Friday, January 18, 2008

Take Today's Poll About the Pats

If you aren't a natural Pats fan, are you rooting for the Pats to go 19-0 or to choke and lose in the Biggest Loss Ever?*

I'm totally intrigued by the idea that there is one segment of the country that wants to see the Pats go 19-0 and there is another segment that desperately wants to see them lose. (Pats fans, of course, are ineligible from consideration for obvious reasons.)

I myself am torn over witnessing the superlative novelty of 19-0... it might just be the greatest feat in team-sports history... and wanting to see them lose, in what would be an all-time epic collapse*. (It's not a choke, per se, but I struggle for the right word to describe the superlative.)

Would I rather see the Pats lose this weekend in the conference title game or in the Super Bowl?

Losing in the Super Bowl would be more dramatic, but I think that the Chargers (even without Rivers) have a better shot of beating the Pats than the Packers or Giants (even on the Super Bowl's neutral field). The bottom line: I don't really care. Seeing them lose at all would be plenty interesting.

But I am curious as to what YOU think, both whether you are rooting for 19-0 or the Biggest Loss Ever* and -- if you are rooting for them to lose -- WHEN you would like to see it happen.

Take the poll in the upper-right-hand corner.

-- D.S.

* - The closest thing I can think of to compete with the Pats losing in either of the next two games would be the unstoppable 1991 UNLV team losing in the Final Four to Duke... but that UNLV team had an excuse -- there's a long-standing urban legend that they were on the take to tank the game. That's right, Duke fans: I discount any credit assigned for what was arguably the greatest win in Duke program history.

7 comments:

John said...

If you're a completely unbiased fan (which I realize doesn't exist) who appreciates the history of sports, I think you root for 19-0, because it's a once in a lifetime occurrence. Historic chokes/loses in sports seem to be fairly common. Hell, just this past CFB season you had two of them with USC losing to Stanford and Michigan losing to Appalachian St.

Luke said...

I'm hoping for a Chargers/Giants Superbowl. Then we could see who was the biggest winner of the 2004 Draft/trade.

The Professor said...

Yes, Chargers have a better shot, BUT, if you want the best-case scenario it is for the Pats to lose in the Super Bowl to the Giants.

First of all, if the Pats lose this weekend, we are in for one of the biggest let-down super bowls ever, if not the biggest. What is the story? There is none unless Favre is going for a title, and it is not like Elway when he was going for his first after a bunch of near-misses. Favre has a title and actually there is a large segment of football fans that are turned-off by Favre, so it would not be a universal rooting-point.

If the Pats go on to lose the Super Bowl it would be one of the biggest upsets in the history of sports* and it would come on the biggest stage in sports. And if you really want Boston-area fans to suffer, it has to be to the Giants. The agida-factor would max-out if they lost to a Manning for the second consecutive season in the playoffs and especially if it were the lesser-Manning on the road to going 19-0.

mmmmmm. Just thinking about it gets me giddy as a school-girl.

*Team USA over Russia would be a bigger upset, but it was not on a big stage and if I recall the game wasn't even live on TV.

marcomarco said...

Like we Pats fans aren't gonna vote in your poll. okey.

@the professor
That was a well thought out, articulated point. In regards to the agida, if I had to pick one team of the three that'd I'd rather lose to it would be the Giants. Most of the league wouldn't have manned up like they did in week 17.

Kover said...

Depends on who they play. If it's the Pack, then I want the Pats to make history. But if my G-Men make it, then I want them to spoil history.

SMangat said...

i just want the pats to go undefeated so the dolphins can't do their dumb celebration anymore and that they will finally shut up and be confined to history. the world will be a better place when all those boners are off the airwaves and forgotten about.

Mike! said...

I'm a relocated Eagles fan whose heart was broken against the Pats in Super Bowl XXXIX.

I've since relocated to Florida, and hoped the Jags could pull off one of the greatest upsets in history.

At this point, the Patriots had better frigging go 19-0.

Though a win for Favre could be the highest possible note on which to call it a career.