by Maynard Black

Created on: June 19, 2008   Last Updated: December 26, 2008

It's been a few years since Super Bowl XL, but it remains fresh in my memory. No matter how well the Seahawks have done, they've received nothing but disrespect from the NFL and it's fans. What remains forever burned in my folds of gray matter, were the disgusting calls made in that game and the aftermath 24 hours after the supposed "loss."

The following day I read numerous articles from ESPN and Fox Sports writers on their respective websites. Every one of them laying out the reasons they believe that Seattle was robbed of a Super Bowl victory. I felt a bit relieved to see that it wasn't just me or the local press that realized how awful that game really was.

The next day I came into work wanting to re-read those articles, only to find that every last one of them had been pulled from their websites. Did anyone else notice this? Suddenly, all those stories pointing the finger at the NFL and the officials from the game, were gone. Vanished. Can you find them in their archives? Nope. They were all replaced by stories about a "glorious" victory by the Steelers. How had their minds changed so quickly?

Super Bowl rigged? Maybe it was just a series of bad calls. I have no idea. But why would those articles that reflect negatively on the NFL be immediately pulled from the major sports media outlets? Were they trying to cover up a conspiracy or just that they made really bad calls and didn't want to admit that they were at fault?

I agree that rigging games is a pretty difficult thing to do. All of the articles that I've read on this site, specifically point to the fact that there are so many people involved. And honestly, I don't think there really was any larger conspiracy. That's not to say that it isn't possible, because I think that the NFL could have easily paid off the refs to make the game more interesting. After all, 90% of the nation wanted the Steelers to win that game. The Seahawks weren't even favored to win when they were the better team in all aspects statistically. They weren't favored because no one respects the Seahawks or even Seattle as a city. Tucked away in the Northwest, it gets very little National coverage despite being a top 10 market in the US.

I can't speak for the refs in that game, I can only speculate that they might have favored the Steelers. I think that's the more plausible explanation for what happened. Re-playing the Super Bowl or even an admission by the NFL that the game was not enacted fairly, reflects very poor lighting on the NFL and the validity of the Super Bowl as a whole. Like it or not, it's not fair. It's business as usual. The NFL cares about making money and maintaining their image. That's all. They don't care about what's fair. So they stamped out all the naysayers, and pretended like nothing happened. And since just about everyone wanted the Steelers to win, it didn't matter and all was easily forgotten.

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