Super Bowl Hype, Part VI: Greg Easterbrook's Grudge
Sometimes Greg Easterbrook's anti-Patriots tone gets so shrill, I can't help but wonder if Bill Simmons played some sort of really mean practical joke on him. Easterbrook's latest column (linked above) is entitled "Conditional Immortality" and it implies that this great Patriot season will be forever tainted by the specter of spygate. Now I'm no genius, but didn't spygate occur week one? I can understand if you have some legitimate questions about what past Patriot teams did, but this year, they were caught after a week one blowout of the Jets and fined before their week two game with the Chargers. SO how is this supposed to taint the 18- hopefully 19- wins they have this season? I don't get it, but I guess it makes for a good story.
And this is probably just me making mountains out of mole hills, but Easterbrook points out that if the Giants won, this wouldn't be an upset of historic proportions. According to Easterbrook, the last big Super Bowl upset was the Giants win over the Bills in Super Bowl XXV. And sure, that was an upset, but that game did feature the 13-3 Bills with the league's best offense and the 13-3 Giants with the league's best defense. Conveniently forgotten by Easterbrook is Super Bowl XXXVI, in which the two-touchdown underdog Patriots shocked the world by defeating the greatest show on turf ... on turf! Those Rams were 14-2 and poised for their second Super Bowl trophy in three years, while those Patriots were an 11-5 surprise that had gotten to the Super Bowl behind the tuck rule and a special teams extravaganza in Pittsburgh.
One thing Easterbrook has right is that very few people are predicting a blowout. Of course, very few people are also predicting a Giants win, which is probably for the reasons I've discussed before- Unless you're a Giants fan, why would you pick against Tom Brady in the 4th quarter? I know I'm on the verge of crowning the Patriots, but so is the rest of the media - It's not that a Giants win would be so shocking, it's that it would be shocking if the Patriots didn't finish off this season.
And this is probably just me making mountains out of mole hills, but Easterbrook points out that if the Giants won, this wouldn't be an upset of historic proportions. According to Easterbrook, the last big Super Bowl upset was the Giants win over the Bills in Super Bowl XXV. And sure, that was an upset, but that game did feature the 13-3 Bills with the league's best offense and the 13-3 Giants with the league's best defense. Conveniently forgotten by Easterbrook is Super Bowl XXXVI, in which the two-touchdown underdog Patriots shocked the world by defeating the greatest show on turf ... on turf! Those Rams were 14-2 and poised for their second Super Bowl trophy in three years, while those Patriots were an 11-5 surprise that had gotten to the Super Bowl behind the tuck rule and a special teams extravaganza in Pittsburgh.
One thing Easterbrook has right is that very few people are predicting a blowout. Of course, very few people are also predicting a Giants win, which is probably for the reasons I've discussed before- Unless you're a Giants fan, why would you pick against Tom Brady in the 4th quarter? I know I'm on the verge of crowning the Patriots, but so is the rest of the media - It's not that a Giants win would be so shocking, it's that it would be shocking if the Patriots didn't finish off this season.
posted by lonely libertarian at 11:18 AM
1 Comments:
Ummm, pretty sure the Bills never beat anyone in the Super Bowl. Might want to fix that.
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