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Gaffe of the week: Amazon congratulates Notre Dame fans on NCAA football championship

Within seconds of a team winning the Super Bowl, Grey Cup or World Series, players on the winning team are always sporting brand new hats and shirts indicating they are the champions.

This isn't because there are people who are like the Flash at making clothing, but because they make gear for both teams beforehand. The gear for the losing team is kept far out of reach of fans. According to a New York Times article from 2007, it's hidden behind a locked door and donated to World Vision, which ships it to a developing country, usually in Africa.

Meaning somewhere in the world people are wearing shirts indicating the Buffalo Bills are Super Bowl champions in 1990, 1991, 1992 and 1993. That would be quite the dynasty for a team I have been a huge fan of since I was young. But they lost all four games and have been doing a lot of losing ever since.

[ Last week's gaffe: Man invites cops to check out his grow-op ]

While that gear is quickly locked away, online retailing giant Amazon.com accidentally tried to sell some Notre Dame NCAA football championship merchandise before the game even started, according to AL.com.

"Congratulations to the Notre Dame Fighting Irish, NCAA National Football Champions," read an email to Notre Dame fans. "Customers who have shown an interest in the Notre Dame Fighting Irish might like to see NCAA championship merchandise and additional fan gear."

A similar email was also sent to Alabama fans on Monday, the day of the big game. Maybe it was sent by a wishful-thinking Irish fan or maybe they had incorrect advice from a psychic?

The glaring problem is that the email was sent before the game started and the Irish lost to the Alabama Crimson Tide 42-14. The game was over after about three minutes.

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A short time after the first email was sent, the retailer sent a follow-up email to both groups.

"Well this is embarrassing...we completely fumbled our congratulation email for tonight's game," read the second email. "We admit that we can't tell the future. We congratulate Alabama and Notre Dame for making it to the NCAA Football National Championship."

Alabama players could hold up a paper copy of the email like U.S. President Harry Truman did with the Chicago Daily Tribune that indicated he lost the 1948 election to New York Governor Thomas Dewey.

Luckily for Amazon, there are no reports of anyone purchasing any of the Notre Dame gear or of it being shipped.

But the same can't be said for the people behind Toronto's bid to host the 1996 Olympics. I managed to get my hands on a pin indicating Toronto was hosting. Now, it's time for me to start looking for some of that Bills gear because it's not looking like they are going to win the Super Bowl any time soon.

For this, Amazon is awarded the Gaffe of the Week, commemorated with a picture of Rob Ford in butter.

(Reuters photo of a Notre Dame fan at the BCS Championship game in Miami Monday)

Gaffe of the Week appears each Thursday
On Yahoo! Canada News.