The NFL started the 2009-10 season Thursday night, and the Pittsburgh Steelers and Tennessee Titans put on a great show for NBC. The Steelers needed a field goal in overtime to win, 13-10. I didn’t see it — I try to hit the sack around 10 p.m. on weeknights, so I only caught the first half.
In 90 minutes, I found some things I really liked ... and some things I found truly annoying ... as the NFL began its autumnal hostilities.
Here’s the list:
* Steelers’ safety Troy Polamalu played spectacular football, great defense that stopped a bunch of Titan running plays. He also made a terrific one-handed interception. Guys like Polamalu, who play with a passion for the game, keep me coming back. Hope the knee injury that kept him out of the second half is not serious.
* NBC lets players introduce themselves on screen. Offensive and defensive units get their turns, and I wish the guys running the cameras would issue simple instructions: “Name. School. Nothing more.” But they don’t. That’s why you have guys mugging for TV, and announcing they played collegiately for “Gator Nation” and “The Cuse.” That’s Florida and Syracuse. My favorite annoyance is Miami, as players almost defiantly proclaim their allegiance to “The U.”
I think even announcer Al Michaels is annoyed with this practice. “We’ll have to work on subtitles,” he said Thursday night, after the first group finished their hellos. Just say where you played, guys. Be true to your school.
* Glad to see Pittsburgh fans turned out in force for the game: The stands were full of black and gold. I can do without the “terrible towels” and I could have done without all the fireworks and dramatic music that were part of the game’s opening ceremony — a mix of Olympic fanfare and World Wrestling Entertainment theatrics. It’s just the first game of the season ... not the Second Coming.
* The pre-game acknowledgements of the Sept. 11 attacks were a nice touch, a good way to remember. Relatives of people killed in the crash of United Airlines Flight 93, which was hijacked and crashed near Shanksville, Pa., were on the field for the National Anthem, all dressed in Steeler “93” uniforms.
* I’ve saved the worst for last. Advertisements are always fair game for criticism, and I have knocked my share. But I don’t think I’ve ever seen more annoying, obnoxious, imbecilic commercials than the ones presented by Bud Light. The new spots, all about a TV “game show host” named “Jimmy Football,” and all his Bud Light-inspired improvements for the football experience. Insulting, stupid and insipid, “Jimmy” and his adoring “studio audience” make the fun-loving dolts of the Flomax ads look like Shakespearian actors. And the new Buds make the annoying Coors Light “cold insurance” ads — where silver-tinted mountains on cans turn blue when the beer is properly chilled — seem like “Masterpiece Theater.”
Beer commercials don’t have to be dopey. The jolly Miller High Life delivery man who plays Robin Hood — rescuing cases of High Life from sports snobs and distributing the suds to the common man — is a regular riot.
But Bud Light is drawing national heat for another ad, this one for the brand’s lime-flavored beer. The beer was first available in bottles only, but is now out in aluminum cans. The ad, no doubt devised by a team of sub-morons, shows men and women discussing the merits of “getting it in the can.” Annoying, insulting, bad taste — they all apply. I’ve only seen this ad online and not on local television ... I’ll bet if it does show up on TV in the Capital Region, people are going to complain.
Lousy beer anyway.
