---I gave up on Pro Football last year. I did. I probably shouldn't have--- but the performance of two teams drove me to a level of apathy about the NFL that I wouldn't have thought possible just a year before. The teams responsible? First, my team, the St. Louis Rams were incredibly bad. Bag over the head bad. And second, the Patriots looked like a lock for the Vince Lombardi trophy all year long. I despise the Patriots and have since 2001. I have never seen a team look so good as they did last season. There was no chance they were losing in 2007. In fact rooting for teams to beat them was sort of like watching the movie Titanic and rooting for that stupid boat to miss the Iceberg. It would sure be cool but it ain't happening. Funny thing though, somehow the iceberg, not the boat, sank in the Superbowl. Go figure.
---You see because the Patriots had managed to win 3 Super Bowls in this first decade of the new millennium and that fact added to the dominance they showed last year caused me to forget a cardinal rule of the NFL. That is, NOTHING IS A LOCK IN THE NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE. The last 3 Superbowl winners should drive that lesson home. Pittsburgh in 2006? I was ready to stick a fork in them by November of that season. The Colts in 2007? There defense was so atrocious nobody had them going to the Superbowl. Then Bob Sander shows up and they are the very definition of defense. The Giants last year? Please, Eli Manning was so inconsistent somebody needed to start feeding him fiber flakes just so something in his life could be regular. ----And yet all three of these underdogs won when it counted.
---Maybe the Patriots will win them all this year. Maybe they'll avenge the Superbowl loss that they were robbed of by an insane hail mary grab. Maybe they won't. The point is I should know that I can't let the evil nature and brilliant play of one hated team or the disappointment of my team discourage my passion for the pro game. My Rams might turn things around (doubtful for this year) and the Patriots might choke again (hopeful). A little unpredictability is a good thing and ironically something we can probably count on for the season.
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