I don’t even know where to start when it comes to Championship Sunday leading into Super Bowl Sunday…oh wait, I can’t say that cause the NFL bans anyone to use that phrase, so, the big game at the end of the NFL season.  I have to start off letting my Patriot homerism shine through…somebody needs to take Bernard Pollard out.  Seriously, the man is probably more hated in New England than Buckner, Boone, or Dent ever have been.  He has single handedly ended 4 Patriot seasons.  Tore Brady’s ACL when Pollard was with the Chiefs, the next season with the Texans, helped shred Welker’s knee, last season rolled up on Gronk’s ankle, and this year, knocking Ridley out cold, forcing him to drop the ball, basically ending the chance at a comeback for the Patriots.  Then, in the postgame show, Shannon Sharpe, former Raven, rips Belichick for not talking to Steve Tasker on the way off the field.  Really?  He doesn’t talk to the sideline reporter more than half the time, regardless of the score, and even when he does, he basically says things like he said in the post game press conference, “We gave up too many points and we didn’t score enough”.  Really Shannon?  You think that would have been good for CBS?  Shut up.

If you believe in teams destined to win, how can you argue against the Ravens being destined to win?  4th and 29 vs. the Chargers.  The deep throw against the Broncos when the Ravens had no business scoring.  The domination of the second half against the Patriots.  The made for TV movie that is Ray Lewis.  Speaking of Ray Lewis, is anyone else sick of every Ravens broadcast, during the national anthem, the camera basically zooming in up his nostrils while Lewis tries to force out a few tears to add to the caricature of a personality he has become?  Ray Lewis playing his last game will be one of the story lines that will be driven into the ground over and over again the next couple weeks.  Here are the other ones I am already sick of and they haven’t even started.

The Harbowl, or the Bro Bowl, or whatever lame phrase media outlets come up with to go overboard talking about two brothers facing each other as head coaches of the two teams.  The death of the BCS version 2.0.  Yeah, we are still a year away from the BCS being a thing of the past, but how many times will we hear about Flacco coming from Delaware and Kaepernick from Nevada, neither of which are schools anywhere near the national spotlight of college football?  The read option:  We will see clips of Kaepernick running wild against the Packers hundreds of times, and debates as to whether or not the read option is the future of the NFL.  Let me answer that for you…it is absolutely not the future, see Wild Cat.  The Elite QB:  Yup, the arguments are sure to come, is Flacco and elite QB?  I will put up a bounty on the question, can somebody please come up with an original though when it comes to valuing quarterbacks?  Manti T’eo.  Yeah, I am sure his fake girlfriend story will find a way to be a storyline with comparisons and stories of professional athletes being taken advantage of by people of no morale compass.  But I am sorry, I don’t feel bad for you if you are about to make millions of dollars and were gullible enough to have a “relationship” with a woman for several years, but never bothered meeting the girl, didn’t visit her when diagnosed with Leukemia, and didn’t attend her funeral.  The best comment I have heard about it all was on ESPN radio, when the host, whose name is escaping me, simply said, “I had a better time following along with Inception than Manti T’eo”.

Things that are actually intersting leading into the Super Bowl are actually few and far between.  Both teams are a mix of old and new school.  Kaepernick is fun to watch with his speed and insane arm strengh and Flacco throws a great deep ball, while both teams have a solid run attack and impressive defenses.  I see the game being very close, and the deciding factor just may be to one storyline too boring for mainstream media to even care about…kicking.  After setting a record for field goals made last year, Akers has missed double digit field goals this season.  And after seeing their season end on a shanked kick, the Ravens cut a vet in favor of a rookie kicker.  Make or Miss, The game will come down to the kicking game.  Oh joy.