Super Bowl and recruiting hype would be funny, if it weren’t so hysterical

Everybody take a deep breath. The sports hysteria of recent days is over. In our rearview mirror, thankfully, are the Super Bowl and high school football signing day.

The NFL ran its annual scam and we all sat up and barked.

No question, the game is great theater, the athletes are special and the chance to have a party is nice. The problem is, we have to hear about it constantly for two weeks, almost as if we are deaf or have attention deficit disorder.

We get it. We know it is our civic duty to watch the commercials and buy from the advertisers so they will make enough money for even more expensive commercials for next year’s Super Bowl.

Those who say the Super Bowl is all about greed and has zero socially redeeming value are wrong. How else would our children learn Roman numerals?

We in the media lead the way, of course, having been duly brainwashed for about the last XLIV years. Peyton Manning versus Drew Brees is worthwhile fodder, but what are the stories for the next 12 days before the game? That’s where the real enterprise kicks in, the stories about the reserve nose tackle whose grandmother came over on the boat from Ireland, settled in Montana and lived in caves with wolves.

You missed that one?

The media, of course, could do as Nancy Reagan would advise: just say no. But clicking heels and saluting the NFL has become their national pastime.

Still, it is a big deal, fans think it is important and the media follow fans now, rather than leading them, as they once did. No time to think. Just run a poll. Web hits, baby.

Again, this is generally harmless and the screeching lasts only two weeks. But this year’s most-invoked Super Bowl story line was especially fascinating. It said that a New Orleans victory would help heal the wounds inflicted by Hurricane Katrina. We were told, over and over, how important a victory was for the city, that it deserved it. The implication seemed to be that all those people who had relatives washed away when the levees broke, or who were still living in trailers in their frontyards, would be OK now that the Saints won a football game.

Katrina was indescribable. Its effects will be felt for 20 years. If winning a Super Bowl made people in New Orleans feel better and forget for a few days, that’s wonderful, well-deserved. But the parade leaves town and the trailers will still be on the front lawns.

One story, hyperbole at full volume, said that not just New Orleans, but America, needed a victory by the Saints because this country, beaten down as we are, needed success from an underdog. All this time, we thought this country needed a health care plan and relief from the liars and crooks who run many of our corporations.

In the midst of all the Super Slop, we were also treated to breathless accounts of Little Johnny signing a letter of intent to play football at Big BCS U.

Not so long ago, outside of the state of Texas -- where insanity about such things is in the drinking water -- these signing days were handled by publishing or broadcasting little lists of which colleges high school athletes would attend. That way, fans and mom and dad’s friends could know.

Now, this has become huge news, with big headlines, pictures in the paper and interviews on TV, even though nobody can be sure yet whether Little Johnny will catch a pass, or a cold.

The NCAA used to take care of such things by not allowing freshmen to compete on the varsity level. The NCAA could do that again, but the last time the NCAA did anything pro-education and anti-big-time sports was when Herbert Hoover spoke at its convention.

The most outrageous of all was news that a 13-year-old seventh-grader from Delaware, who visits California a lot because he has a personal coach here, made a verbal commitment to play at USC in five years and Lane Kiffin offered him a scholarship.

This needs no further comment, only prayer for the future of our species.

Fear not. The hysteria is over. There is credible stuff ahead, such as figure skating judges.

bill.dwyre@latimes.com