Super Bowl : I Starved at the Super Bowl

Sports writers always get loads of free food in the press box at major sports events, right? And the Super Bowl has to be one of the biggies, right?

But then there are those days when the system breaks down.

It was 20 years ago, Jan. 14, 1973. I and half a dozen colleagues from the Associated Press rode up the interminable Los Angeles Coliseum elevator to cover Super Bowl VII. I had heard that myth of great food in the press box at the Super Bowl, and I eagerly awaited pheasant under glass.

Reality hit like a wet rag to the kisser when I learned that the attraction, the Washington Redskins vs. the unbeaten Miami Dolphins, was so compelling it had lured too many scribes to the press box; it was filled. The AP sports editor got a seat; the writers were shifted to the “auxiliary press box,” which I quickly learned were seats in the nosebleed section of the stadium, where the game was more rumor than spectacle.

Worse: There was no food until halftime. No peanuts, no hot dogs, no sodas, no pretzels, no popcorn, no beer.

Ah, but halftime would soon come, and with it the NFL’s best. We had heard it was to be lobster. Goody. The foam plastic boxes arrived out a side door to the press box a minute before halftime. Those of us in the auxiliary press box slathered.

More reality: The lobster was there all right, but the plastic fork we got broke immediately upon impact. The sauce was little more than spicy ketchup and was excessively sweet. The avocado-laced salad, perched on the lid of the foam box, which I balanced on my knees, fell onto my shirt. The small napkin didn’t remove much of the stain.

The sodas were flat, warm, thin and watery. Dessert, such as it was, was a brownie.

Now it may sound like a feeble complaint, being upset over free lobster. But consider: We’d arrived at the Coliseum hours before the event, had to take play-by-play notes on our knees, did interviews until late into the evening, had to write our stories with typewriters balanced on our laps, and weren’t finished until stories for the next day’s afternoon papers had been filed--a 17-hour day--with no chance to buy so much as a hot dog.

After Miami had beaten Washington 14-7, I headed down to the locker room in the oncoming twilight. I recall that my stomach growled, and I vowed someday to reveal that not all sportswriters get red-carpet treatment, to reveal someday that some end up having to wait until the next day for a decent meal.

My day has come.