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The Fourth Wall
page 7
By Tony Arnold
News/Sports Editor
I spoke with a certain someone
in a private correspondence. “I’m
predicting a beautiful performance.
by Eli ~~ Manning—Ilike
Hemingways bullfighters—minus
the bandilleros and the sword
thrust at the end,” I said in what
was to be prophetic enthusiasm. I
was very much intent on watching
the upstart New York Giants—3-0
NFL fans and very nearly in my
own, the best team to ever play the
game of American football. The
Pats were the only team ever to go
16-0 in a season (the ’72 Dolphins
played only 14 regular season
games) and were the first team ever
18-0 overall (again, the ’72
Dolphins played only 17 games
total before capping. their perfect
season). Aside from this
impressive résumé, the Pats also
made the additional statement of
helm, and an overall conditioning
to disappointment led almost any
football fan with half a brain to bet
the hell out of the yawning point
spread that lay between the New
York Giants and the unassailable
enigma that was the Patriots
not unpredictable and what
unfolded in Glendale, Arizona on
Sunday, February 03, 2008 matches
very perfectly with that enduring
assumption.
What is very plain to note here
to be an MVP performance in Super
Bowl XLII. The oft-derided
younger brother of Peyton went 19/
34 with 255 yards, two
touchdowns, and what can only be
fairly described as an indirect
interception (Garber). The
numbers speak volumes but what
is most imperative to note about
Eli’s performance is the
z
on the road in ‘the 2008
postseason—dethrone ‘what was
prematurely predicted’ to be the
To be sure, I took myself only
half seriously. The New England
Patriots were, in the eyes of most
demoralizing most of their
fashion one might only expect to
witness at Waterloo or Dien Bien
Phu. Additionally, their two banner
players, quarterback Tom Brady
and wide receiver Randy Moss
each broke the regular season
touchdown records at their
respective positions. A wrecking
ball never made so commanding a
statement.
* On the reverse side of this coin
lay an etching not quite so well
chiseled: A seismic quarterback in
Eli = Manning, a fairly
monochromatic wide-receiving
corps with Plaxico Burress at the
determination which is a drawback
the man who keeps that memory
from fading into obscurity, Brett
Favre. Indeed, the world thought
Favre when, during the Giants’
game-winning drive, Eli spun out
of a hopelessly persistent mass of
yard pass to receiver David Tyree
(Garber). Undoubtedly, Eli
Manning earned his stripes in that
42M Super Bowl and dually earned
his name in the annals of NFL
history.
To return to my prediction once
more, I would just like to say that I
was prophetic about Eli’s
performance in a much more
metaphorical fashion. Indeed, Eli
was not very unlike one of
Hemingway’s bullfighters, whom
he most notably aggrandizes—and
simultaneously chides—in his
Death in the Afternoon. The
quarterback feigned his
opponents, dodging them with
terrific veronicas like the 33-yard
resuscitative play to Tyree, and,
bull straight in the face and stood
stolidly: in place. What Ernest
Hemingway found most admirable
about those bullfighters of whom
he possessed immeasurable
respect was the ability to recognize
death in the horns and yet face that
not so fantastical to posit that Eli
Manning saw death in the horns
of the New England Patriots on
Super Bowl Sunday. In light of this
revelation, I realize [ was wrong on
one-account.. The final sword
thrust occurred in this bloody
mess—whether it was the game-
winning touchdown pass to
Burress or the final kneel-down—
and it-became quite clear that Eli
Manning had the resolution to kill
the bull from the very beginning.