As we all know, the Atlanta Falcons had Super Bowl LI in the bag, holding on to a commanding 28-3 lead. Before the yesterday, teams down at least 25 points had a win-loss record of 2-391 since 2001. And yet, here we are, with yet another Tom Brady-led Patriots win. So what happened? Where did it all go wrong?
There are quite a few theories, ranging anywhere from the Falcons' hot-garbage level of playcalling late in the game to the destiny of Tom Brady to be the greatest and most decorated quarterback to ever play the game. But then there's another theory – that's it's all Nintendo's fault.
Pro-Football Reference keeps a record of each team's win-probability throughout the game, and, as one NeoGaf user pointed out, the wheels didn't start to come off the Atlanta Falcons until after the 30-second Nintendo Switch spot, five minutes into the fourth quarter.
As you can see, the Atlanta Falcons had a 99.9% chance of winning Super Bowl LI when Nintendo ran its advertisement. After that … not so much. Could this be the dawn of a new curse? The Switch Curse? The Nintendo Curse? I guess we'll find out next time Nintendo decides to run an advertisement during a prime-time football game.
As a native of the Pacific Northwest, I just hope it's not during a Seahawks game.
