By Vince Darcangelo
To be honest, the P-6 is at a loss for words.
As I told the G-6 before the Super Bowl, when your team isn’t in the Big Game, you hope for a classic, a nail-biter, something like last year’s Patriots-Giants showdown. But when your team is playing, you want it to be the most boring Super Bowl in history. Screw all the impartial fans. You’re rooting for something like Super Bowl XXII, in which the Redskins took a 35-10 lead into the locker room at halftime.
Up 20-7 entering the fourth quarter, we thought our wish would be granted.
Not quite.
However, the only thing better than watching your team walk away with a blowout win in the Super Bowl is watching your team walk into history by suffering through a heart-stopping, lead-changing, final-drive victory that takes about 15 years off your life and instantly turns your hair gray. We still haven’t exhaled, even though the Gatorade was poured long ago.
This was one for the ages. Forty years from now, we’ll still be watching the highlights of this game and smiling.
Make that 25 years from now, subtracting those 15 years we lost on Sunday.
While this victory was one for the ages, more importantly, it was one for this age. Seldom are the Super Bowl’s one-year wonders remembered long after their time has passed. The 1968 Jets and 1985 Bears may be the only exceptions. The teams that get remembered are those that do it at least twice in one incarnation — the Packers, Steelers, Dolphins, Cowboys, for example.
How legendary are the 2000 Ravens and the 2002 Buccaneers? Not very. You don’t hear much talk of the celebrated 1969 Chiefs, do you?
The 2005 Steelers risked suffering the same fate if they could not climb back to the top of the mountain. Instead, after one of the most amazing Super Bowls ever, the Steelers of the Oughts will be remembered for winning two championships in four years, making it to the AFC title game three times in five years, and four times in eight.
A team that went 15-1 in 2004. A team that in one decade produced an offensive rookie of the year (Ben Roethlisberger), a defensive rookie of the year (Kendrell Bell), coach of the year (Bill Cowher), comeback player of the year (Tommy Maddox) and defensive MVP (James Harrison).
This is a Steelers team that will be remembered for making it to the playoffs in six of nine years, and for enduring only one losing record in that stretch (6-10 in 2003).
In fact, even the losses were wins. A decade ago, following a Championship Game loss to Denver, the Steelers laid the groundwork for a future dynasty with a draft class consisting of Hines Ward, Alan Faneca and DeShea Townsend, who sport five rings between them.
A down year in 1998? That led to a 1999 draft class of Joey Porter, Aaron Smith and Jerame Tuman, who have a combined four rings (Tuman now plays for the Cardinals, but was inactive on Sunday).
There were many more draft gems, but perhaps the most significant was in 2004, when Pittsburgh — benefiting from a down year in 2003 — snagged Roethlisberger after geniuses at franchises like Cleveland, Oakland, Houston and Detroit all passed on the gunslinger.
Sure, there were many first-timers at Tuesday’s victory parade, including Super Bowl MVP Santonio Holmes and coach Mike Tomlin, but with a core group of players like Ward, Roethlisberger, Troy Polamalu, James Farrior and the like, the Steelers of the Oughts will now be remembered as more than a one-year wonder.
Hot Reads
Home-Field Advantage: This year, the P-6 and kick-ass girlfriend the G-6 watched the game from the friendly confines of the Shenango Valley in Western Pennsylvania, a short trip northwest of Pittsburgh. Winning a sixth championship was a thrill made all the more rewarding for enjoying it with family and friends and great food.
Got Pride?: Think your hometown loves its football team? We’re sure it does, but it ain’t got nothing on Six-Burgh, where a statue of local hero Franco Harris greets all arrivals at the airport (see attached photos).
Drive for Five: This is a golden age of sports viewing for the P-6. For the fifth consecutive calendar year we have had a team competing for a championship. In order:
2005: Colorado Crush (won Arena Football League championship)
2006: Pittsburgh Steelers (won Super Bowl XL)
2007: Colorado Rockies (lost World Series)
2008: Pittsburgh Penguins (lost Stanley Cup Finals)
2009: Pittsburgh Steelers (won Super Bowl XLIII)
Now the Bad/Good News: With football season finished, the P-6 must go into sports hibernation as basketball dominates the airwaves. (We hate basketball.) The good news is that this will free up the equivalent of a part-time job in our schedule without all that football programming and ESPN morning shows to watch!
Douchebag of the Week: It’s hard to get down on anyone after winning the Super Bowl. But for the sake of filling space: Anyone giving Michael Phelps (aka the lost Manning brother) a hard time. Seriously, it’s 2009 and we’re making a big deal about a bong hit? Get over it, douchebags.
Luckiest Player of the Week: Santonio Holmes, who was in danger of being our Douchebag of All Time had any of his bonehead celebrations cost the Steelers the Super Bowl. First of all, Santonio, this is the pros. You celebrate touchdowns, not first downs, and you’re lucky that your ridiculous showboating on the final drive didn’t cost the team any yards in penalties.
And as much as we loved your LeBron celebration after the touchdown, save it for the sidelines. That easily could have been a major penalty that could have swung the game the other way.
Also, nothing personal, but Big Ben should have won the MVP.
Six Pack: After correctly picking the winner of the Super Bowl, the P-6 completed another season in the W column, going 53-36. Although this record loses some of its luster considering we did not once win the office pool.
P-6, Over and Out: It’s been another great NFL season, and sadly, we at the PickSix are signing off for another long, cold winter and what Gary Zeidner rightly calls the Dark Time. Much thanks to all of our wonderful writers: Zeidner, newcomer Mikey Hammerstone and guest columnist Joel Warner. And most of all, thanks to everyone who swung by the PickSix.biz and http://gamedaygourmet.blogspot.com/.
We might be updating periodically during the offseason, but either way, we’ll be back in April for the 2009 NFL Draft.
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