Yo, Meathead!

Things sure have been crazy, so I apologize for not blogging more often lately. Just trying to get everything together for our big move to Seattle next week.

But how could I not weigh in on the NFL Championship Games? In the AFC, I never thought the Chargers would make it to this weekend. I didn’t think they had it in them to beat Indianapolis and Peyton Manning last week. Of course, without LaDainian Tomlinson yesterday, they never had a chance against New England, although the Patriots probably got more than they bargained for against a banged up San Diego team. Now the Pats go to Arizona to face their biggest nemesis of the 2007 season in the Big Dance.

As for the NFC, I guess I was wrong all along, and I couldn’t be happier to admit it. Who could’ve guessed that the Giants would beat three division winners, all on the road (stretching their NFL-record road win streak for a season to 10 games), to make their first Super Bowl in seven years? I thought this year would be Coach Tom Coughlin’s death march, especially after the Giants’ 0–2 start in which they gave up 80 points combined to Dallas and Green Bay. Instead, somehow, Coughlin changed his coaching demeanor so that the team wanted to play for him, the defense bought into defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo’s scheme, and now the New York Giants are playing for all the marbles. After beating Tampa Bay in Round 1, the G-men got revenge, first on the Cowboys (who I said were the best team in the NFC all season), and then on the Packers, knocking both out of the playoffs and back to their homes, where they will be watching Eli and Co. on TV in two weeks. The Giants now try for their third measure of revenge, going after the 18–0 Patriots, who beat them by 3 on the last weekend of the season in a game the Giants could easily have won. Here comes yet another chapter in the epic sports rivalry between New York and Boston.

What about all those comparisons between the Manning boys, Eli and Peyton? Peyton has his ring, but it took him a lot longer in his career to play in the Super Bowl—nine years to Eli’s four. Archie Manning is the proud father of two Super Bowl quarterbacks in two years. It would be great if he could be the father of two Super Bowl–winning quarterbacks after February 3!

The Giants played like the best team in the NFC, beating the legendary Brett Favre in the third-coldest game in NFL history. Even though they made a number of mistakes—costly penalties, dropped balls, missed kicks—their heart could not be denied. Hey, Tom Brady threw three picks in the AFC game, and no one would say the Pats are not the best the conference has to offer. Now, seven years after the Baltimore Ravens crushed Big Blue in the Super Bowl, the two remaining holdovers from that era, Michael Strahan and Amani Toomer, will have one more chance to get the ring they both desire. How much better would Strahan’s Hall-of-Fame career look with a Super Bowl victory, especially against a previously undefeated team?

As a biased party where the Giants are concerned, I run the risk of going on and on and turning this into an even bigger puff piece than it already is. Let me just close by saying I’m totally psyched to have the Giants in the Super Bowl, and it would give me great pleasure to see them knock the Patriots off their pedestal in the last game of the year.

Go Giants!