A Midwinter Sunday

Sunday February 5 started like any other Sunday, sleep in a bit to 7:00 instead of the usual day, 5:30. Open up the Sunday papers; NY Times, LA Times, and Daily Bulletin. Watch CBS Sunday and Meet The Press.

Then things became different - ESPN SportsCenter has the NFL crew, the Weather Channel is live from of all places Indianapolis. CNBC is live on a Sunday, what gives? It is Super Bowl Sunday.

The annual national party, hype, commercial and yes a football game. Facebook, Twitter are full of picks and commentary, everyone is an expert. The basketball, hockey, and golf telecasts are early to finish before 3:00 PM Pacific time. Only in America does a whole society stop for about three hours.

Office pools, side bets, family challenges, rule the day. The game, pigs in a blanket, nachos, every conceivable snack and beverage all devoured while watching over hyped commercials and athletes. Why all the fuss, no idea - what time is Downton Abbey on tonight?

BEST SUPER BOWL AD: Chrysler's "It's Halftime in America," starring Clint Eastwood http://bit.ly/w8hVzX

SPORTS BLINK - NFL release: "New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning was voted the winner of the Pete Rozelle Trophy, awarded to the Super Bowl XLVI Most Valuable Player. ... Manning hit nine different receiving targets and completed 30 of 40 passes for 296 yards and one touchdown for a passer rating of 103.8. Manning rallied the Giants from a 17-9 third-quarter deficit [to beat the Patriots, 21-17] ... Manning is the first Giants player to win the Rozelle Trophy multiple times; also voted MVP of Super Bowl XLII. Previous Giants Super Bowl MVPs: QB Phil Simms (Super Bowl XXI), running back Ottis Anderson (Super Bowl XXV) and Manning (Super Bowl XLII). He is the fifth player in NFL history to win multiple Super Bowl MVP honors (Joe Montana, three; Tom Brady, Terry Bradshaw and Bart Starr, two)."

SUPER BOWL RECORDS SET IN SUPER BOWL XLVI:

Oldest Winning Head Coach - 65, Tom Coughlin

Most Consecutive Completions - 16, Tom Brady

Most Consecutive Completions To Start Game - 9, Eli Manning

Most Passing Yards, Career - 1,277, Tom Brady

Most Passes, Career - 197, Tom Brady

Most Completions, Career - 127, Tom Brady

Most Punts Inside 10, Game - 3, Steve Weatherford

Most First Downs Passing, Game, Both Teams - 33 (N.Y.Giants 18, New England 15)

OTHER STATS -

--Eli Manning is the fifth player to win the Super Bowl MVP Award at least twice. Joe Montana won it three times; Bart Starr, Terry Bradshaw and Tom Brady won it twice.

--Ahmad Bradshaw is the fourth player to score the game-winning touchdown in the last minute of a Super Bowl, joining John Taylor (Super Bowl XXIII), Plaxico Burress (Super Bowl XLII) and Santonio Holmes (Super Bowl XLIII).

--The Giants won the Super Bowl for the fourth time, tying Green Bay for the fourth-highest total of Super Bowl wins. Pittsburgh has won six; San Francisco and Dallas have won five. The Giants have now won the NFL Championship eight times; only Green Bay (13) and Chicago (9) have won as many.

--In each of the Giants' four Super Bowl victories, they had trailed at halftime (10-9 to Denver in Super Bowl XXI, 12-10 to Buffalo in Super Bowl XXV, 7-3 to New England in Super Bowl XLII, and 10-9 to New England in Super Bowl XLVI).

--Best Super Bowl Party was at The Pugliese’s; great food, interesting conversation, many Madonna lovers, cheating was prominent with the betting pool.

TWEET STATS - @twitter: "The highest Tweets per second #SuperBowl peak came at the end of the game: 12,233. 2nd highest was during Madonna's performance: 10,245."

Had enough???

BIRTHDAYS THIS WEEK – Birthday wishes and thoughts this week to: Tom Brokaw (72), Garth Brooks (50), John Hickenlooper (60), Carole King (70), Michael McDonald (60), Robert Wagner (82), John Williams (80).

COLLEGE HOCKEY PICK OF THE WEEK – Saturday 2/11, 7:00 PM MT, FSN – a huge February WCHA contest with #2 ranked University of Minnesota Golden Gophers (19-9-1) visit Magness Arena and the 13 ranked Denver University Pioneers (15-9-4). Only three weeks to go in the regular season, Minnesota will win a tough one in Pioneer land. Season to date (3-3).

NFL PICK OF THE WEEK – Congratulations to the New York football Giants on their fourth Super Bowl victory over the New England Patriots 21 -17. We end our NFL season a hapless 11-11, an off year for Rink Rats but a fun one…see you in September. Season to date (11-11).


THE SWAMI’S TOP PICKS – Minnesota 5 Denver 2, Michigan State 3 Michigan 2, Detroit 4 Philadelphia 3. Season to date (9-6).

BUSINESS BURST -- "Facebook to files $5 billion IPO: "The company founded by Mark Zuckerberg in a Harvard dorm room in 2004 picked Morgan Stanley to take the coveted 'lead left' role in what is expected to be the largest IPO ever to emerge from Silicon Valley. ... Facebook declined to comment on the report by IFR, a unit of Thomson Reuters. ... The preliminary IPO filing sets the stage for a May market of the world's largest social network, IFR reported, a coming-out party that will dwarf almost any before that, including Google Inc's $2 billion IPO."

IPO COULD VALUE FACEBOOK AT $100 BILLION - "Facebook Inc. filed for an initial public offering ... that could value the social network between $75 billion and $100 billion, putting the eight-year-old company on track to be one of the biggest U.S. stock-market debuts of all time ... The company listed its offering size at $5 billion in a securities filing, but aims to raise as much as $10 billion when it goes public this spring ... After years of speculation, Facebook for the first time revealed its financial numbers, showing why it's one of the coveted Internet companies. Facebook said it produced $3.71 billion in revenue last year mostly from advertising on the site, with a profit of $1 billion. ... Among U.S. companies, only Visa ,General Motors and AT&T Wireless have held larger offerings than $10 billion."

WILL GM GO FROM BAILOUT TO $10 BILLION PER YEAR? - "Bailed out by the government just three years ago, General Motors ... has set its sights on a once-unthinkable goal: making more than $10 billion a year. It already is headed in that direction. On Feb. 16, GM is likely to report 2011 net income of about $8 billion, its highest ever ... Behind the gain to nearly twice 2010's $4.7 billion are growth in China and strong profits in North America, where GM has shed billions of dollars of costs and lately has been able to command higher prices. GM has loftier ambitions still. It aims over the next several years to raise its profit margin-the portion of revenue left after paying expenses-to 10%, Daniel Ammann, chief financial officer, said in an interview.

"That would be a significant jump from the current margins of about 6% and would be among the highest in the auto industry. It would be a remarkable reversal for a company that needed an infusion of billions of dollars in taxpayer money to stave off collapse in 2009 and later went through a bankruptcy restructuring engineered by the federal government. GM has added 13,000 jobs in the U.S. since bankruptcy ... Such success could make it easier for the federal government to sell some of its remaining 26% stake in GM. Doing so at the current stock price would mean the government would lose more than $10 billion on the GM investment acquired in the bailout."

FLORIDA WRAP: ROMNEY WINS BIG - Florida Primary results with 100 percent of precincts reporting: Mitt Romney, 46.4% (771,842); Newt Gingrich: 31.9 % (531,294); Rick Santorum: 13.4% (222,248); Ron Paul: 7.0% (116,776)

RONALD WILSON REAGAN was born 101 years ago today

Next week, Academy Awards picks and a mid-winter recipe.

Until Next Monday, Adios.

Claremont, CA
February 6, 2012

#II-41, 94