Eddie Adelman is an AP award-winning writer who lives in Belfast. His book of columns and short essays is titled “Don’t Get Me Started.”

Apparently there’s a select group of football fans who have attended all 59 Super Bowls.

I can assure you that I’m not one of them. For one thing, I don’t have that kind of coin. The ticket price alone would bankrupt me. And frankly, all the pregame, postgame and  halftime hoopla would just be lost on me.

So once again I’ll probably end up at some Super Bowl party because, as a red-blooded American male, that’s what I’m trained to do on this, the holiest day in American sports.          

There’s a huge upside, though.

You have to admit that the food at Super Bowl parties has gotten a lot better over the years. When Green Bay played Kansas City in the first Super Bowl, it was pretty much beer and chips. Maybe bean dip, if you got lucky.

But nowadays, an enterprising mooch can show up at several parties and sample some great food. Last year, I watched the first half at a party serving Tex-Mex. At halftime, I bolted for another party serving shrimp cocktails. Touchdown! I prayed for overtime. I still had room for dessert.

The only downside to all this activity is that at some point I’m obliged to watch the game. But if I time it just right, I can sit down just as the real action gets underway. Of course, I’m talking about the commercials.

As the quality of the food has gotten better over the years, so has the advertising. It’s been estimated that up to half the viewers regard the commercials as the true highlights of the game.

During the 1980 Super Bowl, there was an ad that featured “Mean” Joe Greene of the Pittsburgh Steelers and a young boy.

The boy follows a hobbling Greene into the tunnel under the stands and offers him a Coca-Cola. After initially declining the offer, Greene accepts it. And in return, Greene throws the boy his game jersey. The ecstatic child cries out, “Wow! Thanks, Mean Joe.”

But there were other striking Super Bowl ads.

For instance, the 2010 ad where a muddy and cantankerous Betty White plays tackle football with the boys. She then eats a Snickers bar and calms right down. I miss Betty White.

Or how about the 1999 monster.com ad, where a young boy looks into the camera and says, “When I grow up, I wanna claw my way up to middle management.” Me too, kid.

Let’s see. I can quote Super Bowl ads verbatim from decades ago, but I can’t remember the final score or even who played in last year’s game. I think one of the teams wore red.

So, is there anything we can do about all the hoopla that overshadows the game itself?

Hey, wait a second. I just had a wacky idea.

What if … we shrink the NFL to just 14 teams. We’ll start by kicking out all the teams that play in domed stadiums. Then we shorten the season to 14 games. The championship game would be played in mid-December with the winner of one conference hosting the winner of the other conference.

All tickets would be $75. No corporate logos. No rock bands. No 6-foot chickens. No fireworks. No choreographed touchdown dances. And best of all? The game would end in less than three hours. Hallelujah!

You know, this idea is just crazy enough to work.

And if I’m not mistaken, a similar experiment was tried in a country much like our own. The players had names like Unitas, Ditka, Hornung, Stabler and Namath. And there was a coach named Lombardi. 

There’s just one drawback to this bold new vision. Why, the food, of course.

Goodbye, Tex-Mex. Goodbye, shrimp cocktails. Looks like its beer and chips once again.

“Hey! Anyone seen the bean dip?”