10:00 PM
12/21/24
12/21/24
February 01, 2016
SportsFilter: The Monday Huddle:
A place to discuss the sports stories that aren't making news, share links that aren't quite front-page material, and diagram plays on your hand. Remember to count to five Mississippi before commenting in anger.
This is also the first Super Bowl for the Panthers in which John Kasay won't fuck up a kick-off late in the game.
posted by NoMich at 09:47 AM on February 01, 2016
In the same vein, here's an early list of prop bets.
I'll take:
- SB winning team scores more points than Trump % points in NH primary
- No appearances by Left Shark
- and way over on +/- 2 announcer mentions of dabbing
posted by bender at 09:57 AM on February 01, 2016
To help kick off Super Bowl Week here at SpoFi, and as pick 'em participants polish up their game predictions, here's a snippet from Uni Watch contributor Jay Braiman, who is truly obsessed and a deeper diver than James Cameron will ever be. I truly hope that this guy works in counterterrorism or some such analytic field.
"This will be the second Super Bowl in which both teams' nicknames/mascots are mammals (not including humans), the other being Colts vs. Bears in Super Bowl XLI. Overall, teams named for mammals are 8-19 in Super Bowls (not counting the 0-4 Buffalo Bills, who wear a mammal on their helmet but are not actually named for that mammal, or the 0-1 San Diego Chargers, whose nickname and secondary-logo history does refer to and include a horse but are primarily associated with lightning or electricity). None of the mammal teams has a winning record and none will after this game; the Broncos are 2-5 and the Panthers are 0-1.
This is the 15th Super Bowl in which neither team's primary home jersey color is blue, and of those, the first in which both teams use blue as a trim color (and the second in which either team uses blue as a trim color).
This is the 12th Super Bowl - and the third in a row, second time that's happened - in which neither team's helmet logo/decal contains any letter(s) of the alphabet. It's also the 13th Super Bowl and the third in a row for the first time in which both teams' left- and right-side helmet decals are mirror images of each other (counting the Seahawks and Chiefs; the Bengals and Ravens would also count but were not involved in any such games).
This is the 14th Super Bowl matching one team whose jerseys have generic varsity or block numerals against one with a custom numeral font (the Patriots' current design is counted in the latter category). Teams with custom numeral fonts are 7-6 in these games. Note: Of the first 30 Super Bowls, only one involved a custom numeral font: Super Bowl XX between the Bears and Patriots. Only two of the last 19 Super Bowls - XXXVII (Bucs/Raiders) and XLIV (Saints/Colts) - have not involved a custom font."
There are more of Braiman's observations at Uni Watch. Between grum and this fellow, no sporting detail is immune from scrutiny anywhere in North America.