I had more than 10 thoughts yesterday, but these are the ones I remember the best:
1. That was the best Super Bowl I've ever seen. Competitive, well-played, a dramatic ending, an abundance of storylines. It was pretty near perfect. And most surprising of all, the game didn't have a single controversial call - the refs handled the Belichick 12-men-on-the-field challenge efficiently and correctly, made the correct pass interference call on the Pats' early TD drive and generally had this game entirely under control. The good referees are the ones you don't notice, and I didn't really notice them until after the game, when I noticed how awesome they were.
2. I had absolutely zero confidence in Eli Manning all evening. Not until his pass settled in the hands of Plaxico Burress did I believe he would make a decisive play. He looked shaky and a little scared on every possession between the opening field-goal drive and the final game-winning one. Manning looked like he was the one who had to deal with the Giants defense.
3. Speaking of the Giants' defense, that was simply unbelievable, especially since Eli and the offense left them hanging out there forever. The Patriots' offensive line, a group packed full of Pro Bowlers, was completely overwhelmed, to the point that they suffered from nervous twitches that turned into false starts. And Matt Light's face was a brighter red than Tom Coughlin's was at Green Bay.
4. Tom Brady's reputation is going to have to take a hit on this one. It's not really his fault he spent much of the night on his back, but even when he wasn't getting hit, he threw like he was expecting it. He overthrew, underthrew and just plain missed receivers throughout the night. Not to paint myself as insightful after the fact, but you could kind of sense something was wrong with him from the way he was kind of slumped on the bench every time the cameras cut away to him on the sideline. He just looked a little off, and when he was playing, he looked more than a little off. Hope Terry Bradshaw didn't start carving Brady's mug into Mount Passmore yet. By the way, I blame Gisele.
5. David Tyree is my hero. He catches better with his helmet than most people do with their hands. And I love that he held onto that ball despite the efforts of performance-enhanced Rodney Harrison.
6. I flipped over to ESPN as the Fox show was winding down. They were "efforting" Mercury Morris, so I decided to just go to sleep.
7. Wes Welker was an absolute monster. It was pretty cool that Randy Moss caught his go-ahead TD because the Giants were double-covering the Slot Machine.
8. My favorite part of any championship game/series is watching people win rings for the first time. For the Giants, that was roughly everyone. And I never appreciated how good a player and leader Michael Strahan really is until last night.
9. Bill Belichick is an enormous jerk. What's with him walking onto the field and heading for the locker room with 1 second on the clock? Was I the only one who immediately understood that the Giants had a second or two to kill after Brady's 4th-down incompletion? You can't just wave off that final play - it's not a mercy rule youth basketball game, it's the Super Bowl. Finish it off right.
10. The commericals were overall pretty lame, as I'll discuss in detail below.
1. Will Ferrell's Bud Light spot was predictably awesome.
2. The remaining Bud Light ads were predictably crass and unfunny. They get worse every year.
3. Underdog vs. Stewie Griffin, and Charlie Brown wins. My favorite commerical of the night.
4. I didn't like the talking baby E-Trade commericals until the baby wondered how he was going to spend all this coin. That was funny.
5. I'll admit it - I'm a Justin Timberlake fan. For real. And his Pepsi commercial was pretty good. I also didn't mind the Pepsi Max commercial, which was very funny when everyone was nodding off but kind of annoying when they all did the Night at the Roxbury head-dance.
6. Tide To Go's talking stain ad made me giggle.
7. More ads that didn't work: The unattractive woman using Planters peanuts as perfume was simply nasty; if I ever have to swerve around aging celebrities on a twisty, darkened road, I'll do my best to be using Bridgestone tires; and the Taco Bell Fiesta Platter looks like all of Taco Bell's least-desireable menu choices piled onto one segmented styrofoam plate. When I'm nostalgic for Mexican Day at my old middle school cafeteria, I know where I'm going.
8. Company that should be banned from advertising in future Super Bowls: SalesGenie.com.
9. Good idea for Doritos to use its spot for a music competition - those seem to be popular - but if that warbling folkstress singing Bum-bum-bum over and over is the best the contest produced, I don't want to see who finished second.
10. The FedEx carrier pigeons scared me.
P.S. - Velveeta Chili Dip was a big winner, as were my wife's chicken wings in Jack Daniels Spicy Barbecue sauce.