Insert warning comment about lack of news this time of year.
Then introduce criticism on lame topic from writers meeting quotas by introducing odd and sometimes befuddling series concepts attempting to qualify two unlike topics, plays, ideas etc.
Today, it's Shutdown Corner from Yahoo! Sports coming up with the most overrated and underrated Super Bowl plays.
I'm not even sure what that means, or what I'd even say are "underrated" Super Bowl moments, but the Steelers find themselves the subjects of each argument made by Eric Edholm and Frank Schwab.
Edholm's suggests Jackie Smith's infamous drop of a Roger Staubach pass in Super Bowl XIII is the most overrated play in, I suppose, Super Bowl history. It doesn't really indicate any kind of timeframe, so we'll go with that.
Smith's dropped pass came from a less-than-stellar Staubach pass, but a drop is a drop. Edholm's argument is the drop, coming in the third quarter, didn't cost the Cowboys the game. This makes it an overrated play...somehow. It wasn't the reason the Cowboys lost the game, but it certainly didn't help their chances either. Call it a draw; not under or overrated. It's just rated.
Schwab's argument, though, is a complete mess.
It's understandable why people want to write things to attract attention. I do it far more often than any sane person should. BTSC writer Jim Racalto recently passed along to me, for the sake of humor, an article someone wrote on what might have happened if the Steelers had traded Ben Roethlisberger to the Oakland Raiders before the 2009 NFL Draft. The point is still unclear, if not solely to attract attention.
Schwab says Santonio Holmes' championship-clinching touchdown catch in Super Bowl XLIII is the most overrated play in Super Bowl history.
I'm not downplaying the historical significance of Holmes' game-winning catch against the Cardinals in Super Bowl XLIII. It was a huge play, but I think we like to make highlights like that bigger than they are.
So a huge play that weighs in on the scale of historical significance, by Schwab's own words suggest, is also the most overrated play in Super Bowl history because "we" like to make Super Bowl-winning catches bigger deals than they are.
Is Dwight Clark's catch from Joe Montana overrated, too?
Schwab again applies righteous praise on the play itself, only to attempt to diffuse those accolades with criticism that is juvenile at best, and grossly underwhelming at worst.
A remarkably significant play in the annals of NFL history, and the catch itself was also very good. But it wasn't one of the most impressive catches ever
I'm sure I don't stand alone when wondering what makes Mr. Schwab qualified to address an audience as to what would constitute the "most impressive" catches of all time, but a large amount of those standing with me would also probably factor the magnitude of the game into that same description. It earned him MVP of the game.
In reality, what this is, most likely, is a short-sighted current-events-only hack spouting off the easiest 300 words he could come up with at a dead time in the year.
FYI - I'd nominate myself for runner-up of the same award but this is 500 words.