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Emptywheel’s Gigantic Patriotic Bad Ass Mega Super Bowl Trash Talk Houseparty

It is SuperBowl weekend and the biggest story in Indianapolis is Peyton Manning. Probably not fair to Peyton, Indianapolis or the Giants and Pats, but such is how it seems to be playing out. The melodrama has served as a reminder that the Colts are still an Irsay family enterprise and the main difference between Robert “Midnight Mayflower” Irsay and his gabby son Jim is that Jim stumbled into Peyton Manning. Who knew all these years we have been facetiously calling them the “Indianapolis Peytons”, it was pretty much accurate?

Irsay has made almost as much of a hash of things the last couple of weeks as the Susan G. Komen Foundation, which is saying something. I wonder if Ari Fleischer is helping the Colts too? Remember, Ari “helped” the Packers with the Brett Favre separation too, and the end of the Peyton era in Indy is turning every bit as ugly. Manning claims to be cleared to play and is intent on resuming his career; clearly it looks to be in another city though. Hmmm, wonder if Larry Fitzgerald has been in touch?

The Peyton Place soap opera has sapped some of the attention off of the Pats and Giants over the runup to the big game. The New Yawkers have been running their yaps about how awesome they are now and, while still the slight underdog, everybody seems to think the Giants are the team to beat. All of this likely suits Bill Belichick just fine. It is no longer possible to discount Tom Coughlin as a coach, but give Belichick two weeks and sell him short, and you are asking for trouble. It took until the AFC Championship game, but the New England defense finely gelled. Getting linebacker Brandon Spikes and safety Patrick Chung back, along with the sudden awesomeness of Vince Wilfork, has really made a difference. Julius Edelman is the weak link, but Belichick may be able to scheme around him.

The national media has focused on the health of Gronk, and he will play, but the Pats have Aaron Hernandez too. Almost have to wonder if there is not a stealth plan to spread the field vertically with Ochocinco. Heck, might as well give it a try, no one will expect it after him being in the witness protection program all year.

As for the Gents, well, Bad Eli seems to be but a distant memory and the New York offense really is clicking on all cylinders. Victor Cruz is simply an animal, and now Mario Manningham is back. Coupled with the two headed monster of Brandon Jacobs and Ahmad Bradshaw, there really is no weakness. Actually, the same can be said about the Giants defense too, led by Jean Pierre Paul and Justin Tuck. The weakness is the secondary, where the Giants lost enough corners and safeties this year to stock a couple of teams. The situation improved over the year, but if the Pats O-line gives Brady any time at all, he ought to be able to carve em up.

So, what gives? Every factor seems to favor the Giants. There is simply no way to add up all the respective factors and do anything but predict a Giants win. So, I am going to go out on a limb and jinx Marcy. Patriots win on the foot of Stephen Gostkowski. Not to mention Bill Bel just doesn’t lose to a team twice in the same year.

For some strange reason, the NFL picked Madonna for the halftime snoozapalooza. I guess Rosemary Clooney wasn’t available, so they got the next oldest dame they could find. She sure ain’t no virgin anymore. Bleech. As the game is thankfully not in Michigan, at least we don’t have to suffer through Nicleback. So we got that going for us I guess.

So, at least here in this post, we are gonna have some better music. Both cities/teams are represented. For New England, it is the Bad Boys of Beantown, the one and only J. Geils Band, with the classic “Houseparty”. And for New York, it is, of course, They Might Be Giants with the oh so appropo “Take Out The Trash”.

That is the rundown for Super Bowl XLVI. We have a lot of time for pre-game trashin, so what you got and why do you got it? This is the last football of the season, so get down and dirty and let fly the dogs of trash!