That beautiful football shot isn't 8k

Yes and no. It’s artificial bokeh. Cameras won’t naturally have that much bokeh in a wide angle shot unless they’re inches from the subject, which is why those shots stand out so much. For all our lives we’ve grown accustomed to seeing bokeh on medium to long shots and greater depth of field on wider shots. Noticeable for casual viewers, distracting AF for a photographer (at least in my case).