The final act of CBS’s Super Bowl broadcast Sunday night left me wondering how prepared the network was for a New Orleans victory. This was not an ordinary city whose Saints upset the Indianapolis Colts, 31-17. This was the team representing Hurricane Katrina survivors and the team that had not been to the Super Bowl in a lifetime dating to 1967.
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Super Bowl XLIV
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Yet in the immediate aftermath of the game, CBS showed only quickie shots of Bourbon Street. Was that the best CBS had for us? One could argue that it would have been justified in cutting to gathering points in the city after critical moments during the game. But there’s no argument about what it should have done when the game was over.
Reaction shots of a few seconds each was not enough to tell this story.
Showing cities celebrating titles has become trite. But New Orleans is different, as riveting pregame segments by James Brown and Wynton Marsalis amply demonstrated.
When Jim Nantz cited the names of various streets and sections of New Orleans, I thought CBS’s cameras would go there. When CBS left Sun Life Stadium about 10:15 p.m. Eastern, it should have gone directly to the happy heart of New Orleans for 15 minutes and delayed the start of its new series “Undercover Boss.” But that was not to be.
Some other questions remain.
Did CBS adequately explain the rule on the Saints’ 2-point conversion?
At first, Nantz and Phil Simms were certain the pass from Drew Brees to Lance Moore was incomplete. But each successive SuperVision slow-motion replay changed their thinking. Although Simms was not nearly as succinct or as clear as he could have been as he rolled out his explanation, he eventually got it right. According to the league, if a receiver with possession of the ball is in the act of going to the ground and performs a “second act” by reaching out to break the plane of the goal line, the catch is kosher.
One small omission: no matter how revealing SuperVision is, CBS never showed a real-time replay, the speed at which the officials originally saw the pass.
Was CBS surprised with the Saints’ onside kick to start the second half?
No, it seemed to excite Nantz and Simms. “What a fearless way to start the second half!” said Nantz, leading Simms to reflect on the courage of Saints Coach Sean Payton’s failed, if bold, fourth-and-goal call from the 1 in the first half.
The onside kick was a reminder that when CBS and NBC simulcast Super Bowl I, NBC missed the second-half kickoff. (Charlie Jones’s halftime interview with Bob Hope ran long.) Believe it or not, they did a kickoff do-over. On Sunday, CBS kept its focus on the scramble after Thomas Morstead’s onside kick, with the audio giving a vivid soundtrack to the frantic scene.
Was Simms’s analysis sharp?
Very. Take his assessment of the way Brees put the Colts’ defense on its heels with a series of short passes: “They’re used to their pass rush getting to the quarterback, but they keep seeing one look after another, another formation, another short pass, so you get to where you react, you’re not attacking.”
On a Brees-to-Reggie Bush pass, Simms saw something quite subtle, saying, “Brees felt pressure from the right side and changed his throwing motion; it looked like he shorted his arm up a little to make sure, as he took it back, that it wouldn’t be knocked out of his hands.”
And I have always liked the way Simms admits his errors. With 3 minutes 24 seconds left in the game and the Colts at the Saints’ 31, Simms said: “If I’m the Saints, I don’t blitz. I put the extra guys in coverage.” Just like that, Tracy Porter intercepted Peyton Manning’s pass and the Saints went ahead, 31-17. “What was I saying? Don’t blitz? So they sent everybody. The Colts ran their favorite play, and oh, he was coming under and the timing wasn’t there.”
Was CBS shameless about promoting its pregame show sponsors?
Indeed it was. CBS had five sponsors, one for each of the first four hours of the program and another for the final half-hour. Yes, sponsors are seeking more for their money these days, and networks are delivering it. But there is a point at which a network can erode its credibility when it integrates sponsors into a show as CBS so flagrantly did.
Ritz crackers got enormous exposure from Boomer Esiason, who packed his mouth with Ritzes while recalling the Ritz tailgate party, and from a barbecue with the celebrity chef Guy Fieri, where everything but Katie Couric fit on a Ritz. At other points, Brown enunciated corporate pizza statistics to thrill Pizza Hut, and Phil Mickelson was in a taped segment for Callaway, which he endorses, in which he predicted which team would win by the distance balls marked “Indy” and “N.O.” flew with his Diablo driver. Enough!
At long last does no one have any taste?
Did President Obama deliver the football goods?
Actually, no. Couric asked so many policy questions during their 20-minute interview that the president never got around to much football. But he gave CBS plenty of good hoops talk when he appeared during the recent Duke-Georgetown game.
