This is not an excuse. I am neither smart enough nor am I Nostradamus’ protege to have predicted what happened today at Super Bowl LIII. There is no way I could have conjured this game as one of my probabilistic models.
The game between the top 2 teams, played at the highest level, took 53 minutes to find the first touchdown of the game, the defense on both sides fought like gladiators and ended up creating the lowest score in Super Bowl history. It was an exhausting game, even for the fans, definitely for the defense because they seemed to be on the field way too long and exhausting for the offense because they were on the sidelines for too long in the game.
Tom Brady did not seem his amazing best but he did not need to be that guy. The relentless pressure by the Patriots, the physical onslaught on Goff and the baffling decision to not beef up the coverage on Edelman, even when he was single-handedly racking up yards more than the entire Rams offense combined as factors to keep the New England Patriots in the game, who kept searching for that elusive crack that will let them through and they found it in the middle of the 4th quarter….and everyone, including the Rams knew at that time that this was almost done, unless a miracle came by in the waning seconds. The New England Patriots are too disciplined to let a miracle slip by them and the game ended just that way.
It is easy to sit back and watch the game on TV and wonder why this play was not executed well or that call was not made. It is easy to collect numbers and build a probabilistic model to call the winner and put it on social media. But it is unimaginably difficult to deal with the complexities of the game on the field and make those split-second calls that make or break a game. We cannot take anything away from either team!
In the end, the New England Patriots knew where they were going and kept consistently tapping into their vault of experience to find answers to keep going towards the end zone and that paid off for them. As for the Los Angeles Rams, they end with a great season as a defense powerhouse that can (almost) stop anyone. Sadly for them, the 2018-19 New England Patriots are not one of them. This is just the beginning for that awesome team.
Congratulations New England Patriots, the Super Bowl champions!
Bravo Los Angeles Rams!!