PREVIEW: Historic Super Bowl clash: bullies vs laughingstocks

Jan 29, 2009, 15:00 GMT

   Washington - Hollywood sports movies usually feature a rag-tag bunch of losers who somehow learn how to win and find themselves in a climactic championship, facing a much-feared team against which they shouldn't stand a chance.

   The Super Bowl - the biggest television event of the year in the United States and the annual championship of American football - has seen plenty of clashes between David and Goliath.

   But the underdog story is being stretched to unprecedented lengths in Sunday's Super Bowl XLIII between the favoured Pittsburgh Steelers and the Arizona Cardinals.

   The Steelers, arguably, are the most dominant team of the National Football League's (NFL's) modern era, which began with the first Super Bowl in 1967.

   The Cardinals, one of the NFL's 1920 founding teams, are widely acknowledged as the league's worst team, having collected a disputed championship in 1925 - the origin of a reputed curse - and only one other trophy in 1947. In 89 seasons, the Cardinals have finished with a winning record only 23 times.

   Founded on Chicago's working-class South Side, the Chicago Cardinals toiled in the shadow of the vastly more successful Chicago Bears.

   The team relocated in 1960 to St Louis, Missouri, where it played second fiddle to the beloved St Louis Cardinals baseball team. Seeking greener pastures, owner Bill Bidwill, whose family bought the franchise in 1932, moved the football team again in 1988 to Phoenix, Arizona.

   But the team was even worse there. This season was only the Cardinals' second winning season in Arizona as the team went 9-7 behind an explosive offence led by quarterback Kurt Warner and his dynamic duo of wide receivers, Larry Fitzgerald and Anquan Boldin. The passing-oriented offence ranked third in the league in scoring, good enough to overcome a mediocre defence.

   The Cardinals finally reached the Super Bowl under second-year coach Ken Whisenhunt, who was the Steeler's offensive coordinator until being passed over for head coach. When Pittsburgh hired Mike Tomlin as only the team's third coach since 1969, Whisenhunt was lured away by Arizona.

   A coach seeking redemption is a familiar story angle, but the Kurt Warner story would strain credulity - even in Hollywood - if it weren't true.

   An Iowa native undrafted out of college, Warner clung to a seeming fantasy of an NFL career while working as a supermarket stock boy, even playing for the Amsterdam Admirals in NFL Europe before becoming a faceless backup for the St Louis Rams. In 1999, a preseason injury to the starting quarterback gave Warner an opportunity that made him a legend.

   At the relatively geriatric age of 28 and in his first year as a starter, Warner led the previously long-suffering Rams to a championship. Driving one of the most prolific offences in league history, he earned NFL and Super Bowl most-valuable player honours in the process.

   Despite a second league MVP award in 2001, injuries contributed to his ouster from the Rams in 2003. Catching on with Arizona in 2005, Warner outplayed and eventually pushed aside the Cardinals ballyhooed young quarterback, Matt Leinart.

   Now, Warner has returned to the NFL's summit, due to become only the fourth quarterback to play in a Super Bowl at age 37.

   In the playoffs, the Arizona defence has exceeded all expectations, much like the last two Super Bowl champions, the New York Giants a year ago and the Indianapolis Colts in 2007, whose defensive units overcame regular-season struggles to clamp down when it mattered most.

   Bidding on Sunday to become the NFL's first franchise to collect six Super Bowl titles, the Steelers' own history shows how a franchise mired in failure can forge new traditions.

   After joining the NFL in 1933, it never sniffed a championship and only reached the playoffs once before the NFL's merger with the upstart American Football League, which launched the Super Bowl era.

   In the 1970s under coach Chuck Noll, Pittsburgh quickly built a powerhouse, fuelled by a roster full of future Hall of Famers and the feared Steel Curtain defence. It won the Super Bowl four times from 1974 to 1979, a dynasty that remains unsurpassed.

   The team was a consistent contender for the next quarter-century, losing in the 1995 Super Bowl and five other times in the NFL's semi-finals.

   Finally, in 2005, Pittsburgh broke through for a fifth Super Bowl trophy under young quarterback Ben Rothlisberger, who has led the team back to the verge of a championship this season.

   Over the decades, the Steelers have forged a reputation for ferocious defence and a stout running game.

   This season's Steelers were 12-4 and entered the post-season among the playoff favourites.

   Sunday's contenders share one strange bit of historic futility. Amid player shortages during World War II, Pittsburgh formed a temporary merger for the 1943 season with the then-Chicago Cardinals. Officially known as Card-Pitt, the team was ridiculed as the 'Carpets' and according finished 0-10 that season.