The NFL Roundup 2022: Super Bowl LVI Recap

Written by John Edward Betancourt

Over the course of the past twenty years or so, the Super Bowl landscape has been dominated by familiar names and teams. For time and time again, we’ve seen the battle for the Lombardi Trophy involve Tom Brady and the Patriots, and later the Bucs. Or we’ve seen Patrick Mahomes work hard to hoist that iconic trophy, and the same goes for Peyton Manning, with both the Broncos and Colts and Ben Roethlisberger and Russell Wilson, and Eli Manning also snagged their own rings during this time period. Which while great for the fanbases of those respective teams, did something of a disservice for the rest of the league and the sport.

For the NFL is supposed to be about parity, where any team can win it any given year. But when Tom Brady netted his seventh championship with another team, it seemed as though consistent domination was going to the be the theme going forward. Which is why Super Bowl LVI was such a refreshing and hopeful and joyous venture this year. Because this is the Super Bowl that bucked twenty years of repetitive tradition to deliver unto us a game free from discussions of legacy and domination. It was just a young gunslinger versus a hopeful veteran and well, by removing the mystique of legends and repeat teams from this game, we were treated to one of the best Super Bowls in years.

One that you could simply kick back and enjoy, regardless of who won and having something on the line for each team, really did add a sense of urgency to this game, one that offered up a great deal of back and forth and incredible play through and through. The kind that saw both squads spend most of the first quarter, figuring out the other’s weaknesses to properly exploit them and even then… it took the rest of the game for one side to truly take full advantage of them, and sadly, for Bengals fans… it was Los Angeles that mastered this aspect of the game. Because the defensive line started to come through when it needed to the most, and of course, Matthew Stafford and Cooper Kupp figured out how to best the Cincinnati secondary.

Which means that in the end, the Los Angeles Rams were the heroes of the day and there are so many great stories from this team to celebrate a day after the confetti has been swept up. Since Cooper Kupp had the greatest season ever for a wide receiver in the history of the game and Aaron Donald, finally got his ring. Not to mention, there's Von Miller. A former Super Bowl MVP and future hall of famer… who was traded away to give him a chance to hoist the Lombardi once again and speaking of traded players… we have to talk about the majesty of Matthew Stafford’s journey. Because he languished in Detroit for twelve years behind subpar teams and proved to the world that with the right cast surrounding him, he was a Super Bowl Champion quarterback through and through. 

The only question now, is whether or not we will see a new era of domination and repetitiveness return to the big game courtesy of these two teams and honestly, it’s hard to say if that is going to be the case. Because the Rams are about to lose a bevy of players to free agency and possibly retirement and if the Bengals don’t release Eli Apple and replace him with a shutdown corner or two and invest in the offensive line… we won’t be seeing Joe Burrow in the big game anytime soon. But while we wait to see if repeating and returning to the Super Bowl is in the cards for these teams, we can celebrate one of the best Super Bowls in years. One that reminded us that parity is a great thing, and the league should do more to ensure that it happens… so we can enjoy more feel good stories from teams that have so much to gain from winning the Super Bowl.

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