Mile High Meltdown

I got an email asking about my thoughts on yesterday's...whatever that was. Admittedly, I didn't watch it all. I tuned out at the end of the first (maybe early in the second) when Seattle ran back a turnover for a touchdown. The score was still manageable by then, but I knew the Broncos would never recover. I knew Seattle was going to win the moment they got that safety. It was such a rookie mistake on the part of the Broncos, I don't care how loud it was in that stadium. They knew how loud it would be, and they've played in louder environments than that before. The whole half-ish of the "game" I saw reeked of a team who spent the past week taking in the sights and thinking they already had this thing in the bag, rather than a top team who prepped for the biggest game of their lives. Looking at them on the sidelines after that botched first snap, I saw nothing of the team I'd been supporting the past year. Their eyes were vacant. They looked uninterested. Even Manning, who I've never seen look so bored. And who I never took to be a quitter. Your career nearly ends because of a neck injury, you spend two years getting back on the field, and you get put out on your ass by your longtime team. This was what you'd worked for those years, and the past two seasons. Fuck the records, fuck the MVP trophy. This is what you were working and waiting for all that time. And when you finally get to the big dance, THAT'S how you play?? Manning lashed out at a reporter who called it an embarrassing display, but I don't see how he could disagree. Unless he wanted to use another word to describe it. Like pathetic. Or unbelievably horrible. Hell, get on up on that podium and tell the press what the whole world got to see yesterday - that you quit, your teammates quit and your coaches apparently aren't able to properly motivate you to do otherwise. I've never, ever seen a worse football game in my life. When even the other team is shocked by how easily they can score, you know you're a fucking embarrassment.

What pisses me off the most is that Seattle ran their big mouths all week and, in the end, they didn't even have to play for a championship. All they had to do was show up. Denver's prolific offense still has not met Seattle's great defense. Defense didn't win the championship. All Seattle did was show up, Denver handed them (literally) everything they got, including the Lombardi trophy. It was never a competition. Everyone will say Seattle won the Super Bowl but really Denver never even seemed remotely interested in competing for one. They shoulda saved us all the trouble, not to mention a ton of cash, and forfeited the trophy a week ago. I've been thinking about why it all feels so devastating. I mean, it literally broke my heart to see them just give up and not care. How do you do that? Anything worth having is worth fighting for. All they had to do was be who they had been all season long, and for the better part of two seasons. And I think that's why it's been such a blow. Because it's been a two year wait to get this point and now that's how it ends? From the time Manning signed, it became clear that it was Super Bowl or bust for the Broncos. Last year, they had their ticket all but punched when a terrible defense and a belief that their lead was insurmountable felled them in the final minutes. Supposedly they'd learned from that. Apparently not. Is this some sort of test? The first try, you blow it in the AFC Championship game, the second time (which can't even be labeled a "try"), you bitch out on a worldwide stage and next year you'll actually go all the way? Yesterday was so god-awful, I don't even think I want them to get back to the Super Bowl. Why embarrass yourself twice? Obviously the pressure got to all of them, they quit and they got steamrolled. End of story. And you have to be a special kind of awful to make a bunch of people want nothing to do with you. I mean, I bought a Broncos shirt that had a SB logo on it, thinking that even if they lost, I'd still have a memento of them having gone to the big game. But after yesterday's fiasco, I don't even wanna remember they went to the big game. I can't return the damn thing fast enough. Hopefully, yesterday fades from memory ASAP. I don't wanna talk about, I don't wanna read about it, I don't even wanna see the color orange on a damn construction cone. I just wanna move on.