Super Bowl XLIX

On Sunday, February 1, 2015, at the University of Phoenix in Glendale, Arizona, the New England Patriots will face the Seattle Seahawks for the 49th annual Super Bowl. Tom Brady, a veteran future hall of fame quarterback, faces off against the young but still very talented reigning super bowl champion quarterback Russell Wilson and the dominant Seattle defense. Now I am from Baltimore and am an avid Ravens fan. So, in attempt to write an unbiased blog, this will not be about the actual game. Instead, it will be on why the Monday after the Super Bowl should be a national holiday in which kids don't have school and people don't have to go to work. Obviously, there are many super bowl parties that go on during Super Bowl Sunday. For those fans who are rooting for the team who wins, they will obviously be very happy and want to celebrate, possible consuming some alcoholic beverages. For those fans rooting for the team that loses, they will clearly be upset and most likely stay up mourning the lose and most likely consuming even more alcoholic beverages. In either scenario, neither group of fans will be in any shape to work the next day. Instead of making them come in and go to work and most likely not be very productive and potentially make a costly mistake that could harm their employer or the company, they could have the day off and have them come back in fresh and ready to work on Tuesday.
The Super Bowl in itself is one of the most watched television event of they year, in most cases the most. It is by far the biggest sporting event in America, second in the world to the Fifa World Cup. Last year there was over 100 million people watching the Super Bowl. This year I expect there to be much more. The hype that goes into the two weeks before the game is unlike anything else. People all across the nation, employees and their bosses and their bosses and students alike would greatly appreciate a day off after one of the biggest television event of the year.

There has been a lot of controversy in the most recent AFC championship game between the New England Patriots and the Indianapolis Colts. According to NFL sources, the New England Patriots deflated 11 of the 12 game balls given to them by 2 pounds. This would clearly give an advantage to New England quarterback Tom Brady, however slight that advantage may be. The score of the game ended up being 45-7 in favor of the Patriots. Regardless of the deflated footballs, the New England Patriots were the better team in that game. That is besides the point. The Patriots had no need to deflate footballs. Even one of the Indianapolis Colt's tight ends even tweeted something along the lines of the patriots could have used bars of soap and still won.
The main issue with Deflategate is the ethics of the situation. Bill Belichick, the head coach of the New England Patriots, has been known to cheat or perform sketchy acts in the past. He was disciplined years ago for spying on opposing coaches play books during the games. This has been known as Spygate. Back to the ethical issues with Deflategate: the fact that there was no need to deflate footballs is a huge issue. This whole scenario is another act of shady behavior by the Patriots. Many people believe that the Patriots should forfeit the Superbowl. This may be a bit harsh. They should definitely be disciplined in the form of draft picks and fines.
For any possible future scams that the Patriots may be involved in, Deflategate should be considered the final straw. They cannot keep breaking the rules and getting away with it. The next time something like this happens, the NFL should put their foot down and dish out some serious punishment.