It’s Super Bowl week! This Sunday, the eyes of the world will be focused on Caesars Superdome in New Orleans for America’s biggest sporting event.
The Super Bowl has been an American staple for nearly six decades—sort of.
When the American Football League (AFL) and National Football League (NFL) merged in 1966, one of the provisions of the merger was the establishment of a championship game.
Pete Rozelle, the league’s commissioner at the time, suggested calling the championship game “The Big One.” But that name failed to click with the owners. After much discussion, they eventually settled on simply calling it “The AFL-NFL World Championship Game.”
However, Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt felt the concession to be too cumbersome and not likely to be embraced by the media. In a 1986 New York Times op-ed, Hunt recalled referring to the title game as the “Super Bowl” while discussing it during an owner’s meeting.
“Then one day, the words flowed something like this: ‘No, not those games – the one I mean is the final game—you know, the Super Bowl,’” Hunt wrote.
To his surprise, that name stuck.
“I do not recall any predetermined thought relative to this rather unhistoric moment. My own feeling is that it probably registered in my head because my daughter, Sharron, and my son, Lamar Jr., (ages 8 and 10) had a children’s toy called a Super Ball and I probably interchanged the phonetics of ”bowl” and ”ball,” Hunt added.
Super Bowl III was the first to officially bear the trademark name. The previous two championships were retroactively named Super Bowl I and II.
The word super comes from a Latin prefix meaning “above,” “over,” or “beyond.” Super is a fascinating word in that it’s not quite a superlative, but it’s super close. Attaching super to any word exponentially amplifies that word.
Superman. Superhero. Supermarket. Superhighway. Superstorm…
In many ways, good teammates are defined by their super traits. They’re super helpful, super caring, super loyal, etc.
But the super word that is most relevant to good teammates is supersede. All their super traits emanate from their understanding that their teams’ needs supersede their individual wants.
Good teammates are super helpful, caring, loyal, etc. because that’s what their team needs them to be. Their teams’ success relies on their suppression of individual goals, agendas, and comforts in favor of what is best for their teams.
Team members who regularly put this belief into practice aren’t only good teammates, they’re super teammates.
When the Super Bowl ends on Sunday and the winning team hoists the Lombardi trophy, take a moment to think about the roles that team’s super teammates played in that crowning achievement. Undoubtedly, they were super important.
As always…Good teammates care. Good teammates share. Good teammates listen. Go be a good teammate.
