Media day for the Super Bowl: Everything you need to know about the first night of the game
Today is the first day of Super Bowl week, and in Las Vegas, the fun starts with Super Bowl Media Day, which has become an annual tradition.
As part of Monday night’s extravaganza, reporters and some people who aren’t reporters will be able to ask any player from the Kansas City Chiefs as well as the San Francisco 49ers tough questions.
Over the years, what the NFL now calls “Super Bowl Opening Night” has been a show for the strange, with reporters dressed in crazy outfits asking strange questions. At the same time, members of the mainstream media are looking for the newest piece of news.
The NFL does not keep records on this. No NextGen numbers. Not enough Pro Football Focus Premium pages for maintaining track of the scores.
It could also be the crowd hearing Seattle’s Marshawn Lynch say over and over, “I’m just here so I won’t get fined.” That was cool.
That’s why this excited veteran of the event will have to lead the largest group of reporters ever to gather around just one participant on Super Bowl Media Day, or “Opening Night,” as the league now calls it.
Before Super Bowl 50, I think it was Peyton Manning of the Denver Broncos. Otherwise, it could have been all the cameras and microphones near Tom Brady or Bill Belichick during one of people New England Super Bowls, maybe when Deflategate was still going strong.
Some news outlets set up front-row seats in front of Kelce’s podium two hours before he showed up. Half an hour ago, there were six rows of people.
It was too far away to hear what his companion was saying by when he got there—maybe 20 rows spread out in a half-moon shape.
As Kelce looked around the crowd, he said, “This is among the greatest people that I’ve witnessed on Super Bowl Thursday.” He’s been here a total of three times before, and he’s won two Super Bowls and lost one.
Opening Night is always “media day” for the NFL when they invite tens of thousands of reporters and photographers.
Fans can go to Allegiant Stadium, which is the site of Super Bowl LVIII, and witness the teams play in public for the first time before Super Bowl Sunday.
There will be live entertainment and interviews with Super Bowl LVIII stars on Monday, February 5. This is the only public appearance for the AFC and NFC Champion teams before the big game.
The doors open at 3:00 PM PT, and the opening team goes on at 5:00 PM PT. Get the NFL OnePass app and bring along your headphones so you can listen to the content on your device at the Player podiums.
No, we’re not speaking for the Super Bowl itself. We’re talking about Opening Night, which used to be called Media Day and then Media Night and is still thought to be the most fun football fans can have without actually playing football.
This is the initial one in three years that looks like this. The last two were virtual opening nights because of COVID-19, which took away from the circus feel of the event.
This year’s version will take place Monday night at the Footprint Center, house of the NBA’s Phoenix Suns.
For one night only, virtually any kind of mischief is welcome. It will be my ninth year, and there are some great times.
Things aren’t as crazy as they used to be—there aren’t as many wedding proposals and crazy pranks—but it’s still an episode within a show, so take it as you will.
You can’t take back some of the things you saw on Opening Night or in real life. It will be hard to forget the time when comedian John Oliver showed different players pages from an erotica magazine and asked them to provide expert, er, analysis.