Super Bowl XLVII Afterword: 49ers vs Ravens

Jim Harbaugh may have had a legitimate gripe over a missed
holding call late in the 4th quarter, but it fell on deaf ears.
Photo credit to Times-Standard.

Saturday, I gave the offensive edge in this game to San Francisco, I labeled the coaching edge as ‘even,’ and I gave Baltimore the edge in both defense and special teams. A lot of people who commented on that write-up must have lost some serious coin yesterday.

They said the 49ers had the best three linebackers in the NFL, but I didn’t see them pressuring Flacco or containing Dennis Pitta or keeping Ray Rice from breaking out on screens. One even said Donte Whitner and Dashon Goldson is the best safety tandem in the league. Funny how they looked like Denver on Jacoby Jones’s long touchdown reception late in the second quarter.

Via Madden, I predicted the 49ers to win. I had been leaning to San Francisco for most of the week and then toward Baltimore as I finished preparing to write my preview, so I have no idea who I would have picked without using Madden.

The first half of the game was pretty lame. By that, I just mean that we haven’t had a blowout Super Bowl in quite a while and I’m hoping we’ll never have one again. The past several years have been great, so when the Ravens went up 21-3, and then led 28-6 after a second-half kickoff return touchdown, I would have been ready to turn the TV off if I were an average fan.

As it was, the power outage in the Superdome a couple minutes later was the most exciting thing that had happened up to that point.

The power outage seemed to allow San Francisco to regroup, because during a 4:10 period shortly after the outage, the 49ers scored 17 points. But the Ravens can’t blame the stadium malfunction for letting San Francisco back in the game. The first play once the game resumed was a failed 3^rd & 13 attempt, which forced the 49ers to punt. The Ravens didn’t have to let the power outage affect the game.

San Francisco came all the way back, but failed on a two-point conversion try that would have tied the game. If they had made it, they never would have had to try for the touchdown on their final possession, a field goal could have tied the game and sent it to overtime.

Instead, a failed 4^th & goal effectively ended the game. Baltimore won it’s second Lombardi Trophy while handing San Francisco their first loss on the league’s biggest stage.

I am still not ready to jump on the Joe Flacco “elite” bandwagon – I’ll explain on The All-Sports Crew on Wednesday – but he had a phenomenal postseason. Despite only leading two field-goal drives in the second half, he added three touchdowns and no turnovers to his tally, bringing his postseason total to 11 touchdowns and no interceptions and earning Super Bowl MVP in the process. Not bad for four games considering his only threw 22 touchdowns in 16 regular season games.

I give a lot of credit to John Harbaugh. I’ve felt for a long time that Jim is the better head coach, but we saw some things on special teams that we never would have seen in a Super Bowl without John trying them. They failed by just two yards on a fake field goal in the first half but they ran a kick back and the way they took the safety late in the game was genius. Defense is the one thing that could keep the Ravens from getting back here soon.

The 49ers, meanwhile, will definitely be back. They have a terrific team and they aren’t likely to lose too many key players. What they may lose, they can get back through the draft, especially since they ought to get a decent pick for Alex Smith.

Thanks for reading my blog all season. I’ve enjoyed maintaining it and I will make some changes to make it even better in 2013. To stay updated on my blog as new posts are published throughout the offseason, ‘like’ my blog’s Facebook page and follow me on Twitter, @cpuffnfl.