Super Bowl LXis almost upon us, and the coming clash between theNew England Patriotsand the Seattle Seahawks is fascinating. Few would have expected either team to make it this far; both were given odds of greater than 50-1 at the start of the season and neither quarterback, Sam Darnold nor Drake Maye, had won so much as a playoff game before this campaign.
Last season, the Patriots lost 13 games. No team has ever recovered so quickly to make the Super Bowl, and if they win again on Sunday, they'll become the first team to win it seven times.
History will also be made in the halftime show, as Bad Bunny becomes the first Latin male performer.
Now in its 60th year, this is one of the greatest events in all of sports. So, to get you in the mood for the week of build-up ahead, here's a A-Z guide to the history and traditions of the Super Bowl.
A is for Anthem
There is no sporting event anywhere in the world that embraces pageantry quite like the Super Bowl, and nowhere else is "The Star-Spangled Banner" guaranteed an audience of over 100 million Americans. The performance is always intensely scrutinized, just in case somebody drops a note or flubs a line of the national anthem. Billy Joel has sung it twice; 1930s and '40s actor Pat O'Brien chose to speak the words at Super Bowl IV in 1970; and Whitney Houston's 1991 rendition during the Gulf War is considered the best, even though she later revealed that it was lip-synced.Angelic.
B is for Bills
Nobody knows heartbreak like the Buffalo Bills, who played in four consecutive Super Bowls and lost them all. The Bills have never won the Super Bowl, and they've never returned to football's biggest stage since their last, fateful appearance in 1994.Brutal.
C is for Commercials
There's something for everybody on Super Bowl Sunday, and the commercial breaks have become a key element of the entertainment package. Some of the ads are so eagerly anticipated that there are even trailers to promote them.
Leading brands will plan their annual marketing campaigns around the game and will pay handsomely to display their wares in the world's biggest shop window. NBC says they sold all their Super Bowl LX ad space before the season had kicked off. With a 30-second slot selling for an average of $8 million, that's $266,667 per second.Costly.
D is for Defense
They say, "Offense wins games, defense wins championships," and that was never truer than Super Bowl XII when the Dallas Cowboys beat Denver 27-10. The Cowboys' defensive linemen Harvey Martin and Randy White made three sacks between them, leading a defense that forced eight turnovers and limited Denver to 156 total yards. They were so good that it's the only time two MVPs have been named in one game.Doomsday.
E is for Elvis
Yes, Elvis really did play the Super Bowl halftime show; no, not that one. In 1989, the Joe Robbie Stadium in Miami Gardens, Florida, became the stage for a giant magic trick at halftime, with "Elvis Presto" holding court. The show was broadcast in 3D, viewers who had purchased promotional packs of soda had the glasses to watch it. Remarkably the performer slated to play Elvis quit the gig to shoot a Lee jeans commercial, so Alex Cole stepped in with just three days' notice for the performance of a lifetime. Cole went out on top, he later said it was the last time he ever performed on a stage.Entrancing.
F is for Forty Niners
One of the Super Bowl's most successful teams, the Niners have won it five times, twice in record-setting fashion. At Super Bowl XXIV in 1990, San Franciso piled on a record 55 points against the Broncos. Five years later, they were involved in the highest scoring Super Bowl of all time: the Chargers scored 26 points; the 49ers scored, of course, 49.Formidable.
G is for Gatorade
It's the brightly colored liquid showered over the winning coach at the end of the game. The New York Giants had been dousing coach Bill Parcells throughout the 1984 and '85 seasons, and after the team's Super Bowl XXI win in 1987, the Gatorade shower went mainstream. Now fans even gamble on the color of the shower, but it's never been red. Given the chance of it looking like blood, it probably never will be.Gross.
H is for Halftime
The Super Bowl musical performance has become as eagerly anticipated as the game itself, and staging it requires an extraordinary feat of planning and execution. From the moment the players head for the locker room at the end of the second quarter, hundreds of crew members have barely six minutes to wheel dozens of carts onto the field, forming the stage, lighting rigs, video screens and sound systems around which the show will play. Afterward, they have about the same amount of time to clear the decks for the second half. It's very impressive to watch.Hustle.
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I is for International audience
The Super Bowl isn't just huge in the United States; it's become a massive global event, too. According to the NFL's latest figures, the game is aired live in 195 countries and territories, with commentary in 25 languages. The league also says it has collaborated with the US State Department to host 150 events in 65 countries around the globe.Ingrained.
J is for Joe Namath
The first true star of the Super Bowl era. In 1969, "Broadway Joe" led the New York Jets to a huge upset win against the Baltimore Colts – an 18-point favorite – fulfilling his guarantee of victory that he'd made days before. The media lapped up Namath's charisma and style, and the Jets' triumph in Super Bowl III marked a first for an AFL team, legitimizing the league.Jock.
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K is for Kickoff.
For over 30 years it's taken place at 6:30 p.m. EST, which allows the NFL to capitalize on the domestic audience and maximize commercial value. The contiguous US mainland has four time zones, meaning that viewers on the East Coast can easily watch at least through the halftime show, whereas on the West Coast the game is played from late afternoon through to early evening.Keen.
L is for Left Shark
Some of the Super Bowl's most enduring images have nothing to do with the actual game. Case in point, the man in the 7-foot shark dancing alongside Katy Perry in 2015. During her performance of the song "Teenage Dream," the shark on the right of the screen was coordinated and in-sync, whereas the shark on the left seemed to be in a world of its own.
Left Shark went viral, becoming an instant cultural phenomenon. Dancer Bryan Gaw subsequently revealed that his act was intentionally freestyle, and even though he left Perry's tour to become a hair stylist, he still boasts of his Left Shark gig on his resume.Loopy.
M is for MVP
From Tom Brady to Joe Montana, Terry Bradshaw and Patrick Mahomes, the sport's greatest players have been named as the Super Bowl's Most Valuable Player multiple times. Through 59 Super Bowls to date, the MVP has finished on the winning side, except for Super Bowl V in 1971, when the Cowboys linebacker Chuck Howley was given the honor. Howley made two interceptions and one forced fumble, but it wasn't quite enough as the Cowboys lost to the Colts, 16-13.Mitigate.
N is for Nielsen ratings
The Super Bowl is a broadcast behemoth. According to Nielsen, which measures television audience size and composition, the NFL's showpiece event is unmatched in the world of sports and entertainment. A record average viewership of 127.7 million people watched the last Super Bowl in the United States, breaking the record of 123.7 million set the previous year. In the list of most-watched broadcasts of all time, the Super Bowl dominates the top 20 spots.Notable.
O is for Overtime
Only twice has the Super Bowl lasted more than 60 regular-game minutes, and on both occasions the winners overturned big deficits to snatch the trophy. Despite leading the Patriots by 25 points, the Falcons somehow lost Super Bowl LI, and the 49ers blew a 10-point lead against the Chiefs in LVIII.Ouch.
P is for Patriots or Pittsburgh.
These two teams have won the Super Bowl a record six times each. Nobody knows the game better than the Pats, who've made 11 appearances, and if they can beat the Seahawks on Sunday, they'll have the win record all to themselves.Phenomenal.
Q is for Quarterback
The signal-caller is the heartbeat of every team in the NFL and usually the focus of attention at any Super Bowl. And none were bigger than Tom Brady. Despite almost being overlooked as the 199th pick in the sixth round of the 2000 NFL draft – with six quarterbacks chosen before him – Brady emerged as the greatest of all time.
Over a remarkable 20-year period, he made a record 10 Super Bowl appearances for the Patriots and the Tampa Bay Buccaneers, winning seven of them. He's one of only two QBs to win the Lombardi trophy with two franchises. (The other is Peyton Manning.)Quintessential.
R is for Rings
Nothing reveals a Super Bowl winner quite like the ostentatious rings that they wear on their fingers, and if you look closely, many will tell the story of the game. The Patriots' LI ring from 2017 carries 283 diamonds, denoting the 28-3 deficit they recovered from against the Falcons. There are 127 diamonds on the bezel of the Eagles' ring from Super Bowl LII in 2018 – 127 represents the total when adding the jersey numbers of the three players involved in the "Philly Special" trick play against the Patriots. The Buccaneers' LV ring from 2021 even has a removable top, revealing a mini replica of their Raymond James Stadium, where the game was played.Regal.
S is for Super Ball
Without the bouncy ball toy, we might still be talking about the annual "AFL – NFL World Championship Game." In 1966, the founder of the American Football League, Lamar Hunt, spontaneously referred to a proposed showdown game between football's two merging rival leagues as the "Super Bowl." Commissioner Pete Rozelle wasn't convinced, but by 1969, for the third game between the Jets and the Colts, the NFL was officially marketing it as the Super Bowl. Hunt said later that he thinks he was inspired by his kids' rubber toy ball, which could bounce over a house.Soaring.
T is for Tickets
There were roughly 33,000 empty seats at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for Super Bowl I – about a third of its capacity in 1967 – but every game since has been a sellout (including the extremely limited seats available during the Covid-19 pandemic). And you won't find tickets for anything close to the $12 they were sold for back in 1967, about $116 in today's dollars. This year, Forbes has said the average ticket price is around $7,500, among the highest on record. The Super Bowl has established itself as the pre-eminent FOMO event in world sport.Toppy.
U is for Unbeaten
The 1972 Miami Dolphins are the only NFL team to run the table, winning Super Bowl VII against the Redskins and closing out the season with a 17-0 record. The New England Patriots were the closest to matching them in 2007, losing only to the Giants in Super Bowl XLII and finishing with an 18-1 record. The surviving '72 Dolphins players still celebrate when the last remaining unbeaten team loses each season.Unique.
V is for Vince Lombardi
The legendary coach led the Green Bay Packers to victory in the first two Super Bowls, and his name was given to the iconic Tiffany trophy after his death in 1970.Venerable.
W is for Wardrobe Malfunction
Arguably the most controversial moment in Super Bowl history came when Justin Timberlake fleetingly exposed Janet Jackson's right nipple during the 2004 halftime show. Whether accidental or intentional, "Nipplegate" caused a storm of controversy and sparked a heated debate over public decency and broadcasting standards.
If you blinked you would have missed it – Jackson was only exposed for half a second – but the scandal lasted for at least eight years and an argument over fines against CBS for airing the nudity went all the way to the Supreme Court, which tossed them out. Meanwhile, "wardrobe malfunction" made it into all the major dictionaries.Whoops.
X is for X
And all the other Roman numerals that add an air of grandeur and tradition to the Super Bowl. The league adopted the numerals to avoid confusion, because the Super Bowl is played in the calendar year after the regular season. Since the fifth Super Bowl was named V, only once has the league reverted to Arabic numbers, because it thought L (50) didn't look right.X-factor.
Y is for Young, Steve.
Even the great Tom Brady could never match Young's feat in Super Bowl XXIX in 1995, when he passed Joe Montana's record and threw a record six touchdowns. Since he'd never done that before, in any game, Young described the feat as "unbelievable" and over 30 years later, he's still amazed that nobody has done better.Yield.
Z is for Zero.
The A-list stars who perform in the halftime show get paid $0. Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney, Prince and Beyonce have all rocked the stage from the 50-yard line, and while the NFL spends tens of millions of dollars putting on the show, the main performers leave empty handed. Most wouldn't have to be asked twice, though; the exposure to such a massive global audience is worth a fortune in streaming revenue, back catalog sales and concert promotion.Zillionaire?
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Super Bowl LXis almost upon us, and the coming clash between theNew England Patriotsand the Seattle Seahawks is fascinati...
