, right? You know? And these commercials are just such, like, it's almost like an insider vocabulary, right?

There's like, there's the one that's like a mini movie. that sort of is like deliberately ironic, but it's still two minutes long and the robot dog is doing something and then there's the big like flourish at the end driving off into the sunset. And then there's the other one where it's just like celebrities who are like ironically like addressing the point

that they're getting paid to be in a Super Bowl commercial. And then, but like who is, what is the audience for these things? I mean, I understand the audience is us talking about them. Yeah. And the 100 million people watching the Super Bowl on television. By the way, Richard to Richard Hopkins, Richard Hopkins in the chat, Richard, I can pay for Hulu.

I pay the maximum. I pay Hulu all that I can pay them. Very defensive. And they still won't show. I cannot watch, my wife cannot watch like 90-day fiancé without incessant commercial breaks. I don't know why. I don't know why. But that's just the way my life is set up.

So when we were on Radio Row last week and there were athletes running around pitching things, I'd often get the question, well, what is that guy pitching? And the answer was either Marriott, a Gatorade vitamin water drink, crypto or cannabis. You could not go wrong when picking one of those four categories. Tonight at the Super Bowl, David, it was either crypto or streaming service. That was basically every commercial. Crypto is the new light beer. That was my big takeaway from the night.

Like every commercial break has a crypto commercial, and I don't, but I understand them less than I understood what light beer was when I was like 12. So this is very bizarre. Some of my favorites that I wrote down, Arnold Schwarzenegger as retired Zeus with Salma Hyatt. Oh, electric cars too, says Kristallania. There was a lot of electric car. A lot of, okay.

We will allow that. Electric cars in the mix. Also enjoyed the discarded singing animal slash rockafire explosion of Chuck Echise fame thing getting. discarded. That was great. Sorry, I already said that. Discarded.

And then it was something for MetaQuest. I don't even understand what the commercial was for, but I enjoyed it. There was the Lobowski inspired ad was Steve Buscemi and Peyton Manning was Serena Williams walking in right at the end. Yes. That was kind of incredible. Larry David has various characters in history and everybody's laughing going, ah, ha, Larry David did it again.

And then it was crypto and everybody on Twitter turned on him. Mm-hmm. And you're like, oh. You're not funny anymore. Yeah. There was the Sopranos themed ad for the electric Chevy Silverado. I really don't participate in Sopranos discourse as a rule. Not out of dislike, just out of, you know, fear of looking stupid.

Is that like I'm just not into it enough? I just don't care at all. Not into it enough. I don't care at all to participate. I'm out. guy with a Pringle's can stuck on his hand, I wrote down. Our old pal Guy Fietti was back for Bud Light Seltzer. Tommy Lee Jones was in a truck ad, I believe is the punchline to keeping up with the Joneses.

And then some from the worst, David. Amazon Thursday Night Football, it has the slogan, football is open. What does that mean? Football is open. There was the one with the QR code going around the screen. and everybody on Twitter only. Yeah,

that we followed was just like, I am not doing that. I choose not to participate in this commercial. There was a McDonald's ad where people couldn't decide what they wanted to order

in the drive-thru that, uh, uh, ad that was really in the game. I didn't hate this commercial, but I disagree because I never have a problem

deciding what I want in the McDonald's drive-thru. I was doing with a plan. They released a, they had like a viral tweet going around that made it look like somebody took a picture of like a McDonald's sign that were like they had put the letters up to spell like can I have uh and it was like that was a big thing this week I guess to tease this thing I don't have I basically always end up getting the

same thing but but there will be a moment there where I'm right I'm right on the verge of ordering my my order and I'm like you know what I'm a grown up I have my own money I could get two different things and that's what oh yeah and it's like the three for five or whatever. It's like, you know, I can take that Big Mac and the filet of fish and just skip the rest of it. Yes. I don't need the fries to go with it. Why do I have to order in meal form when I

can just have two sandwiches? David Freeman points out that this was, this might be, was this the first GoDaddy free Super Bowl since the GoDaddy trend started? It might be. God bless if it was. Jim Wolverton said, wasn't there a baby flying a plane? I think the baby was flying a helicopter, wasn't? I don't remember.

Yeah. I think I thought that was like, It was so weird, man. A Super Bowl commercial that references a previous, I don't know if it was a Super Bowl commercial, but a bygone commercial campaign that, I mean, that's asking a lot. That's asking a lot of the audience. I wanted the Dolly Parton thing to be funnier.

Dolly Parton was poised for Super Bowl commercial startup. Dolly Parton. Dolly Parton is in a category of celebrity that doesn't need to be, does not need to be doing gags, right? Dolly Parton's role in any Super Bowl commercial should just be reverence, you know? She's in a different, speaking of categories, by the way, of celebrities, I couldn't help but think of your, which day of media week or, I mean, of Super Bowl week are you when I was watching this?

Because when you're watching these commercials, you realize there's different, there's, it's not days, but there's different tiers of celebrities. Like, are you the lead, like the lead role, like the main? star of a commercial, are you just like the gag that's thrown it at the end? Just like, oh my God, Tom Arnold is here. Just do mowing the grass. Yes. Or are you sort of like the featuring track of celebrities where it's like you're not the

main, but you like you open the show or like you have a big role, but you're certainly not carrying the commercial the whole way through. It's very, I mean, you got to wonder, you got to wonder what the conversation is with like William Shatner where it's like, we want you in a Super Bowl commercial. and he's like, holy shit, I knew this phone call would come. And then it's like, but it's somebody else's commercial and you're the gag at the end. You're the gag at the end for a Lindsay Lohan commercial. As she's walking out of the gym, you're there and she acknowledges you.

And that's the joke. I mean, I'm sure Shatner's happy to get the paycheck. But he's probably thinking, isn't there a world in which I'm the main character in this? And Lindsay Lohan is the punchline and not, I don't know. It's just, it's, you get it, you probably get. get a real sense of who you are, where you are in the celebrity hierarchy when, when Super Bowl commercial season comes around. There's something a tad heartbreaking about that, but I think Bill Shatner has probably made

peace with the fact that he is the, he's the hammer at the end of the commercial now. Yeah. He's not the star. He could be the star, but he's, he's probably going to be the hammer. You mentioned Radio Row. So I've got a new game for you, David. I guess we can only do this once a year. But it seemed fun.

Now, I was on Radio Row, which is the big Super Bowl hype fest all week long. And as we talked about on the last show, on Radio Row at the Super Bowl, fame is measured by which day of the week you are brought out to speak to the nation's sports radio stations. This got a little bit more traction than I was comfortable with, but go ahead. And sell whatever it is you are selling. Okay. So if you're not a very famous person, you come out to Radio Row on Monday. Hence, you are a Monday guy. You're a little more famous.

You come in on Tuesday, a little more famous. on Wednesday. Radio Row peaks on Thursday. So Thursday guy is the highest possible designation. It goes down a smidge on Friday. Friday guy isn't as famous as Thursday guy, but Friday guy is more famous than Wednesday guy. So here's the game. I'm going to give David the celebrity and he has to try to match the celebrity to the day of the week that they were brought out on Radio Row this year. And are these all actual celebrities who are on Radio Row? Are you going to going to say like these are not made like this is not me assigning them a value this is the value that society assigned them this week in los angeles so they were all these people were on radio

row yes yes all actual examples from radio row contestant number one or example number one david actor joe montania oh my gosh actor joe montania kind of a surprise on radio row i'm i say montaneia um somebody wrote Monday guy. How dare you, Jeff Lins? Well, I think we're working forward, not backward. I think that I'll go Tuesday for Joe Montania. You are correct. Joe Montania was a Tuesday guy on Radio Row this year.

Tuesday guy. Kind of a heartbreaking story about Joe Montania, who is being shown around by the PR minder there. And I saw the PR minder had to go to a sports radio station, said, by the way, his name is pronounced Montania, not Montegna. It was always kind of sad

when they have to tell the sports radio host how to pronounce your name, this great actor. I got a moment with Joe Montania when he was between stations. He was like walking between, I don't know,

Austin and Wichita, whatever it was. And I kind of wanted to understand the cultural references of sports radio hosts in our great nation. I said, Joe, have you heard the words

David Mamet today on Radio Row? And his answer was, indirectly. Somebody said my favorite movie is things change. Oh. That's a deep Joe Montania cut and a pretty deep David Mamet cut. Wow.

That's really impressive. That's a great story. I kind of wanted to meet the sports radio host who said that Joe Montania's Things Change was their favorite movie. All right. Moving on. Another radio row guest this week, quarterback Joe Montana. Not Joe Montania, Joe Montana.

I mean, Joe Montana's got to be a, wait, what was it the category? Was Thursday, was Thursday the biggest day or was Thursday the biggest day? Friday's a half step down. I didn't remember if we counted, if Saturday was a day. All right, I got to go Thursday for Montana. You are two for two. Joe Montana was a Thursday guy. Excellent work.

All right, David, this one will be close to your heart. Country music superstar kicks Brooks, formerly of Brooks and Dunn. Yes. I'm just saying that for the audience's benefit, David. I know you know who kicks Brooks is. You know, I know who kicks Brooks. Marie. Oh, my Maria.

I love the Brooks and Dunn thing where it's like they just split up and then they got back together. But it's like, right? They're back together touring now. I love that. Chris Delaney says formerly of kick cereal. No relation, Chris. Thank you for that, them.

I love the idea that there are these two dudes. Neither of them can quit because the name of the band is Brooks and Dunn. And they just, they were, I know before they were thrown together by like an A&R rap or whatever. Like, you're good at singing. You're good at guitar. Neither of you're going to sell an album. But like, what, do they just secretly loathe each other the whole time? Like, how can you not make that work?

It's so busy. Anyway. You're actually missing the important question. When they broke up, did somebody write the headline Brooks and done? Oh, God. Yeah. I don't know. Who's writing that?

Is there like an insider Nashville newspaper? CMP insider. Yeah. I don't know. Okay. Kicks Brooks I'm gonna I mean

I'm gonna sheesh this is really hard I feel I want to go Tuesday with him too but there was just a Tuesday so I'm inclined to go towards like I don't know if he's more Monday or Wednesday

I'm just gonna say I don't I guess Wednesday but I don't really feel strongly about it Kicks Brooks was a Thursday guy no Yep. Now remember, this is the PR, you know, this is the PR aiming for the stars. So I don't know, but Kicks Brooks was a Thursday guy. Darius Rucker, by the way,

appeared on Slow Newsday with our friend Kevin Clark was a Friday guy. All right. That feels good. But by the way, I saw Brooks. People in the chat are indignant over the Kaysbrooks. I want to apologize to everyone, all 548 listeners about Kicks Brooks being a Thursday guy. Yeah. You know, what it was. They probably, someone probably like, you know, Kicks Brooks is probably like, I can't, if I'm on Wednesday, just imagine if Dunn shows up on Thursday.

Imagine how I would look. How embarrassed will I be? I saw Brooks leaving Radio Row. I did not see him touring, but I saw him leaving, and he was wearing a cowboy hat, the trademark sunglasses, boots, and I may be imagining this last part, but I swear he was wearing a duster. And if he wasn't wearing a duster, I want him to be wearing. wearing a duster. Sure. Just say he was wearing a duster. All right, David, Vikings wide receiver

Justin Jefferson. What day did he appear on Super Bowl Radio Row? I mean, he's a good player, but like, I wish I had some like vague comprehension of how many current NFL players were on the Radio Row conveyor belt. But I'll just say Wednesday for him to. He was a Tuesday guy. All right. Kind of a surprise. Tuesday guy. In fact, one radio host told me, hey, you get Justin Jefferson as a Tuesday guy. That's a jackpot.

Tuesday guy. Now, remember, if you come earlier I love these conversations. Oh, this is what we talk about on Radio Road. Now, remember, if you come early in the week, you get more bookings because you're not competing with kicks, Brooks, for the hearts and minds of America's sports radio host.

Sure. All right, David, another big one. Chris Berman, whom we mentioned earlier, Chris Berman. Ro, Ro, Ro, Rumbling, Bumbling, stumbling was on Radio Row. I mean, Chris Berman should be a Thursday guy because I feel like he has more name recognition

than most of the football players that would be going up and down the row. Also, he's, you know, of the genre. People love him. Anybody interviewing him will love him. But I feel like he'd want to be one, like it feels more natural from him to be a degree off. So I'm going to call him a Friday guy.

Chris Berman was indeed a Thursday guy. Oh, gosh. overthought it. Yeah, and that one probably goes to not only Chris Berman's stature, but the interview you're going to get. Right? With some of these guys, the athletes are being very careful. They don't want to say anything that's going to make tons of news.

Chris Berman is going to give you a good interview. Thursday guy. All right, David, Seahawks quarterback, at least for the moment, Russell Wilson. These big names, they can all be Thursday, guys. I'm going to say Friday only because. I think Russell Wilson probably wanted to keep his obligation window as tight as it could be. I had some obligations on the field today, obviously.

So I'm just going to say Friday for Russell Wilson. Somebody named David Stern, no apparent relation, said that he thought Berman had Thursday in his contract. You said Friday for Russell Wilson? Yeah. That is correct. Russell Wilson is a Friday guy. Okay. On Radio Row.

All right, David. And this is the last one. former NFL running back Lagaret Blount Blunt Ligarrett Blunt You're not gonna You're gonna try to get me

Yeah you're trying to give you in trouble Excuse me If I said he was a Monday guy Then now I have And he's not I have beef with Lageret Blunt That's a we don't know No beefs here on the podcast

Legerat Blunt We haven't I'm sorry Adam Evang for the mispronunciation It's late We're not Al Michaels here He won a Super Bowl Right? So he did he had a Super Bowl ring yeah I'm going to call him a Wednesday guy all right this is kind of a trick question

Lagaret Blunt showed up on Wednesday and really never left he was also there Thursday and Friday so le garret Blunt is a Wednesday through Friday guy that's great he figured it out it's like when you it's like when you were a kid and you would buy a ticket to a movie and then just theater hop until like 7 p.m. or whatever it was like well they they won't let me in on Thursday but what if I never leave it's like Inside Man 3, Legerat Blunt on Radio Row. Legerat Blunt might still be on Radio Row as far as I know. He might be the first ever Sunday night guy. I don't know.

I don't know what's going on there. David, before we get out of here, let's do our instant think piece. The thesis of which is did the NFL, which is already the biggest thing in American culture, managed to get bigger over the last couple of weeks? We had two fantastic rounds of playoffs where every game was close. we have a three-point Super Bowl tonight, and it's not just whether the NFL is getting actually bigger,

it's whether it's getting bigger in terms of the things it competes with for airspace and American culture. Yeah. Winter Olympics were this week. How much Winter Olympics did you watch on Super Bowl Week? Not a ton. Oscar nominations were released this week. The Oscars used to be a gigantic top 10, top 20 show in American Life.

How much attention did you pay to the Oscar nominations? that weren't making art for something. No, not barely any. I was on the road for work this week and realized I knew when the Oscar nominations came in. I was aware that like there was art being done for stories. Stories were being filed on the ringer.com. And then I,

but then it was the next day that I realized I hadn't actually like look to see who was nominated. And here's the amazing thing. And Derek Robertson wrote a good story in Politico about this today. It's not like the NFL. has been sailing through the last couple of weeks with great press. Brian Florey's lawsuit, the Washington football team thing,

John Gruden, Aaron Rogers and COVID. Like these are just absolute PR maelstroms by any sense of the term. And yet the football has been great. The NFL is gigantic. And I'm just like, it's hard to on it again. we talked about this the other day.

Do the NFL do anything to make all these games close and exciting? Of course, they did not. No. But unless you want to talk about free agency and salary caps and all that stuff. But it just feels like the NFL's position in American culture is now stronger than ever has been. And I didn't think I'd ever be able to say that. You know, it's funny. There's probably a lot of, you know, really microscopic, I mean, level research that's going to be going on over how this playoff went.

Because, you know, look at the Super Bowl. this was nobody's ideal, like, Super Bowl match. No. In terms of like the league, in terms of advertisers, I mean, L.A. is a big market, but the L.A. Rams don't have like a ton of traction there. You know, they have a legacy there that predates their legacy in St. Louis, but no one's, you know, it's L.A. And L.A. is just a weird sports town. Like, you know, it's not, it's not the same as a cold weather town or a smaller place, obviously.

And, you know, the Bengals, one of the smaller markets, a team that, both these teams are teams that nobody expected. I mean, the L.A., the Rams built the Super Bowl contender team, you know, on paper, but it didn't seem like they were going to make anything of it until the sort of late season push, you know, they could have just fizzled like they have at the past. It wasn't like the narratives of the two teams were not built in. This is not the Cowboys. This is not even the Buffalo Bills, you know, this is not, there's certainly not the

Steelers, the list goes on. And there were times I was watching tonight. where both the teams were like depleted as well, or at least the Rams were particularly. And you were just like, what? How much, you know, imagine paying $10,000 for a seat to go see this live. And then it's like, these are the two teams I'm watching. Like this is like a backyard pickup game or whatever.

That said, it was exciting as hell. And it doesn't matter, right? Maybe, maybe an exciting game matters more than all this shit that we thought mattered. Right? I mean, maybe that's what people really care about. It certainly even as like, you know, a fairly, a fairly ardent fan like myself, and sometimes it's like it's easier for me to follow along with those sort of A, B storylines too. If I only have to pay attention to like two guys on offense, then I can watch that I'm watching

Cooper Cup in a way that I've never really paid attention to like offense before when he's like out there running wide. I don't know. It was, it was really great playoffs. And it was, it does feel like this is a big thing. Certainly, it's like big, you know, compared to other stuff that's going on. It is, and it's very interesting to watch it in comparison to the Olympics. NBC had everything going on at once, you know, I mean, and there was enough peacock ads

that everybody now knows it, but they get the Olympics and this and all these other shows. The WrestleMania season, as we all now know, is in full swing. But, yeah, the NFL, I mean, Super Bowl, I mean, it's Super Bowl Sunday, but it really stood out. Yeah. And everybody, by the way, in the comments is point. pointing out that Van Jefferson's, did his wife have a baby during the Super Bowl? Oh, my gosh.

Now there's a storyline. Oh, she went into labor during the Super Bowl and left SoFi on a stadium. On a stadium? No, no, on a stretcher. Sorry, left Sofai Stadium on a stretcher. We wish the best of the Jefferson family. My goodness. A couple of things before we get out of here, David.

We should have absolutely done a Super Bowl media prop best. will more than one NFL insider file a report about Tom Brady's possible comeback on Super Bowl morning. Because that bet would have hit. Wow. As overcovered as... I totally miss it. We got a Mike Floreo who talked about said

there's a definite and palpable sense. Brady will play again and then one on NFL network from Ian Rapaport and Tom Pelliserro. By the way, isn't it amazing? The Super Bowl is so covered. So overcovered, but there's this one inefficiency, which is the morning of the Super Bowl, that you wake up, fired up to watch football and to just consume football. And yet there's nothing happening.

And there's nothing really more to say about the game. So all the insiders have their big splash ready to go, right? I'm going to have some news, baby. Here we go. It is an inefficiency. You're right. I mean, and there's, you know, the pregame shows start at, what, noon? or something, you know, and they're just sort of plugging along.

So there's all this time to fill, all this air to fill. But you're right, it's just an incredibly, like, empty day up until this night game. Maybe they should just have the Pro Bowl on Super Bowl Sunday, just have them run up there on the field earlier in the day and just give us something to give us something to watch. What if it goes into overtime and the Super Bowl has to be delayed? Everybody's just standing around the sidelines waiting for the Pro Bowl then. Well, take you to the Super Bowl as soon as this, as soon as this overtime is over, folks. Yeah, no, it's, it's, it's, it is. It's an inefficiency.

I'm very, but what's, but I mean, Tom Brady, come on. Is that, what is the point of him retiring just to come back? Is he just like taking notes out of like, old punch drunk boxers playbooks?

Is that, I mean, it's so strange. But it was a, it was a perfect NFL content moment because Brady was on his podcast on Monday. And he said, never say never, never,

never, which is not a declaration of anything. But that gets everybody's juices flowing. And then he got, well, maybe he'll come back and somehow get to the 49ers. maybe the bucks will keep calling him and give him to come back and play for the bucks. And everybody wins.

Everybody wins. And people like us are talking about it now. And it's like, oh, here we go. We got a little bit of a new cycle on Sunday morning. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, obviously, I wouldn't be shocked at all. But for somebody that went so, well, however, that whole retirement thing went down,

for someone who seemingly went so far out of his way to not steal the spotlight from anything else when he was announcing his retirement. It wouldn't seem really weird to have this really like, hey, I don't want a retirement tour. I don't want a farewell tour. But then it's just like, yeah, but I'll just come back for 10 more games. You drag me out of retirement at the by week or whatever. Yeah, I don't want a farewell tour, but you're going to make me. You're going to twist my arm.

I was waiting for some insider to tweet today. Tom Brady does not want any speculation about his possible future plans to overshadow the Super Bowl. That is the last thing Tom Brady would want. That's absolutely it. Can I say one thing before we get out of here? Sure. I should have probably said this during the Al Michaels old-timey words segment that we had earlier. But we were texting.

We actually talked some about the wives and girlfriends and other family members who were so well-framed and high-deaf on the science. It seemed like there was a lot of extra cameras. You noticed it early on. This is just a general broadcast note, but you knows it early on when there were like, you know, cameras on the field that were following people running off that didn't seem to be strung up on apparatus, whatever. I mean, there just seemed to be like a lot of cameras around. And one of those made quite an impression early on.

Now, I'm just going to like tell the story out of order because later in the game, after the Bengals had their successful trick play with their running back throw or whatever, later on, LA tried the Philly special. And Al said, that's back of the playbook stuff. Not exactly old-timey, but kind of old-timey. That's back of the playbook stuff. The funny thing is that we had already seen the back of the playbook. Anybody that was on Twitter saw the back of Sean McVeigh's play-calling menu. And it was like because of the camera angle, because of the HD, like everybody could read all

this stuff that it was on there. And one has to wonder if it was a little bit deliberate. I know they're going to zoom in on me, so I'm just going to write like, you know, hi mom on the back of this thing. But they left it up. Both coaches were flashing, flashing their playbooks the whole game. It was sort of, it was sort of stunning. Yeah, that is weird.

And I guess the inevitable result when you get so many cameras in there that you're going to catch something like that. Yeah. I got one more thing for you. I know we keep saying one more thing. I got one more thing. No, let's do as many more things as we can. There is a media party every year for the media that is covering the Super Bowl and the week before the Super Bowl.

And as a veteran of these media parties in years past, David, it is often a big sort of charmless room and a bunch of reporters holding a beer in one hand and looking at each other being like, why did we come here? Yeah. This stinks. Let's go home. This year, the NFL held their media party at, wait for it, Universal Studios. the theme park. And it was as far as I can tell, only media members in there.

And I don't know if you remember Universal Studios from when you lived out here where it has those escalators that go way down the side of the mountain because it's kind of built on the side of a mountain. So you ride all the rides at the top and then you take four escalators down. And then you get to some more rides

that are way down the mountain. And the absolute funniest thing about this, and I was with Kevin Clark and his wife and Peter Buchowski, who does a locked on Packers podcast, we're going up and down the escalators, and it's just other sports media people. It was sports media escalator coming the other way.

So I was like, oh, there's a guy that covers the Bengals for the Athletic. Oh, yeah, there's that guy. Oh, my gosh, I can't believe he's here. One of the more surreal experiences of my entire life, and I say that as a media reporter. It's time for David Shoemaker guesses the strained pun headline. All right. David, today's headline comes to us from loyal listener, Joseph Bean Khan.

It's from Toronto Life. Toronto Life. I'll read to the subheadline here. A saucy survey of the city's best bowls of pasta. So this is a consumer food piece, a saucy survey of the city's best bowls of pasta. up. What was Toronto Life's strained-pun headline?

The best is it like noodles? Is that what I'm using here? Yeah, what if what if you shorten that word just a smidge? Nude? Plural, maybe? Nudes. Send me new.

What is it? I honestly don't know what the phrases, although I feel like I should. Yeah, it's not something, Not something smutty. It's, you know, live nudes?

No, no, what is it? Oh, not something smutty. It's, oh, oh. Here we go. Getting there. Healthy, no. No. Clean nudes, clean,

clean, uh, uh, uh, Tay, taste. Tasteful, tasteful nudes. Tasteful nudes. Oh, that's,

that's like so difficult. I can't imagine that ever making it onto a newspaper. any other periodical, but that's, I mean, just for a lot of reasons, but that is, I enjoy that headline quite a bit. Tasteful Nudes. He is David Shoemaker. I'm Brian Curtis. Production Magic by Erica Servantes.

Thanks to all of you, 589 people staying up late with us on Spotify Green Room. Yeah. That's great. We are truly grateful. We're actually coming back tomorrow. Well, I'm coming back tomorrow, David. A couple of cool things. Jason Gay, the aforementioned Wall Street Journal columnist, is offering a debriefing to us about what

it was like to cover the Winter Olympics in Beijing. So a lot of tweets about that. Obviously a very, very interesting experience for a sports writer. He's going to explain. And then we're going to have a little service, David, for Entertainment Weekly. Did you see the print edition of Entertainment Weekly bit the dust last week? They did. They did.

A couple of our favorite bylines from our Entertainment Weekly Hayday, aka the 90s, Owen Glyberman and Ty Burr are going to be here to talk. talk about what EW was like, R-I-P-E-W. And, of course, David Chewmaker and I will have more lukewarm. Takes about the media. Happy Super Bowl, David. Happy Super Bowl, DeU-T-B, Brian. And thank you guys for listening.

Let's sign off. See ya.