Non-Football Fans Guide to Superbowl 54

Non-Football Fans Guide to Superbowl 54

 So a lot, if not most, of the people attending Superbowl parties this year are not going to be football fans. You've either gone for free food or have been reluctantly dragged along and will take part in this strange American tradition with football playing in on the background. There's nothing wrong with treating it like that, football is a weird game the main purpose of which is to allow men to not think about their emotions. 

But! What if you have to talk to one of your male relatives at the party? What if your boyfriend/girlfriend/partner/polycule is into it and you want to seem supportive? What if you have an inkling of curiosity as to what's actually going on in the game?

This guide exists as a tool to get a quick overview of the Superbowl and maybe allow you to get a little stake in the game! (Speaking of stakes, nothing works better to get people invested into any event than literal investment. Here's examples of fun betting games to give everyone real life stakes for the Superbowl!

Who's playing this year?

This game features the Kansas City Chiefs versus the San Francisco 49ers. Kansas City has a football team! And Kansas City is in Missouri! Wild.

Wait, where the hell are the New England Patriots?

In the fucking garbage. This annoyingly dominant team (so annoying that they keep creeping up in non-football spaces) is not in this year's Superbowl. Instead, they were defeated in the Wild Card Round of the playoffs, which is essentially a consolation. The Tennessee Titans, the scrappy underdog team that approximately -34,284 people believed in at the beginning of these season, vanquished the Patriots. 

See, the Titans have this player named Derrick Henry. Derrick Henry's position is running back, the guy who grabs the football and runs as far as he can before getting tackled. The Titans utilized him in a strategy known as "Derrick Henry Runs With the Football For The Whole Game Without Getting Tackled". The Patriots controversy attempted to counter this with their own strategy, "Don't Tackle Derrick Henry", which would become their downfall.

The Titans would proceed to the next round of the playoffs where they would face off against the Baltimore Ravens. Many people thought the Ravens were the best team in football, with a stifling defense that rivaled Rome at her zeitgeist and a young star in Quarterback Lamar Jackson, who can run super duper fast and does this thing where he spins 30 times in a row and makes opponents really dizzy so they can't tackle him. In most eyes, the Ravens were surely going to play in the Superbowl.

But the Ravens gameplan of "Make Sure not to Tackle Derrick Henry" would backfire. The Titans would obliterate the Ravens in the upset of the year, and the Titans would proceed to face the Kansas City Chiefs in the semi-finals, the game to determine which of them would head to the Superbowl. The Chiefs pulled their signature move, "Don't Let Derrick Henry Play Football". Thus, the Chiefs are the ones who are playing the Superbowl.

Ultimately you can't feel bad for the Titans: they went from a crumbling, disrespected organization to dethroning last years champion team, demolishing the best team in the league and nearly making it to the Superbowl. Hats off to you, Tennessee. 

Derrick Henry: Unstoppable Force

Kansas City Chiefs: An Overview

History: The Chiefs have won a Superbowl! It was like fifty years ago. Since then, things have not been great. Kansas City for a long time has been regarded as directionless, ineffective, irreputable and disappointing, and to top it off the city's football team hasn't been very good. Flashes of hope and victory dashed by a vicious cycle of mediocrity. But since last year, things have started to turn around due to the introduction of some exciting new faces!

Coach: Andy Reid is a guy who should have won like 5 Superbowls by now, but has won 0. Despite being considered one of the best coaches in the league, fate's cruel hand has always intervened to curtail his success in ways beyond his control. He's been the coach of various teams, but this stint with the Chiefs has been something of a redemption tour for him. Y'know that semi-finals game where he finally stopped the Titans and Derrick Henry to send the Chiefs to the Superbowl? He celebrated by eating a cheeseburger and then passing out on the couch. Man loves his food, and Kansas City with its barbeque culture is his Mecca.

Quarterback: So a few years back the Chiefs drafted this guy named Patrick Mahomes. I was like, "But all he does is play baseball! How good is he at football?"

Turns out he's literally the best.

See, Patrick Mahomes doesn't understand that he's playing football instead of baseball. He throws the football as if it were a baseball, which is a really bad strategy except when he does it the ball goes down the entire length of the football field. I could give you some boring statistics, but the point is he does things that don't make thermodynamic sense. He can perfectly pass the football with his left hand, while being tackled. He can make a perfect pass without evening looking to see where his players are. That doesn't make sense. It's made up pretend anime bullshit but he does it consistantly. What the fuck?

Two of his notable personality traits is that he only eats things that have ketchup on them, and he has a very silly voice that his whole team bullies him over, earning him the nickname "Kermit the Frog, the Real Bastard".

Other Players: 

Tyrann Mathieu is a vicious defensive player whose popular nickname is The Honey Badger because he looks unassuming but he really don't give a fuck. 

Travis Kelce is a really good Tight End, which is a funny sounding position that means you catch the football but you're also bigger than football-catching-guys should be. 

Tyreek Hill is a Wide Receiver (a Tight End if they were normal human size) who is good catcher and really fast. I need to disclaim that for all Tyreek's success, he's a controversial and often hated player for being involved in a domestic violence case. No jokes here, there's the reality that we face where many of the best and most exciting football players have (allegedly) done horrible things. If a domestic abuser being on a football team is enough of a reason for you to root against them, that is completely valid. This of course extends beyond football, as many popular and beloved actors, politicians, musicians and so forth have also been accused of and/or performed heinous acts. Further discourse on this is far too broad and serious to approach in this post, but it is notable enough for me to bring up to anyone familiar with Tyreek Hill.

On a less serious but still problematic note, the Chiefs aesthetic is based around stereotypes of Indigenous People. During the game you will watch a crowd of mostly white people do a Tomahawk Dance/Chant. Why are sports teams like this? Gaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah

San Francisco 49ers: An Overview

History: The San Francisco 49ers, unlike their Superbowl counterparts, have won a whole lotta Superbowls. Like five or something? Let me check. Yeah it's five. They've been good!

But not in the 21st century. For the past two decades the 49ers have been anywhere from 'bad' to 'playing Half-Life 2 but then Gordon Freeman pulls you inside the game and coerces you to be his maitre'd for nine months, which is only five seconds in the real world but still feels like nine months to you regardless'. It hasn't been pretty. There was one season where the 49ers got to the Superbowl, 2013 I think, where they played against the Ravens. That shit was crazy!

Okay, so in the Ravens-49ers Superbowl the coaches were brothers. What a good plotline! The Ravens quarterback at that time was Joe Flacco, who was as uncharismatic as his name implies, and the 49ers had Colin Kaepernick. Yes, that Kaepernick. The game starts, and the Ravens pull out to a big league before the Beyonce halftime show. But Beyonce was so powerful, that after her performance half the stadium lost power and the game had to stop for like an hour! After the Beyonceing, the 49ers began an extraordinary comeback that saw them just shy of victory in the end. This game has since been known as "The Beyonce Bowl Bmiracle."

After that Superbowl appearance the 49ers have been straight anus, an unceasing march of sadness that would make Dostoyevsky flinch in his grave-bed. Like they even sucked last year, and now they're doing superbowl shit! What a turnaround.

Coach: Remember that Superbowl when the Falcons had the Patriots down to a score of 28-3 during halftime, and somehow the Patriots won that game and everyone got real fucking miserable? Kyle Shanahan was the architect of the Falcon's offensive strategy in that superbowl. And now he's the head coach of the 49ers in this superbowl! How bout a redemption tour? No pictures of him because he looks pretty boring.

However, among the 49ers assistant coaches I want to point out Defensive Coordinator Robert Saleh, the first Arab (Lebanese) coach to get to a superbowl, and Assistant Offensive Coach Katie Sowers, the first female and openly gay coach to get to a superbowl. That's dope!

Quarterback: There's this Jimmy Garoppolo guy. He has a hard last name to spell if you don't have Google, and was once the backup for Tom Brady until he was traded from the Patriots to the 49ers. I guess he's good at football? Otherwise, how would he get to the Superbowl? Does anyone watch this guy play football? I hear literally nothing about him. He'll have a game and some people will be like, "Jimmy Garoppolo is decent". Okay then.

Notably, he is the hottest quarterback.

I've been looking through a bunch of pictures and they don't really do him justice! Look for yourself. If you find any stuff of him talking he's really cute and charming. Like, c'mon, he's this guy! What a dude.

Other Players:

George Kittle is a WWE Superstar who accidentally plays in the NFL. Dude seriously loves the WWE, talks about it all the time, does WWE-style celebrations. After a touchdown, he grabs beer from the fans and chugs it during the game. He parties hard. Also, he's the best Tight End in football right now.

Nick Bosa is a young player who looks like he's going to be one of the best defensive players in the NFL for a long time, woo! But he made some pro-Trump tweets in the past, not good!!! He's stopped since, but just a heads up. Wild how this guy and Kaepernick have both been on the 49ers huh? 

Richard Sherman is a name you might have heard of before, since he was actually on the Seattle Seahawks vaulted defense that went to 2 superbowls, under the moniker "The Legion of Boom". Sherman has always been a notoriously loud, and abrasive though highly clever player. The 49ers are bitter rivals with the Seahawks, and this year the aging Sherman played some of his best football.

What the hell are those weird numbers everyone keeps talking about?

"1st and 10", "2nd and 5", "3rd and 7", etc.: What is this cryptic shit everyone always says during a football game? This weird codal language is the crux of football. When a team has the football, they have 4 downs, a.k.a. attempts, to progress at least 10 yards. So it will always start at "1st and 10", meaning the first of four attempts to get at least ten yards. The second number is the number of yards the team with the football needs to progress to. So if it is currently "2nd and 8", that means it is the second out of four attempts for the team to progress, and they still have 8 yards left to do so. If the team successfully reaches at least the number of yards stated, they reset their downs/attempts to "1st and 10".

 You might ask, "Can't a team reset to 1st and 10 indefinitely until they get a touchdown?" You'd be correct! That's what all football teams are trying to go. Conversely, the other team is trying to impede their progress, because if a team can not progress the requisite number of yards within 4 downs/attempts, they must forfeit the ball to the opposing team. This is why on the 4th down, teams will often punt the ball: it guarteentess (provided some crazy stuff doesn't happen) that the other team receives the football, but they receive it much farther back. Which leads to:

"Go for it on 4th!" A risky but beloved maneuver where instead of safely punting the ball away, a team keeps it on the 4th down, using the final down to try and get at least the number of yards required to reset them to "1st and 10". But! If they should fail, the opposing team gets the football at the precise spot of failure, which puts them in an advantageous position!

Things to say to Impress Football Fans at the Party

"Mahomes can make the most impossible throws."

"Do you guys think Jimmy G(orropolo) is a Top 10 quarterback?"

"It's going to come down to the Chiefs' Offense versus the 49ers Defense."

"At least there's no Patriots this year, am I right? Fuck those philistines."

"The referees have been really bad this year, are they even paying attention?"

"The Eagles didn't treat Andy Reid well during his tenure!"

"Whose do you guys think is going to have a surprising breakout game?"

"At least it's gonna' be better than last year's, huh?"

(When a penalty is called against your team) "Ah shit! These fucking refs"

(When a penalty is called against the opposing team) "Hooty hoo!"

Things to say to Really Impress Football Fans at the Party

"The last player to have Mahomes talent was Johnny Unitas."

"Jimmy G's ability to read a zone defense was instilled in him when he was being mentored by Tom Brady at Foxborough."

"This game is vital for Andy Reid's legacy as well as the impact of his future coaching tree. I'm not exaggerating that we might view Andy Reid on the same level as Bellichick one day." *Someone scoffs* "Reid never had the support system Bellichick had. Consider that Mr. Wise Guy."

"Despite the league being increasingly pass-oriented, a solid run game is still required in order to open up opportunities for receivers. You aren't going to win if the opposing defense doesn't respect your ground game."

"Jimmy G is one sexy slab of gabagool."

"If we think about next year's draft, it's almost guaranteed the Bengals draft Joe Burrow what with Andy Dalton's situation, and it would be in the best interest of Washington to draft Chase Young, a generational pass rusher. Assuming Synder doesn't lose his damn mind and they take Young, this means that the Giants should draft an offensive lineman with the 4th overall, right? Not so! Consider the Chargers moving on from Phillip Rivers. They're going to want a quarterback, and let's be honest, even if Rivers had stayed with them, they would draft a quarterback with an eye on the future. They'll want to nab someone, so it would suit the Giants to trade down with the Chargers to ensure that Los Angeles can get Tua Tagolovia before Miami can...what, you think Detroit is going for a new QB? Get real, Staffords got a few years left in the tank. Anyways, the Giants can still get a great player at six, maybe even the guy they were wanted at four, and then they can attain additional capital from the Chargers to start filling out the defense. The Giants absolutely need a lot of young defensive blood. And if they can't trade down, then I suppose the Giants should draft Jedrick Wills..."

*In your best Kermit the Frog impression* "I'M PATRICK MAHOMES AND I PLAY FOOTBALL REAL GOOD"

*During the halftime show, you're uncharacteristically drunk at this point and grinding your ass on the flat screen T.V.* "IMONTONIGHTANDYOUKNOWMYHIPSDONTLIEANDIMSTARTINGTOFEELALRIGHT:AWGEIOAWGENAIOEGNAGEGEAW, YOUMAKEAMANWANNASPEAKSPANNISH~~~"

*14 minutes after the game has ended and you're laying on the corner speaking into your phone* "...Hello? Hey....hey, it's me Jess. Yeah...yeah  I know it's been...yeah, yeah. I'm just, y'know, having a football fun time and how are you doing?...Oh you're with his family? That must be soooooo much fun Jess. I know you just must love his family.....my mom still mentions you occasionally....yeah, I'm with my friends at a Super...Super Bowl party....yeah, I'm a football fan now, football woo! Go football....mhmm, I'm into football now, see? I can change too...we all make changes....you coming back for Spring Break? Because if you are we could meet up and maybe...I dunno....look, Jess, is there something you still want to tell me? Last time I felt like it wasn't real closure....so if you need to say-uh, hello? Hello? Are you still there Jess? Jess?"

Thanks for reading my guide, hopefully it's of some help! If you have any follow-up questions feel free to ask! Have a fun Superbowl Sunday! :)