Why do I give this bleating?
For it to prosper
none dare call it CHEATING!
That game was so intense it literally gave me a headache. But it was worth it. The perfect season * did not happen. Food and drinks to have while watching the game: $15. Bottle of Aleve for the headache: $8. The look on Peyton Manning's face when little brother Eli "cut that meat": Priceless.
No matter what either Manning brother ever does, that near-sack and pass to David Tyree will live forever. A "signature play" not just for one guy (well, two, you gotta count Tyree) but for an entire era of Bigbluedom.
I can imagine the talk at Chez Manning back in New Orleans:
Peyton: "Eli, I won a ring first."
Eli: "Peyton, you won one for Indianapolis. I won one for New York."
Peyton: "Eli, East Rutherford is not in New York."
Eli: "Peyton, It's a lot closer to New York than Indy is to Chicago, or anything else for that matter."
Peyton: "Eli, I had to play in bad weather in the Super Bowl."
Eli: "Peyton, you had to out-quarterback Rex Grossman. I had to beat Tom Brady and the undefeated Patriots."
Peyton: "Uh... Eli, I make more commercials than you do."
Eli: "Peyton, I just won a Super Bowl for a New York team. The commercials are coming."
*
To the Giants: New York thanks you, New Jersey thanks you, everybody outside New England thanks you, everybody who abhors cheating thanks you.
Too bad ESPN cancelled The Top 5 Reasons You Can't Blame... I'd love to see their reasons why we can't blame the Pats for losing to the Giants. Here's my Reason Number 1: "The Giants were better." The Pats won by 3 points at Foxboro -- and home field is traditionally considered a 3-point advantage. The Giants won by 3 at a neutral site.
You know whose birthday it was yesterday? Dr. Henry Heimlich, originator of the anti-choking maneuver that bears his name. He's 88. Oh, if only he were a New Englander, it would explain so much. No such luck: He's from Wilmington, Delaware, Philly-teams territory. (Though plenty of chokes have come from those teams.) And he went to Cornell, in Ithaca, New York, which is theoretically in the realm of New York City teams. But perhaps he can reopen his office at 4 Yawkey Way, Boston, MA 02215. (I'll still think of it as "24 Jersey St.")
Yes, we Yankee Fans can be obnoxious. Winning it all 26 times can do that. But these Patriot fans? Where were they when all they had to their name was a bad Super Bowl loss to the Bears and the sex-harrassment case against Lisa Olson? (Who, wisely, got out of New England and away from Rupert Murdoch's Boston Herald, and now does a fine job writing for the New York Daily News.) When they were stuck in an oversized high school stadium closer to Providence than to Boston? When the most popular football team in town was Boston College, and the second-most popular was Notre Dame? (Which, of course, is nowhere near Boston.)
A lot of these people won't be caught dead in Foxboro in four years when Tom Brady, his floozy of the year, and a cast of cast-offs, has-beens, never-wases and you-paid-six-point-five-million-for-who goes 5-11 for some coach that Bill Belichick, wherever he is at that point, thinks isn't good enough to cheat against.
(UPDATE: It took Belichick and Brady 7 years to win another Super Bowl. And they found a new way to cheat.)
The Patriots of 2001-present are a fad. And since we now know they cheated, and may have been cheating all along (as is now being alleged), we can dismiss the whole era.
After the Pats won their first Super Bowl, they had a rally at Boston's City Hall. And Larry Izzo, a mere special-teamer, held up the Vince Lombardi Trophy and started a "Yankees suck!" chant. This was February 2002, before Aaron Boone, and before anybody outside of Minnesota and the Dominican Republic ever heard of David Ortiz.
I can recall the Boston Globe's Dan Shaughnessy saying afterwards, "I guarantee you, if the Giants win the Super Bowl, you won't hear anybody chanting, 'Boston sucks!'" Time to see if he's right.
(UPDATE: He was wrong.)
I see that Mayor Bloomberg -- Massachusetts Mike -- is giving the Giants a parade for their Super Bowl win. That's something Ed, uh, Koch wouldn't, uh, do. Remember what he called the Giants before Super Bowl XXI? "This foreign team." Because they played in New Jersey.
Here's an idea: After they leave City Hall in Lower Manhattan, let's restart the motorcade, put 'em through the Holland Tunnel (they should be out the Jersey City end by the time rush hour starts), take 'em onto the Pulaski Skyway over the Turnpike, and take 'em down Newark's Broad Street, and have another celebration at that City Hall. Then get on the McCarter Highway and have one final celebration, the biggest tailgate party the Meadowlands has ever seen. How about it, Mayor Bloomberg? Mayor Booker? Governor Corzine?
That takes care of the Cheatriots. The Bruins aren't going anywhere. The Celtics are next. And where have their fans been since the Hick from French Lick retired? Suddenly, they're talking trash again. It won't be the Knicks who beat them, and almost certainly not the Nets, either, but they will go down hard. Then... Bring on the Fenway Chowdaheads.
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