Giants .... Patriots ... at least I got the conference title games right. What can happen on Sunday? Ultimately only time will tell. You can read all the previews you want to, and you'll see that most of the experts are picking the Giants. The public, certainly, seems to be favoring the Giants heavily, as the Vegas line has down shifted from +3.5 ... to +3.0 ... to +2.5 now in some places. So where does that leave the pick? Consider:
- I already tried the "too many people believe in the Giants" theory when the public came in heavy on them against the Packers ... didn't work.
- I tried the "Patriots are a juggernaut, and will handle the AFC title game" theory against the Ravens ... didn't work, as I needed a miracle to get the Pats to this game.
- I've considered that the Pats only last week won their first game of the year against a winning team, needing a miracle to do it.
- Conversely, the Giants might have needed the bigger miracle to win last week, and have gotten lots of bounces their way to get through the last two weeks of the playoffs.
At the end of the day we've got to ask one question: what's the best story? The last time these teams faced off in the Super Bowl the best story was the upset, and it happened. This time? Think of this:
... Brady's fourth Super Bowl, matching Montana for first all time ...
... The Patriots matching the Steelers of the 1970s ... the 49ers of the 1980s .... and that's the list, as the four time super bowl dynasties...
... Peyton Manning can watch it all in his home town ...
... and all those jagoff Colts fans can watch all this go down on their homefield ...
Come ON! How can that not happen? Well, consider:
Since Jordan retired I've had to deal with a decade of terrible Bulls basketball while the NBA fell apart .... The Hoosiers falling into obscurity ... continued Cubs pain, including 2003 and 2008... watching the Cardinals win not one, but two World Series ... watching the White Sox win the series ... watching the Red Sox break their curse ... Watching my Bears fall to the Colts ... and Peyton Manning winning a title to salvage his legacy (taking him from Marino to Elway level, and nearly to Greatest of All Time level) ... Eli Manning winning a Super Bowl... the Pack winning last year ... and worst of all, my brother falling to the dark side and rooting for the cheese heads ...
Yeah. You get it. More times than not the story line I want doesn't work out. But consider:
... Tracy Porter intercepting Manning to win the game ... Dirk Nowitzki saving us from year one of the Miami threesome... the Bulls resurgence ... the IU resurgence ... Jerry Angelo getting canned ... Theo coming to Chicago ...
Sometimes good things happen. The tie breaker? The Giants website today had a banner declaring "Giants win Super Bowl" which linked to a place to buy championship gear. Bad karma. Check Mate.
The Pick:
Pats (-2.5) over Giants
Pats 31 - Giants 24
Go New England. Screw the Giants, and the horse Eli is riding in Indy this week. :-)
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