The Super Bowl is the most important and watched sports and television event in the United States. Over time, its fame has spread beyond national borders, attracting the curiosity of millions of people worldwide, even those not very interested in the sport of American Football, becoming a real lifestyle and media phenomenon.
For those who are a bit new to the sport or want to find all the latest information about this event, let's go through all the secrets of the Super Bowl.
History and significance
So let's briefly see the essential things to know about this event.
Which teams participate in the Super Bowl? The teams participating in the Super Bowl are the winners of the two conferences into which the NFL championship is divided.
To better understand this mechanism, we must briefly refer to how the American Football League is structured. On the one hand, some teams play in the National Football Conference (NFC), and on the other, those in the American Football Conference (AFC). These two conferences are divided into 4 "Divisions" consisting of 4 teams each. At the end of the regular season, the top teams from each division, plus the two best teams from each conference (called wild cards), enter the playoffs.
The playoffs are the most important part when it comes to Super Bowl Odds , because they determine the winning teams from the NFC and AFC that will then clash at the Super Bowl to determine the American Football World Champion team
The modern form of the Super Bowl, as we know it today, was played in 1967 (although the name Super Bowl to denote the title of champion would not be officially used until the third edition), when the champions of the National Football League, Kansas City Chiefs, and those of the American Football League, the Green Bay Packers, or the two conferences as they were called at the time, challenged each other.
But why is the most important game in American Football called the Super Bowl? We must briefly go back to the sport's origins to understand this. In fact, the term Bowl, used about sporting events, originates from the stadium in Pasadena, California: the Rose Bowl Stadium (yes, the same one in which the final of the USA 94 World Cup was played), whose shape precisely resembled that of a "bowl" and which already from the early 1900s hosted the most important post-season games of American college football. By the years when the first Super Bowl was then played, the use of the term to refer to a major American football game was well established.
But, as is always the case, there is also a more legendary version related to the origin of the name. In fact, the story goes that Lamar Hunt, owner of the Kansas City Chiefs, proposed using the term Super Bowl because his children loved to play with a bouncing ball called precisely Super Ball. The city media loved this name, which soon entered the common lexicon.
Who won the last Super Bowl?
If you are asking how the last Super Bowl ended, the answer is that the Kansas City Chiefs won it for the third time in their history. The Missouri team beat the rival Philadelphia Eagles in the 57th Super Bowl with a thrilling score of 38 to 35.
Super Bowl MVP: the best player of all editions
Out of every Super Bowl comes a winning team and the Most Valuable Player, abbreviated MVP, or the best player in the game. But who makes this kind of decision?
The verdict is made by a jury of 16 journalists and, since 2001, also by a vote of spectators through the Internet or via telephone. The journalists' opinion "weighs" 80 percent of the total, while the remaining 20 percent remains with the popular jury.
Thus, the players to have won Most Valuable Player the most times are Tom Brady (5 times), Joe Montana (3 times), Bart Starr (2 times), Terry Bradshaw (2 times), Eli Manning (2 times) and Patrick Mahomes (2 times), with all other players stopped at one win.
Among the most awarded roles is Quarterback awarded 32 times, followed by Wide Receiver 8 times, Running Back 7 times, Linebacker 4 times, Defensive end and Safety 2 times, while Cornerback, Defensive tackle and Kick returner only 1 time.
The spectacle of the Super Bowl
The Super Bowl is an event that catalyzes the interest not only of American Football fans but also of those who do not follow the sport. This is because, thanks to its enormous success, over time, it has become a true media and lifestyle phenomenon mainly because of two particular aspects: the concerts during halftime and the commercials aired during the game.
Super Bowl Halftime Show
This is the event within the event that catalyzes the most attention from those who normally would not be very interested in the game played. In fact, each year, during halftime of the game, world-class artists perform a show that lasts up to 15 minutes while the two teams are in their respective locker rooms.
Perhaps the event that most attracted the world's attention to this show was the notorious "nipplegate" in 2004 when, during halftime of Super Bowl XXXVIII, singer Janet Jackson, who was performing with Justin Timberlake, went bare-breasted for a few seconds. The controversy stirred by this event led the NFL to broadcast all subsequent halftime shows at a slight delay precisely to avoid further such issues.
During the intermissions of the first Super Bowls, there were only local college marching bands. It was in the 1990s that, in part to counter the counter programming of other channels that outperformed Super Bowl ratings during halftime, it was decided to raise the level of competition.
A watershed between the amateur shows of the early years and the contemporary professional shows was undoubtedly Michael Jackson's performance in 1993 during Super Bowl XXVII, which came to total more than 133 million viewers, something that continues to make it one of the most watched shows in history in the United States.