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ShareGrading All 45 Super Bowls
AP
ike an underachieving student who needs time to register academic success, the Super Bowl took a few decades before establishing itself as a sporting event that was as much about achievement as it was hype.
Using a grading system of A-plus to F, the bulk of the early Super Bowls landed in Delta House territory: Quite a few Hoover-level 1.6 averages and even some Blutarsky-esque 0.0s. Of the first 30 Super Bowls, only nine are graded at B or better, while 15 failed to reach C status.
But beginning with the Packers-Patriots Super Bowl that culminated the 1996 season, the NFL's championship game has registered 10 grades of B or better and only three below C.
It is safe to call the Super Bowl a late bloomer.
The grading system looks at three categories: 1) how competitive the game was; 2)...