BBS Awards: New England Patriots win Team of the Year

The Boston Blood Sox Awards (or Bloodies) are awarded for great success and/or pitiful failure in the 2014-15 sports calendar.

Back in January of 2008, I awarded Team of the Year to the Patriots. They were 16-0. This was before I realized that I should write these posts sometime after the Super Bowl.

I'm very happy to name the Patriots as the Team of the Year for 2014-15.

They won 15 games, including a very hard fought playoff battle against the Ravens, and of course the Super Bowl against Seattle. They were tough, they were imposing, they were difficult to match up against, they were clutch.

The stars were stellar. The role players rose to the occasion. They all did their job.

The season started poorly. At one point a reporter asked Belichick if he was considering replacing Brady (who was that idiot by the way?). The team believed in itself, even though the fans and the media didn't. The Patriots moved on to Cincinnati. Then to Buffalo, then the Jets, the Bears, the Broncos, the Colts, and so on. They scored 87 points in 2 games against the "AFC Finalist" Colts.

And the Super Bowl will probably be the Game of the Century for Boston Sports.

Belichick, Brady, Gronkowski, Revis, Edelman, Wilfork, Stork, Browner, McCourty, Blount, Gray, Vereen, Amendola, LaFell, Jones, Jones, Ninkovich, Casillas, Collins, Butler.

What a great team. What a great year.

I can't wait for the 2015 season to begin.

BBS Awards: Bill Belichick wins Lifetime Achievement Award

The Boston Blood Sox Awards (or Bloodies) are awarded for great success and/or pitiful failure in the 2014-15 sports year.

By winning his fourth Super Bowl, Bill Belichick cemented his legacy as the greatest football coach of all-time. Among Boston coaches in all sports, he's second only to Red Auerbach. NFL coaches can only dream of achieving half of what Belichick has achieved.

Four Super Bowl wins as a head coach, 2 more as an assistant. He's been part of 8 Super Bowls spanning 4 decades. Named Coach of the Year 3 times by the AP. His defensive gameplan from Super Bowl 25 is in the Hall of Fame.

He's won 232 games including 22 playoff wins. His 211 regular season wins is 6th all-time, and with 12 more wins he'll pass Paul Brown for 5th.

One of Belichick's biggest strengths is his ability to move on from adversity. "We're on to Cincinnati" became a theme of the 2014 season, but moving on has been a key part of Belichick's career. He was a failure in Cleveland, but was able to learn from the experience and move on. When the Patriots lost Bledsoe in 2001, he and the team moved on. When they lost 31-0 to the Bills in 2003, they moved on. When the SpyGate story erupted, when Brady got hurt in 2008, when Aaron Hernandez murdered people, when the team was 2-2 last year and people were questioning if Tom Brady should be the quarterback, when DeflateGate broke. Belichick moves on.

No team excels in the face of adversity like Belichick's Patriots.

Few coaches have lost Super Bowls as heartbreaking as the two that Belichick lost against the Giants. And yet he still isn't afraid of risking defeat. He still has massive balls. He had the balls to reject the Jets and work for the Patriots (having learned from his Cleveland experience how important it was to work for owners who let you do your job). He had the balls to keep 4 quarterbacks on his roster, one of them was Tom Brady. He had the balls to let Brady try to win Super Bowl 36. He had the balls to let Lawyer Milloy go, to sign Corey Dillon, to bring in Randy Moss, to drop Randy Moss, to trade Logan Mankins, et cetera.

His aggression has sometimes been questioned, and it hasn't always worked out, but that aggression is why he and the Patriots are 4 time champions.

You could write a 200-page thesis paper on leadership by talking about Bill Belichick. So I'll stop myself here.

But Belichick has yet to stop. He's still doing his job.

BBS Awards: Bill Belichick wins Red Auerbach Award for Executive/Coach of the Year

The Boston Blood Sox Awards (or Bloodies) are awarded for great success and/or pitiful failure in the 2014-15 sports year.

Bill Belichick the GM had been the focus of criticism in this town for 7 or 8 years. Some of it deserved, much of it exaggerated, most of it emotionally overblown. Somehow as a GM, the 2007 team he assembled was inadequate. And the 2011 team, with an unhealthy Gronkowski in the Super Bowl, was insufficient in the talent department to win. He was even blamed for Gronkowski's injuries.

The Patriots' mantra in 2014 was "Do Your Job." The GM's job is to put together a team capable of winning. And that's what Belichick did. And all the critics of Belichick the GM can shut up, finally. From familiar faces like Tom Brady and Vince Wilfork, to a 2nd round steal like Rob Gronkowski, to ring hungry Darrelle Revis, to a former Kent State quarterback turned receiver, to an oft-injured replacement for Wes Welker (who is himself now oft-injured), to an undrafted free agent out of West Alabama named Malcolm.

The team was built for toughness and versatility. It could beat you with offense and defense. And they were physical.

Belichick was also the coach of the year. He kept his team focused even when they were 2-2. He didn't allow DeflateGate to distract them in the Super Bowl. He and his staff prepared his team to make big plays, made the right adjustments during the game, and had the balls to let the clock run out in the 4th quarter.

Bill Belichick was the best coach and best GM in Boston sports last year.

BBS Awards: Super Bowl 49 wins Game of the Year

The Boston Blood Sox Awards (or Bloodies) are awarded for great success and/or pitiful failure in the 2014-15 sports year.

There are about 85 years left in the century. That's around 14,000 baseball games, over 7,000 hockey and 7,000 basketball games, and counting the playoffs, about 1,400 football games. Odds are, none of those games will be able to top Super Bowl 49 as the Boston Sports Game of the Century.

The game was great, but so was everything going on around it. The build up with DeflateGate. The story-lines of old dynasty vs. new dynasty, of attitude vs. adjustment, of Sherman vs. Revis, of Carroll vs. Belichick. The two most talented teams, the two toughest teams. A powerful running back, a powerful tight-end, formidable DBs on both sides of the ball. The anticipation was unreal.

The game itself surpassed expectations, featuring some of the best individual plays of the season. Great throws, great catches, great interceptions, from both teams. So many big plays. So many heroes. Brady, Gronk, Amendola, Edelman, Butler.

And it ended with the best quarterback of his era leading his team to victory. And the best coach of all-time seeing his adjustments, his pre-game preparation, and his audacity pay off.

The lasting impact of the game is another rarity. The Championship tore down the divide between the glory years of 2001-2004, and the "almost" years of 2005-2013. It launched Brady and Belichick into the "best ever" category.

It's very rare that a sporting event has such high expectations, then exceeds them, and then has a major impact in the history of the game. Super Bowl 49 did all of that.

And just imagine what enduring all those blizzards would have been like had the Patriots lost.

BBS Awards: Malcolm Butler wins Tom Brady Award for Coming Out of Nowhere

The Boston Blood Sox Awards (or Bloodies) are awarded for great success and/or pitiful failure in the 2014-15 sports year.

This Award goes to players who went from anonymity to superstars. For example, Koji Uehara won it for 2013, Danny Woodhead in 2010. This year's winner didn't have a great season, or even a great game.

It was one play. At least that's how we'll remember it. Malcolm Butler was the center of 4 big plays in the 4th quarter of Super Bowl 49. He broke up a few passes on key downs. He made a few important tackles. And of course, his interception.

Most of us didn't know who this guy was before that night. Now everyone knows. Take Tom Brady's entire 2001 season and condense it into an hour of football. That was the night Malcolm Butler had.

Super Bowl thoughts and predictions (I compare Belichick to Churchill)

I'm writing this at 4 in the morning of Super Bowl Sunday. It's not that I can't sleep, I don't want to sleep. I can't tell if I'm buzzed, or groggy, or a mellow mixture of both. But I'm sure of the mellowness, which is rare for me.

Seven years ago, as I anxiously anticipated the Patriots meeting the Giants in Super Bowl XLII and perhaps the completion a flawless season, I remember not being able to sleep, and sending texts to my older brother, quoting Shakespeare's Henry V (Roman numeral overload). In that play there's a scene of French commanders conversing on the eve of battle, excited to destroy the small number of underfed and under-equipped English soldiers that stood against them in what would be known as the Battle of Agincourt. And I felt like those eager French. "Would it were day!" In one of history's greatest upsets, the outnumbered, exhausted, and poorly equipped English utterly destroyed the French army in that battle. It was the equivalent of a 16 seed in the NCAA tournament beating a 1 by 40 points, and then continuing to win the whole damn tournament. Similarly, the underdog Giants beat the mighty Patriots.

This feels different. The Patriots are not overwhelming favorites. They face a formidable defense that will not give an inch without a fight. In terms of historical conflicts, this actually reminds me more of the D-Day landings of 1944 in Normandy (and no, I'm not comparing the Seahawks to the Nazis). Like the Allies on the eve of D-Day, I don't know how it will end, but I'm confident that the generals and the soldiers have done all they could to prepare and will do their jobs when the moment comes. We can only wait and watch how it plays out.

I'm more relaxed than I was 8 years ago. Less anxiety, less nervousness. The game starts in 14 and a half hours as I write this, and I'm more concerned about what beer to bring to the party I'm going to. Do I want just Sam Adams, or a mix of some lighter beers? And this is not because I take the opponent lightly, but because there's nothing to think about except the beer. These two teams will decide matters on the field, not in the brains of pundits and "experts,." And certainly the worries and hopes in the arena of my brain won't be able to determine the winner.

Those "experts" by the way, some of whom have been gushing over how amazing Seattle is, completely underestimated them last year against the Broncos. What kind of judge of quality or character are they? In their minds, the Broncos have won 2 of 3 Super Bowls, and the 49ers won the other. The same team they wrote off last year is an unstoppable juggernaut today. The dumbest people in the world are the ones who don't realize what they don't know. And many of those people join the media.

The Patriots have two key advantages in the upcoming game: special teams and Bill Belichick.

The Seahawks are not very good at covering punts. The Patriots have an exceptional punt returner in Julian Edelman. A big return from him could prove to be the difference in the game. A couple of solid 10+ yard returns from him could sway the field position battle in New England's favor. This area is one of the few matchups that either team has a decided advantage over the other.

The other advantage is Belichick. The D-Day invasion was meticulously planned. It involved the coordination of thousands of troops landing in dozens of places, ships and planes bombarding defensive positions, airborne troops landing behind enemy lines to cause disruption (shout out to the 101st Airborne, the unit my brother served in). That was a massive logistical undertaking. There was also a heavy dose of guile and deception, as the Allies were able to convince the Germans that the invasion would take place at the Pas-de-Calais, about 200 miles northeast of Normandy.

Hmmmm, guile and deception. Remind you of any NFL head coaches?

And in risk of hyperbole, wasn't Bill Belichick's "We're on to Cincinnati" press conference the type of simple yet stirring eloquence that Winston Churchill might employ? When the Germans forced the British to evacuate France at Dunkirk in 1940, Churchill might as well have said "We're on to the Battle of Britain," or "We're on to North Africa."

Those 4 words repeated by Belichick helped turn the tide of the season.

These teams are both so good and so tough, wouldn't it be great to see them play a best-of-5 series? Sadly, we only get to enjoy a single game between these very worth adversaries. Only 60 minutes of football. Every small edge will need to be exploited, every opportunity taken advantage of.

I think the Pats make a big special teams play. I think Brady and the offense will have trouble scoring lots of points, but will do their job in the field position game, with the occasional touchdown and field goal. And I think the Seahawks receivers against the Patriots secondary is a favorable matchup for the Pats. The Seahawks won't score many points either.

Patriots win 23-20.

Patriots-Seahawks Drinking Game: Super Bowl XLIX Edition

The Super Bowl is here at last. All that DeflateGate talk actually made the two week wait fly by. And here we are. All the practices, all the roster decisions, all the pain, all the regular season games, it all comes down to 60 minutes of football. And for us fans, 4+ hourss of intense drinking. Here's a drinking game to play while watching Super Bowl XLIX. Remember to get lubed up responsibly, and designate a driver to take you to the hospital and/or morgue.

Anytime a commentator says:
"Deflate" = take 1 drink of beer
"Gate" = 1 drink
"Pressure" = 1 drink
"PSI" = 1 drink
"(in)eligible" = 1 drink
"Controversy" = 1 drink
"Super" = 1 drink
"Legacy" = 1 drink
"Dynasty" = 1 drink
"Wilson" = 1 drink
A name that ends in "-ski" = 1 drink
"Brady" = 1 drink
"Belichick" = 1 drink
"Job" = 1 drink
"Carroll" = 1 drink
"Glendale" = 1 drink (those named Glen or Dale can command others to drink until the next commercial)
"Al" = 1 drink
"Cris" = 1 drink
"Michelle" = 1 drink


Anytime this happens:
Penalty = 1 drink
Penalty on Brandon Browner = 1 drink, 1 shot of liquor
Touchback = 1 drink
Kickoff/punt return = drink for the entire return
Tom Brady points out the "mike" = 1 drink (if drinking Mike's Hard Lemonade, you can command others to drink until the next commercial)
Brady says "Alpha milk" = 1 drink (if drinking a White Russian, you can command others to drink until the start of the next quarter)
Brady says a word that starts with "F" = 1 drink
Brady says a word that ends with "-uck" = 1 drink
Russell Wilson leaves the pocket = 1 drink
The Patriots go no huddle = 1 drink per snap
The Patriots throw short (5 yards and under) = 1 drink
Darrelle Revis and Richard Sherman are compared = drink for 24 seconds
Pete Carroll claps = 1 drink per clap
Bill Belichick folds his arms = 1 drink
Rob Gronkowski spikes the ball = finish your beer, spike it (bonus points for spiking a glass bottle)
Vince Wilfork makes a big play = 1 drink
Wilfork forces/recovers a turnover = 1 drink, 1 shot
Wilfork scores a touchdown = 1 drink, 1 shot, eat 1 turkey leg
Danny Amendola celebrates with his teammates = 1 drink
The Patriots block a punt/kick = drink an entire beer, then 1 shot (2 shots if returned for a TD)
Someone in the room makes a joke about Katy Perry's breasts being properly inflated = 2 drinks

Anytime this is on screen:
A ballboy or where the footballs are stored = 1 drink
A Roman numeral = 1 drink (if drinking Dos Equis or Molson XXX, you can command others to drink until the next commercial)
The number 12 (including in the crowd, and on the clock and scoreboard) = 1 drink
A trophy or representation of a trophy = 1 drink
The word "Wilson" (on jerseys AND on footballs) = 1 drink
Macklemore = 1 shot
Any other celebrity = 1 drink
Highlights from previous Super Bowls = drink for the entirety of the highlight
A graphic of coaching achievements = 1 shot
A graphic of Tom Brady's achievements = drink for 12 seconds
Michelle Tafoya = 1 shot
Bob Kraft = 1 drink
Kraft talking to someone = drink the entire time he's talking
A cactus or anything else from the desert = 1 drink
A promo for other NBC programs = 1 drink
Starbucks logo = 1 drink from a Dunkin Donuts cup filled with ice coffee and Bailey's

Illustration by Linzi Silverman

Anytime you:
Hold in a piss = 1 drink per play and/or commercial you hold it in
Root against the team you like so you can win a square = 1 drink
Don't think a commercial is funny even though it tried to be = 1 drink
Pretend it's an accident that you switched the channel to Puppy Bowl = 1 drink
Endure listening to Katy Perry because of boobage = 1 drink
Claim to be a Lenny Kravitz fan but you want to watch Katy Perry = 1 shot
Wish Celebrity DeathMatch was still around and still did halftime shows = 1 drink, then imagine Kravitz fighting Katy Perry and all the claymated hilarity that would ensue

Bonus commercial and halftime drinking game:
Peyton Manning = drink for 18 seconds (if eating chicken parm, you can command others to drink until the next time Manning appears)
Danica Patrick = 1 drink
A ridiculously hot woman eating junk food = 1 drink (if you are a ridiculously hot woman eating junk food, you can command others to drink until the end of the game, but you could pretty much do that anyways)
Cleavage = 1 drink per cleaved boob
Lip-syncing = 1 shot per artist
Sunglasses = 1 drink
A horse = 1 drink per horse
A dog = 1 drink per dog (mega bonus points if you do this while watching Puppy Bowl, you crazy bastard)
The price of a car = 1 drink
Beer = 1 drink per beer

So that's the game. Make sure you call in sick for work on Monday, and to be safe might as well take Tuesday off as well. Also make sure your last will and testament is in order along with funeral arrangements and organ donation stuff (the ruined liver could be donated to science).

Enjoy playing the game while watching the game, do your job and get lubed up responsibly, don't drink and drive or else Vince Wilfork might have to pull you out of your car, and go Patriots!

Why did the NFL wait until the Super Bowl to change how ineligible receivers are announced?

The Patriots used ineligible receivers and deceptive formations to defeat the Ravens in the Divisional Round, almost 3 full weeks ago. In immediate response to that, the League defended the legality of the Patriots' actions and did nothing to adjust the mechanics of officials for the AFC Championship game. Then DeflateGate happened. Then the NFL decided to make an adjustment to how ineligibles are announced. Odd, isn't it?

I have no issue with the League helping to clarify to the defense who is eligible and who is ineligible. I've heard Bill Belichick himself explain to media that it can be difficult and sometimes impossible to clearly hear what refs announce over stadium PA systems when you're on field level with 70,000 people screaming. So if the NFL wants to help the defense do their job, then so be it. Makes perfect sense.

What's odd is that there was no adjustment made for the conference championship games. And that the adjustment comes as the Patriots and the NFL find themselves in an adversarial position.

I'm not suggesting an anti-Patriots conspiracy in the aftermath of DeflateGate. But I do think DeflateGate might be a partial motivator of this change. The NFL wants this game on Sunday to be perceived to be as honest and clean as possible. While Belichick's ineligible trickery was within the rules, it worked because it was deceptive. In the wake of DeflateGate, the NFL might feel pressured (pun intended) to try to make the game appear to be as least deceptive as possible.

It's just so odd that this change wasn't made for the AFC and NFC title games. And that the League didn't wait until next season to implement it.

I'm trying to avoid jumping to conclusions, as everyone in sports media has been doing the last 2 weeks about Deflate Gate. I just wish/hope a reporter who has more access to decision-makers and league officials, can find it in themselves to ask the questions: Why now? Why not in the conference title games? If not in those games, why not next season?

I'm also very curious to know exactly when the NFL informed the Patriots and Seahawks about this new way of doing things. Was it before the teams started practicing for the Super Bowl? Or after? The answer to that question could either completely squash my interest in the subject, or intensify it. If the NFL told the teams early last week, then I'd accept that as fair and reasonable. But if it waited until the teams were in Arizona, and had already finished game-planning for the other, I'd question the timing.

There are few things in the Universe more annoying than a Patriots fan who is also a conspiracy theorist. The team here has won 3 rings, got caught cheating, and has still been close to winning a few more times, so whining and complaining should be kept to a minimum at all times. If the Pats lose on Sunday, I won't cry like the fans of so many other teams (See: Raiders). But the fact that the NFL decided to change how the officials announce eligible and ineligible receivers on the eve of the Super Bowl, and NOT for the AFC and NFC title games, strikes me as very odd.

Unlike some professional sports media in some recent stories, this amateur blogger won't jump to conclusions. Right now, I just have questions.

Photo Credit: Steven Senne/AP Photo

To beat the Patriots, Seahawks can't wait until the second half

For the Seahawks to beat the Patriots on Sunday, they're either going to have to build a solid lead in the first half, or do something that no team has done since October: outscore the Patriots in the second half.

For 10 straight games the Patriots have dominated the second half. And most of those games were against good teams: Denver, Green Bay, Indy (twice), Detroit, Baltimore. The Pats scored 160 second half points in those games, allowing 46. If you're not good at math, that's an average of 16 to 4.6. In the last 6 games the Pats have allowed 2.7 points per game in the second half

Multiple choice question: Why have the Patriots been so strong in the final 30 minutes?

A) Offense
B) Defense
C) Special teams
D) Coaching
E) All of the above

I think the answer is E, but the numbers suggest that the defense is the biggest reason this team has improved so much in the second half. In other words, the offense plays very good in both halves, the defense plays okay in the first half, then dramatically improves in the second.

In the last 10 games the Patriots have put up 174 points in the first half, 160 in the second, a decrease of 1.4 points per game. The defense has allowed 114 points in the first half, only 46 in the second, a difference of 6.8 per game. So the offense actually gets slightly less productive in the second half, while the defense plays significantly better.

In fact, in 4 of the last 10 games, the defense has held opponents to 0 second half points. And they haven't allowed a second half touchdown in 7 of the last 10.

Those are just numbers, though. The eye-test is more convincing to me. And in the second half my eyes have seen this team make plays in all phases of the game. That's why I still say the reason they do so well in the second half is E, all of the above.

Against the Ravens it was coaching and offense that put up 21 points in the second half, and defense that held Baltimore to 10. In Week 16 against the Jets it was Vince Wilfork's blocked field goal and then the offense killing the clock that secured the victory. Against the Chargers, the defense won the game while the offense struggled.

What's been encouraging about this team since Week 5 is that they've been able to win different kinds of games in different ways. They're versatile. They improvise and they improve.

If the Patriots continue to play great in the second half, the Super Bowl might be decided by the time Katy Perry takes the stage.

Photo Credit: Getty Images

The Patriots broke a rule that shouldn't be a rule

Rules are rules. And if the Patriots altered the air pressure of the ball after the refs inspected them, then they deserve to be disciplined for circumventing a rule.

But why is this rule even a rule? Why can't teams inflate or deflate the ball as much as they want? Why limit them to between 12.5 and 13.5 lbs/PSI? If Tom Brady prefers to throw a football at 11 lbs/PSI, and Aaron Rodgers wants to throw a ball with 14.5, why is there a rule preventing them from doing so?

What unfair edge would be gained? Teams use their own balls. How could one team gain an advantage over the other if both teams are using the footballs they prefer?

What's the worse that could happen? Passing offense might be more efficient and prolific? It wouldn't be the first time a rule change favored the offensive side of the ball.

The NFL allows players to select which cleats they'll use. They let quarterbacks and receivers decide to wear gloves or not. They let everyone decide the types of facemasks they want to wear. Why is this piece of equipment different?

Furthermore, the NFL allows the outside of balls to be rubbed up, broken in, scuffed, and so on. If changing the outside of the ball is fair game, why is the inside of the ball so rigidly restricted?

Again, I'm not saying that rule breaking should be excused. But I think this particular rule should be examined. It's a stupid rule.

Photo Credit: Maddie McGarvey, The New York Times

Patriots would have crushed the Colts no matter what balls they used

The Patriots beat the Colts 45-7 to win their 6th AFC Championship in the Brady-Belichick era. The NFL is investigating whether the Patriots intentionally deflated footballs to be used by their offense, which could have made them easier to grip in wet conditions.

As far as DeflateGate goes, until I stop seeing words like "investigate" and "alleged," and see words like "found" and "confirmed," then I'm going not going to give weight to the story. Maybe I'll talk about the paranoid defensiveness of Patriots fans, or the eagerness of the media to find a juicy story, or the conclusion jumping of people who don't like the Pats.

I could formulate a joke about sour grapes, and include some wordplay with "wine" and "whine," but I'd rather talk about this game.

If the Patriots had used Nerf balls, this game would have still been a blowout. LeGarrette Blount would have run for 148 yards no matter how many PSI the air pressure in the ball was. And Julian Edelman would have still ran past Colts defenders like they were standing in mud.

Anyone who put money on James Develin and Nate Solder catching Brady's first TD passes of the game, you're filthy rich today.

The Pats defense blanketed the Colts receivers, forcing a horrible game from Andrew Luck (12 for 33, 126 yards, 2 INTs). They also pressured Luck, which can be dangerous because he's very good finding open guys when he's on the move. But the coverage held.

Some fun stats that illustrate how dominant this performance was:

First downs: Pats 28, Colts 17
First downs (non-penalty): Pats 27, Colts 13
Third down conversions: Pats 12 for 18 (plus 2 for 2 on 4th), Colts 3 for 11
Total plays: Pats 76, Colts 52
Total yards: Pats 397, Colts 209
Yards per drive: Pats 36.1, Colts 19.0
Time of possession: Pats 37:49, Colts 22:11

The only blemish was Brady's pick in the 2nd quarter, which turned into a penalty aided Colts scoring drive. And that one Red Zone trip (out of 7) that didn't result in a TD.

Flawless victory.

On to the two slowest weeks in sports: waiting for your team to play the Super Bowl.

Photo Credit: Al Bello/Getty Images

The Patriots' road to the Super Bowl

Super Bowl 49. Super Bowl XLIX. Super Bowl X-licks. What does the road to the Super Bowl look like for the New England Patriots?

Divisional Round

vs. IND or CIN or BAL

If Baltimore beats the Steelers, the Patriots will host the 6th seeded Ravens no matter what happens in the other AFC Wild Card game. However, I strongly think Pittsburgh will win that game, so then the Pats would face the winner of the Bengals-Colts game. To be blunt, neither of those teams scare me. They both feature talented players, but they're not tough teams. The Patriots have thoroughly dismantled both of them this season and I'd expect the Pats to do the same thing in the Divisional Round. So it's on to the AFC Championship.

AFC Championship

vs. DEN or PIT

Again, this is based on the premise that the Steelers will beat the Ravens. Denver vs. Pittsburgh is a tough game to predict. The Broncos have talent, but have looked stale the past few weeks. The Steelers have flaws, but are a hot team. Pittsburgh's secondary isn't very good, so I'm leaning toward the Broncos to win.

The Patriots would have an edge against either team. The Pats are tougher than the Broncos, they have pass-rushers who can get to Manning, they have DBs who can pick him off. Denver's only hope would be for Ward to injure Gronk and Welker to take out Revis.

Pittsburgh would be a more difficult matchup. However, the Pats offense should be good enough to take advantage of Pittsburgh's DBs. Unless Josh McDaniels gets too cute. The Steelers were 27th in passing defense, so Josh "that's just what they'll be expecting us to do" McDaniels, might try to pound the ball on the ground (Pittsburgh was 6th in rushing defense).

The Patriots should beat Denver unless there are injuries, and should beat Pittsburgh unless they get too clever.

Super Bowl

vs. SEA or GB or DAL or CAR or ARI or DET

Carolina can't win 3 playoff games. Arizona can't make the Super Bowl without a quarterback. Detroit doesn't have the makeup for a deep playoff run. So that leaves us with the Seahawks, Packers, and Cowboys, with the Seahawks being the most likely winner of the NFC.

The Seahawks would also be the toughest matchup for the Patriots. They're red hot, they have playmakers on both sides of the ball, they don't make massive mistakes, they play with extremely high confidence but don't play outside of themselves. They also have the best passing defense in the NFL and the 3rd best rushing defense.

For the Patriots to beat Seattle, they'll have to win it on defense against Russell Wilson and Marshawn Lynch. Seattle was 27th in passing, averaging only 203 yards per game in the air. They were #1 in the NFL in rushing with over 172 yards per game. If the Pats can contain the run, manage a few field goals, make a play on special teams, make a big play downfield (which the Pats have struggled to do all season), then they're Super Bowl champions. Just a handful of big plays would decide a Seahawks-Patriots Super Bowl. It would be an epic game.

There are more ways to beat the Cowboys and Packers. The Patriots almost beat Green Bay in Green Bay despite a poor first half and despite some cheese-friendly officiating in the second half. Don't get me wrong I respect the Packers, there are just more ways to beat them than there are ways to beat the Seahawks.

The Cowboys are also beatable. Give them credit for going 8-0 on the road, in a year where some of the best teams in the NFL went 4-4 away from home. But until Romo and the Cowboys can win when there's pressure, I don't fear them. Maybe if they win a couple of playoff games and get to the Super Bowl, they will have garnered my respect. Until then, I will continue to see Tony Romo as a nervous holder bumbling a long-snap.

So there's the road. The Patriots beat the Bengals or Colts in the Divisional round. Then beat the Broncos or Steelers to win the AFC, so long as they don't get hurt or get smart. Then it's probably a tough, too-close-to-call battle against the Seahawks.

That Super Bowl will either be the confirmation of the beginning of the Seahawks dynasty, or an exclamation point on the Patriots' dynasty. If Super Bowl 49 is Seahawks vs. Patriots, we will hear the word "dynasty" at least 300,000 times in the 2 weeks leading up to the game.