Did the Cardinals really lose?

Okay,

So not much gaming stuff happened this weekend due to the Superbowl and the Cardinals making it to the big event. So this will be a blog entry on football today, so no game stuff today.

Now let me give you some background on my football passion (or lack of it in some years). I spent most of my life growing up in Southern California with the LA Rams and the LA Raiders. but when the Rams moved to St Louis & then the Raiders made the exodus back to Oakland, Los Angeles was left without any NFL teams (and is still team less today!). So without a home team to root for, I became a fan of quarterbacks instead of a home team. I rooted for Dan Marino and the Dolphins as well as Brett Favre & the Packers. So without a home team I became fans of these other teams living in So California.

Then 10 years ago I moved to the Valley of the Sun, Phoenix AZ and was excited about moving to a city with an NFL team. But when I got here I was faced with a horrible team of Cardinals and never really got on board with the Cardinals. I mean come on, how can you get excited about a team that puts more in the loss column than the win column!! So I kept rooting for other teams not becoming a Cardinals fan. Even with a new state of the art stadium I could not get behind them. Perhaps it was the owners (The Bidwells)and how they seemed to make bone headed decisions that reminded me of Al Davis and the Raiders & George Frontiere and the Rams. I will not go into the coaching troubles or the quarterback flip flop but regardless to say, it has not been a great time to become a fan of the Cardinals.

We then move ahead to this year, while watching the training camp reviews I saw something different with Coach Whisenhunt and the team. They seemed to have a different feel to the team, but then again they were the Cardinals and one thing they seemed good at was letting you down. I watched a few games through the season and was surprised to see them start heading towards the top of there division. And when they clinched the NFC Division I was shocked and could hardly believe it. But then the Cardinals played the Patriots at home & were blown out, & I thought "Hmm same old Cardinals". But I knew they were going to move on into the playoffs and this was now history in the making.

So with the Cardinals making into the playoffs I started to take more notice of them, and I was totally blown away when they actually kept on winning and moving on to the next round. Which takes us to Superbowl Sunday. The Cardinals faced off against the Pittsburgh Steelers with the number one Defense in the league. So I sported Cardinals Red and sat with just about everyone here in the state watching the drama unfold on TV.

Funny thing, that during the game, it was like a ghost town outside here in Phoenix, the street were wide open and it looked very weird to have a busy city be almost empty! I did not get to talk to my folks, but our Super bowl tradition was in effect were we make a dinner bet were the loser buys the winner dinner. My parents knew I would be rooting for the Cardinals while they took the Steelers. needless to say my streak is pretty much the same and I owe my folks dinner yet again!

But as I watched the game unfold I knew that I was a Cardinals fan from here on out. The Cardinals played an awesome game & I have to say that this was the best Superbowl game I have seen for many years because it was so close. I was disappointed during some points in the game (100 yard interception run for a TD) and was on cloud 9 when Fitzgerald scored in the 4th quarter to have the Cards take the lead. There were bad calls by the refs as well as badly executed plays by Kurt Warner & the rest of the teams but yet I am still proud of how the team played.

So in the end the Cardinals lost 27 to 23 to the Steelers who are now being called the Lords of the Rings. But in the end I think the Cardinals came out ahead of the Steelers because the Cardinals finally earned the rights to have a fan base, and they earned my respect and I can now say I am a Cardinal Fan! So now I can't wait until next season to start, go Red birds!

TK