With These 2 Playing, Who Would Care?

Never mind the potty break.

Never mind the 60-second timeout when all of our television screens are supposed to go blank during NBC’s Super Bowl pre-game show.

If the two Los Angeles football teams get to the big game Jan. 26, NBC might consider going blank all day.

Or maybe show reruns of “Supertrain” and “Hello, Larry” instead.

The way the Raiders and Rams played Monday night, a whole lot of people out there in Television-land must have blistered their fingers changing channels.

To tell the truth, it would have been more interesting watching Cagney play football against Lacey.

Friends, only four classifications of human can enjoy a 16-6 football game: (a) coaches; (b) players; (c) ex-coaches and players; (d) cheerleaders, who rarely bother to turn around and see who is winning.

The Raiders and Rams could very well meet again. And that would really be something. A Super Bowl between two Los Angeles teams would sort of be like two nuts fighting over one squirrel.

It also could be New York-New York in the Super Bowl, by the way, which would be good for Frank Sinatra’s record sales, but bad for America’s indigestion.

If the Raiders and Rams get there, it will be a great day--a great week--for all of their fans, including the thousands who still reside in Oakland and the five or six who live in Anaheim.

For the rest of the country, well, let’s just say the TV viewers will be able to take all the washroom breaks they want.

“Marge,” a guy will say to his wife, “call me if somebody completes a pass.”

And now, here’s Dick Enberg with the play-by-play:

Allen sweeps left.

Allen goes right.

Wilson back to pass . . . ohhh, incomplete!

Nice punt by Guy.

“Got a lot of nice hang time on that one,” says Merlin Olsen.

Ram ball, first and 10 on the 20.

(Ron Brown couldn’t return the kickoff, so the Ram offense has stalled.)

Dickerson left.

Dickerson right.

Brock back to pass . . . awwww, so close!

What’s-his-name punts.

Enberg: “Now here are those Up With People singers to do their rendition of ‘Jumpin’ Jack Flash’ with our score at halftime: Raiders zero, Rams zero.”

After the Super Bowl--the first scoreless tie in the game’s history--Marcus Allen gets the MVP trophy for gaining 101 yards in 21 carries. Eric Dickerson, having been held to 21 yards in 101 carries, insists that his contract be renegotiated so that he gets paid by the inch.

All seriousness aside, as Steve Allen used to say, we probably should remember that the Raiders and Rams have played 32 football games against professional teams and have won 23 of them. Not bad.

We also should remember that defense really is the name of the game for a lot of NFL people. Some coaches would be happier if the game were played without a ball.

Howie Long said after Monday night’s game: “I really feel we are going to win the Super Bowl.” In the past, we have not paid much attention to anything said on Mondays by anyone named Howie. But this is different.

He might be right. He might be wrong. The only thing we can be sure of is that very few sportswriters will be standing up to Howie face to face and telling him he is full of it.

Same thing with the Rams. Nobody wants to look them in the eye and tell them they are not going to be in the Super Bowl. First, you might be wrong. Second, the players might start punting you around the locker room until they find out what your hang time is.

Football being a strange game, with a ball that bounces really funny, the Raiders and Rams might meet in Super Bowl XX and play a game that goes into overtime with the score 36-36.

No, not 12 field goals apiece by Bahr and Lansford. Be serious.

They really did not have much at stake in that not-ready-for-prime-time game they played the other night. It wasn’t exactly To Live and Die in L.A.

Raider leader Al Davis summed it up very nicely when he said Monday: “All we want to do in this (bleeping) game is get out of here without anybody getting hurt.”

If NBC ran a minute of that game’s highlights in place of a blank screen on Super Bowl Sunday, everybody in America would get up and go to the washroom.

Or to the bedroom, or the billiard room, or the library, or the conservatory, or someplace. Any room that did not have a TV.