On Super Bowl XLII, two weeks later

Two weeks have gone by, and the rejoicing has finally started to abate for me. Two weeks before stopping to feel euphoric when evoking the past Superbowl and its thrilling ending. It has taken this long, mind you, and that´s a testament to the over-the-top intensity of my rooting for the Giants in the title game. But even if the spontaneous euphoria is gone, I still feel a deep-boned and joyful satisfaction that can only be explained by knowing that, indeed, justice was accomplished. Let me tell you why.

It will come as no surprise to anybody who followed the past regular season that many fans of the Patriots were supremely rude and snide. They bragged constantly about their team´s invincibility, interrupting discussions about completely non-related matters, such as those focused on other teams, just to place their beloved "19-0!" or even better, "your team sucks, go Patriots!" (go check this forum for proof, a thorough search is truly mind-boggling). They felt that everything was about their team, and that everyone had to bow before them. The slightest criticism started flame wars among the worst I had ever seen, rounds that went on and on about how the Patriots were the best team ever, and we were just jealous. It was anadulterated, mindless gushing and bragging and whining. Now, of course, they just can´t take the heat and want the rest of us to let it go.
Yes, I really feel what we endured was some of the worst behaviour ever by sports fans, short of violence of course.

But it´s not primarily because of a vast amount of fans that I wanted the Patriots to lose with the intensity of a thousand suns. No, it´s because I feel the team itself, coach and players, reproducted those traits and eventually encouraged them in their fans.

Of course you expect some stupid fans to brag about a "perfect season" before it´s over. But the Patriots themselves wrote a book about that. And do you remember how many times we had to read during the season about how the players and Belichick were just incensed about the press coverage after Spygate broke out, and how they used that as motivation? Do you remember reading about poor Tom Brady feeling very angry that his team´s accomplishments were questioned? Do you remember Robert Kraft saying that their success was such that it just prompted people to try to take down a franchise that made all of them proud?
Yes, I think for me the clincher in my Patriots-hatred was the hypocrisy and the unsportsmanship. All the talk, for years, about the "Patriot´s way", about how if you were one it wasn´t just about being a good player but also a good person? Please. They hired Randy Moss. Passion for the game? Good human being? I´ ll have neither. And you know what? Most of us are honest enough to realize that a franchise just can´t be made of entirely fair, respectful and kind individuals. Too big, and just not going to happen in this society, particularly in an organization dedicated to competition and profit. No, other teams don´t wax poetic about being the moral center of the universe. Of course, every time a player is caught with his hand in the bag, they come out and say it´s not what the team stands for, yadda yadda yadda (see Michael Vick, Jordan Babineaux, etc...). But they don´t sell that image to the public with the kind of devout holiness you saw in the Patriots. They were the ones who set up that standard, and when they get caught, they spend their time complaining about the unfairness of it all?

Entitlement. For all the talk about how the Patriots are a bunch of hard-working, team-oriented guys, just the embodiment of non-entitlement, they are just that, a franchise (it´s not fair at this stage to include all the players in this statement) that lives by the double standard. Their pride comes from their results? Tony Dungy and Peyton Manning finally avance to the Super Bowl last year, and Bill Belichick just can´t congratulate them and honor the great game that had just ended. Football counts until the last second? Well, if you´re gonna run up the score in the most outrageous way against the Bills (twice), Dolphins, and Redskins, you sure as hell stay on the field for one more second in your only defeat of the season, after one of the most intense, dramatic and beautiful games in NFL history, even if it´s on the biggest stage. You owe that to your sport, period.

You get caught in week 1 violating the league´s rules, a.k.a cheating, more proof comes out that shows you had already been caught doing that, and you release a press statement that doesn´t even own up to it, just evokes a misunderstanding about the term "prohibition"? And if you think Belichick is the only one responsible for it, well, I´m still waiting for Kraft to take some serious action that would indicate he wasn´t in cahoots with Belichick.
You get caught cheating and complain your accomplishments and your integrity are questioned? Memo to unsportsman jerks: yes, cheating is forbidden, which is why results adquired by cheatings aren´t recognized. And even when you don´t know the full extent of the cheating, a strong suspicion taints everything you´ve done. Should we have given Ekaterina Thanou Marion Jones´s Sydney 100 m gold medal, I wonder...


So yes, imagine how utterly ecstatic I was when Eli Manning, the G-Men´s offensive line, David Tyree, Plaxico Burress and the others gave all of us memories for a lifetime. How it felt to watch pure magic unfold, and to see the New York team put an extraordinary finish to an oustanding journey (more about that later).
Yes, you´re damn right a lot of people who are not fans of the Giants celebrated Superbowl XLII with passion. Monday the 4th was indeed "National gloating day" for many (and even broader, not all of us are US-bred sports fans).

Since then, for me, satisfaction has been a constant companion, a sweet cherry pie that has reminded me of all the reasons why sometimes, sports shows the true spirit of life.