Except for the fact it took forever for the damn thing to get started, I didn't see many parallels between the race and the Super Bowl. First, Joe Montana never died playing in the Super Bowl. Second, you can't take a two-hour break from watching the Super Bowl and feel safe in knowing that you didn't miss much. Which is exactly what I did when I took a shopping break in between watching the first 50 laps in a sports bar and the last 50 on my couch. So, to be more accurate, I saw only 400 left turns.

I mean, it's not like I'm walking through Barnes & Noble, stepping over all those cheapskates laid out in the aisles reading books for free, thinking, "Boy, I hope no one jumps out to a 12-lap lead now and ruins the chances of having the top 20 cars running bumper-to-bumper in the final few laps ... for the 47th straight year."

I was rooting for two things: that no one would get hurt, and that Jeff Gordon would win. The first is quite obvious, unless you're a total loon. No one hopes for crashes, right? And if so, they don't get to vote for things like our president, right?

With 11 caution flags coming out to clear wreck after wreck, I don't know how anyone with a family member driving 185 mph in this race could feel 1/10th as much excitement as white-knuckled fear.

As for Gordon, I just don't know why everyone hates him. Doesn't he sound like everyone else and pay respects to his crew and other racers? I know he's got NASCAR Commandment No. 1 down: mention sponsors when answering any interview question, no matter if Chevrolet and Pepsi and GMAC are among the first words out of your mouth after winning the biggest race of your life. Can you imagine Deion Branch being handed the Super Bowl MVP award and thanking Fleet Bank, Oscar Mayer and the whole Anheuser-Busch family?

I didn't even hear Gordon thank his fans. Then again, maybe that's why he lags in popularity. I know he doesn't have any in the announcing booth.

Mike Joy, Larry McReynolds and Darrell Waltrip needed a clean-up rag the way they were gushing over the tenuous final laps. And that's cool. With four lead changes in the last nine laps, I was getting into it, too.

But their bias was palpable when, after Dale Earnhardt, Jr. raced past Tony Stewart in the 197th lap, Waltrip screamed something like, "Go Junebug!" over the voices of the other two cheerleaders. When Gordon slipped past Junior moments later, just seconds before a yellow flag slowed the field, there was hardly even a mention that we had a new leader and likely champ. The crowd sure didn't give a rip. I couldn't even hear cheers when Gordon emerged from his No. 24 car to thank Quaker State.

I guess I enjoyed the race as much as any guy who doesn't know a piston from a pistol. I look forward to seeing the final 50 laps in next year's Daytona 500, when I watch my next NASCAR race.

Today's Sports Links:

• Ask Stupid Questions, Print Distorted Answers — The New York Times finally gets into the A-Rod pile-on soap opera by saying the stories are much ado about nothing. And I agree. It seems every day the wires pass along a provocative headline about a Red Sox player taking his swings at Rodriguez when, in fact, only a couple of the quotes have been newsworthy. Clearly, Shilling and Nixon have little respect for the guy — some genuine bad blood, for sure — but some of the other quotes haven't been bad, especially not from Bronson Coolio, who agreed with me about the infamous slap in Game 6: "The play at first base, I wouldn't fault him, because it's Game 6, a desperate situation and you have to do what you have to do to try to win. ... Somebody on our team might've done the same thing. I know Curt thought it was kind of a bush-league play, but it's part of the game and I look at it as that." Elsewhere, Karen Guregian writes in the Boston Herald: Sox Lose Class Warfare Battle With Trash Talk: It's time to shut up and just play ball.

• The Game and Lame of New York Sports — Part 1 of the New York Post's ninth-annual Best and Worst of New York Sports includes lists of the most overrated (Jeremy Shockey), underappreciated (Hideki Matsui), tough (Derek Jeter), paranoid (Chad Pennington), friendly (David Wright), aloof (Jason Giambi), exciting (Vince Carter), dull (Steve Trachsel) and different (Frank Walker) athletes and execs in the local sports scene.

• Boeheim a Finalist For 2005 Hall Of Fame Election — I'll be in Syracuse on Saturday and have a chance to witness Jimmy B.'s 700th career win against Providence, if the 'Cuse can get by St. John's at home on Wednesday. Gotta admit, I'm not liking the way the team is playing these days, losing four out of six to the Big East's more rugged frontline teams (Pitt twice, UConn, Boston College), but I can't bash 'em the way some are doing on the SU hoops forums. If you're cursing out 21-year-olds who already have a national championship under their belts, you'd better be in high school or certifiably deranged. Gotta love Jimmy's quote about B.C. fans storming their court after an impressive win over the Orange on Saturday. "I thought they were ranked sixth in the country. Maybe they just think we're better than we are." Jimmy knows, as well as I do, that you worry about such things when opposing fans don't want to storm the court after beating you. If nothing else, it's a sign of respect.

• "Homer" Calls of the Year — SportsByBrooks has an audio index some of the most over-the-top broadcasting calls of the year. Just the thought of someone blowing a gasket over a Baylor football win is funny enough, but the audio is priceless. As previously mentioned here, some of the biggest home calls came during that wild 1994 Texas high school Class 5A playoff game, won by Tyler on a 97-yard kickoff return with 11 seconds left. After seeing Plano storm back with 27 points in the final 2:33 of the game and then lose on that play, announcer Mike Zoffuto lamented, "Oh no! Oh no! Oh no! Oh my gosh, no! Come on! No! No! Gosh. God bless those kids. I am sick. I want to throw up."

• Hunter S. Thompson Fatally Shoots Himself — Sort of a sports story, as he wrote for ESPN.com's Page 2 (archive). My initial reactions after learning of a 67-year-old man's suicide: How long did he live with these demons? And what could possibly push a man who's seen and done it all over the edge?

• The NFL's Highest Paid Players — A chart accompanying an article on franchise-tagged stars includes some figures that may surprise you. The NFL cap system is so complicated, and the teams have options on how to dispense the money, but some of these figures are surprising. Vikings cornerback Antoine Winfield made $12.4 million in 2004, almost three times as much as Miami defense end Jason Taylor. Emmitt Smith was the ninth-best paid running back, even though we know he wasn't the ninth-best at anything anymore.