Never work with kids or animals.

I grew up watching sports with my mother.  My father might go to a Super Bowl party to mix whiskey sours and tell jokes, but if you asked him how many yards for a first down, or how many plays until you turned the ball over, he’d be flummoxed.

At first we watched the Giants via some UHF channel in New Haven.  All snowy, brought in by rabbit ears.  No one went to the game.  It was sold out.  And expensive.  And how good could a seat be, in a stadium built for baseball?

We tuned in for Allie Sherman.  Just like Jews wince when a member of the tribe commits a faux pas, we support anybody who achieves fame, especially as a member of the jockocracy.  I remember telling my father I wanted to be a professional baseball player.  He wouldn’t even humor me at age 7.  You had to be a lawyer.  You had to have a job where you thought.  You didn’t want to get left behind.

But isn’t it interesting that ballplayers make all the money these days.  To the point where you can end up OWNING the team.  Wasn’t that way back in the sixties.  You had a job in the off-season.  Oftentimes selling automobiles, or working at a beer distributorship.

The very first Super Bowl was a farce.  As was the second.  We wanted a game, but we didn’t get one.  As for the third?  I was busy ski racing in Northern Vermont.  When I heard over the radio on the way back home that the Jets had won, I couldn’t believe it.  I can still remember the road we were on, what the light was like…

And I caught so many Super Bowls thereafter.  And then gave up.

Not only because my sixties values told me this was a heinous sport wherein one hit could ruin you for life, but because the games themselves were lopsided.  Football ain’t like baseball.  No matter how much you believe, your team doesn’t come back in the fourth quarter with two minutes left.

And while I lived without television, in the hinterlands, the Super Bowl became a cultural institution, a tribal rite, a chance for everybody to get together on a winter day, eat and watch commercials.

That’s another thing we’ve got to thank Steve Jobs for.  Before the 1984 Apple ad commercials were just expensive, they weren’t art pieces, they weren’t statements.  But since that time, the Super Bowl is not only a competition between the two best teams in the NFL, but the ad agencies inhabiting Madison Avenue.

Most impressive ad?

The Hyundai one featuring the Smashing Pumpkins.  A brand we pooh-poohed that is now respected.  Their Genesis is a Lexus for a much cheaper price. And their ad kind of sucked, but it featured Billy’s band, right at the beginning of the show, before we were either so high on alcohol or sugar that it was difficult to pay attention. This is the power of Irving Azoff.  Before Irving, the Pumpkins were forgotten.  Now, with only half the band intact, they’re being featured in front of all America.

Best ad?

The Doritos one, with the snow globe.  I liked the dude throwing it into the vending machine more than his compatriot throwing it into his boss’ nuts.  Supposedly it was fan generated.  The lunatics have taken over the asylum!

As for Audi…  Referencing their number one competitor, BMW?  Wow.  That used to be a taboo.  And someone else did that too, but I don’t remember what company it was!

As for Bud and its Clydesdales and Coke…  They’re so busy playing it safe, wary of offending a single viewer, that their spots are too bland, offending no one, they don’t inspire.  Unlike Pepsi. But seeing Dylan in that ad did bizarre me.

And Sully!  Why the hell was he at the game?  Great water landing, but now you’re at the Super Bowl?  As for General Petraeus…  I never would have let him on TV.  Viewers on Al Jazeera will no longer be afraid, knowing our troops are commanded by this pipsqueak.

And the game?

I wanted Arizona, but I bet on Pittsburgh.  Emotions are one thing, but money is another.  Still, I wanted Kurt Warner to prevail.  But the Cardinals couldn’t move the ball on the ground, and Pittsburgh was eating the turf up.  Until just before halftime.  It was too early for Warner to throw a pass into the end zone.  The Cardinals DESERVED to lose!

And then came Bruce.

I was stunned he started out with "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out".  But he did go straight into "Born To Run".  Was he bad?  No.  But it played like a commercial.  I’m surprised Jon Landau didn’t make a deal where you could point your remote at the set and buy a ticket right there.  It was kind of like seeing an ad for Ringling Bros.  But even the elephants don’t work it that hard.

As for the new number…  For a minute, I thought he wasn’t going to play any.  It fit in.  It just didn’t move me.

And then came "Glory Days".  Far from my favorite number (on that album, it’s "Downbound Train"), it was quite good.  Because the Boss lightened up, he stopped selling and started performing.  And Silvio Dante evidenced rock and roll.  And when the two sang together, when they shucked and jived, I told myself THIS was a Bruce Springsteen show.  THIS was what it was all about.  But we used to keep the essence secret.  You used to have to go to the show to know.  Didn’t MTV teach us that television exposure kills acts?  But no one can give up that chance, to have everybody see you and make all that money right now.  Remember when Trent wouldn’t go on Letterman after that mud-slinging Woodstock?  Despite Dave imploring him? Trent’s still got his cred, Bruce is now just another commercial production.  Grossing in excess of $200 million on the road last year.  When is it enough?

That’s what’s wrong with our whole business.  It’s not about music, but money.  We’ve jacked up the price and played to the last row, trying to get every last idiot to come, to the point where the essence has leaked out.

But at this point, just after halfway through the enterprise, one had to see Springsteen was the highlight.

And then suddenly, the Cardinals came back.  There was a safety.  A seemingly uncatchable toss into the end zone.  We had a GAME!

Just when we thought we had another Super Bowl blowout on our hands, the drama of human life entered the stadium.  That’s what Costas says sports are, a metaphor for life.  Everyone counts you out, you’re a bum, a failure and then you show them OTHERWISE!

It was riveting.  There was tension.  There was investment.  One was on the edge of his seat.

Ultimately, there was disappointment, when the Cinderella story was squashed.

There was everything present in a great rock show.  But it wasn’t scripted.  It unfolded, warts and all, right in front of us.  Springsteen faded, his performance just another unmemorable commercial for a product.  In this case, a concert ticket as opposed to a snack food, but what’s the difference?  Selling is selling.

Football works because the rules don’t change.  But the rules in rock and roll changed long ago.  Which is why sports still flourish and rock is fading.

Bruce made a mistake.  He was upstaged by the game itself.  Springsteen gave it his all, but the game was better, it stole our hearts.