The NFL Experience

After arriving in Indianapolis, we took a walk downtown to soak in the atmosphere. I've visited Indy once before for last year's Manning Bowl II, but doesn't look like the same city now. The streets are teeming with people in Giants, Patriots and Colts garb, and every building and sign is branded with the Super Bowl XLVI logo.

This is officially the biggest Vince Lombardi trophy I've ever seen.

If I had to estimate, I'd say the New York fans outnumber the New Englanders three to one. Throw in the fact that Indy fans hate the Patriots and love the Mannings, and the crowd tomorrow could be 80 percent in favor of the Giants.

Forget about bringing a car downtown during Super Bowl weekend.

For the afternoon, we went into the NFL Experience, a huge event celebrating the teams and history of the league. It was a football fanatic's heaven. We spent four hours there and I could have spent four days.

The quarterback on the left is a Super Bowl MVP. The one on the right...well, let's just move on.

One exhibit had 32 lockers, one for each team. Only two had a line for photos. Eli Manning, and Tim Tebow. Nowhere is safe from Tebowmania.

The Giants' locker was Eli Manning's. The Titans' locker?

Rob Bironas.

If you need any indication that the NFL is doing well, there was a 15 minute wait to get into the NFL shop. Yes, you had to wait to get into a place where you could spend more money on NFL merchandise. Didn't some say that the lockout would hurt the league's popularity?

I forgot to ask this guy what Bills Backers bar he patrons.

The NFL Experience was chock full of areas where fans could punt, pass, and kick their way to impressing other spectators who are as unathletic as them. Omer, Colin, and I hopped in line to catch a punt out of a jugs machine. I did an unsuccessful David Tyree impression, once again proving that it's hard to catch a football with your head. Omer, however, took advantage of my embarrassment to propose to a particularly attractive volunteer.

I'm pretty sure she said yes.

One of my favorite exhibits was an NFL Draft stage, where fans could go up and pretend they were the number one pick. There were a couple of guys there who cheered and booed people based on which jersey they picked. I asked them how long they'd been there. They said "about thirty minutes." The annoyed volunteer next to them replied "at least an hour." For the record, they booed this:

I couldn't resist.

Check back in a bit for my stories from Saturday night, including a concert and our 3:00am conversation with a current NFL starting quarterback.