Since when do so many people like the Atlanta Falcons? Since they were up against Tom Brady and the empire of evil, that’s when.
You might have noticed that it seemed like an awful lot of people were pulling for the Atlanta Falcons this past Sunday, and there were a lot of broken hearts when they lost. You might have also noticed that many of those disappointed fans were people—like myself—that actually don’t watch football, don’t care about the Super Bowl (normally), and were just barely aware of who the rival team to the Patriots were until only a few days before the game started.
Now it’s true that a lot of people were likely pulling for the Falcons because of their underdog status, and it’s a lot easier to root for a coach in his second year to win the Super Bowl over joyless Bill Belichick in his 17th year and umpteenth Super Bowl. It’s also hard to root for Tom Brady to win a 5th Super Bowl (a record) when he cheated just last year during the “Deflate-gate” scandal. Sure, diehard Patriots fans will be screaming that deflating the football didn’t give The Patriots an edge, but then why did they do it? That’s like saying Lance Armstrong doped simply because he loves needles.
But I suspect just as many people were rooting for the Patriots to suck it big-time for the reason Bill Maher laid out on his February 3rd show: political ones. [Please watch the hilarious final New Rule from that episode, and thank me later.] Team owner Robert Craft, coach Bill Belichick, and Brady are all huge Trump supporters, and that certainly didn’t endear The Patriots to liberals (outside of Boston of course). And the fact that they played Atlanta? As SNL’s Michael Che put it “I’d like to see the blackest city in America beat the most racist city I’ve ever been to.” [Although the actual most “chocolate city” in America is Birmingham, AL but why quibble?]
Famous black entertainers like Denzel Washington have long talked about how hostile Boston was to them, and even one of the city’s patron sons—Mark Wahlberg—was arrested for a hate crime years ago. Boston is the last big city in America that I’ve never stepped foot in, so I can’t give my own two cents, but the perception is definitely out there that Boston is hostile to black people. [Although the actual most racist city in America has to be Salt Lake City.]
White supremacy vs. chocolate city? Check. Trump-loving team vs. scrappy underdog Atlanta Falcons? Check. So the match-up seemed primed to give Hillary fans their loooong awaited cathartic moment, and that seemed so sweet until about the third quarter. [Tennis player Eugenie Bouchard was so sure the Falcons would win, she took a Twitter Follower’s bet for a date…only to wind up having to go on a date with a guy who doesn’t even have a real picture.]
Watching the Patriots go into their half-time locker room and do a tremendous amount of steroids (I imagine some were vaporized and pumped in through the air conditioning ducts), and Robert Craft bribe the referees to make a ton of shitty calls on Atlanta was sad. And watching The Patriots essentially steal another Super Bowl through technicalities–the tying two-point conversion was successful because of a penalty, a first down was granted on a penalty, every fucking penalty called was on Atlanta, and the new rules that say a tie game goes into Sudden Death are clearly favoring the team that wins the coin toss, which happened to be The Patriots–was heartbreaking.
It felt like election night 2016 all over again. Naturally, Trump chimed in not long after The Patriots victory to congratulate them, further rubbing salt in the wound. If you can call winning on a shitload of technicalities that go your way at the very end a “huge victory” and we all know Trump does. Twitter users quickly made the connection between bad calls allowing The Patriots a huge advantage in sudden death over time with the election saying “Bernie Sanders would’ve won!” and “The Falcons won the popular vote!”
Once again, liberals have been denied a cathartic strike back moment. [It doesn’t help that Betsy DeVos was our best shot to block one of Trump’s deplorable cabinet picks and that’s not happening either.] Right now, many are wondering when our “Return of the Jedi” moment is, and even though it may not really matter who wins the Super Bowl, but every little bit helps.
nice shoutout to the chocolate mecca that is birmingham!
We are giving Trump so much energy that’s why he is winning. As of today I focus on propensity for the good side. Yeah and football too ?
Chris: I understand what you’re saying, all day every day it feels like “Trump, Trump, Trump” but he truly does do a month’s worth of crazy things in a few hours. And his full basket of deplorables (cabinet) is not sworn in yet! When he has a full house of incompetents and cutthroats I imagine the news will be more Trump, and not less.