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NFL Roundup

The hype gets out of control. The game of the century?
  Michael Larson

 This week we get to finally have the second game of the year. The first was the so called "Duel in Dallas ™ESPN"  I suppose this one shall be called "The battle of the Unbeatens" or something along those lines.  If the Colts win it keeps going with a channel that would love to see the Colts win since Week 10 on Sunday Night on the very aforementioned hype machine ESPN the Colts visit the Chargers. What will ESPN do with that one should the Colts win. Something tells me it doesn't matter. ESPN will find a way to hype it either way. If ESPN had Sunday's New England-Indianapolis game, the pregame show might have started already. CBS is bad enough, Shannon Sharpe called it "the matchup of the century" Sunday, or at least we think that's what he said, he may of said "the trouble with tribbles" you really never can tell with Shannon and his mouthful of marbles.

 I give CBS some credit though, they aren't going completely crazy. They are covering it as an important football game without going too crazy so far. ESPN has had reporters following the two teams all week, and the NFL Network, will just go nuts. This week, it will devote 361/2 hours of coverage — the most it's done for a game other than a Super Bowl.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the NFL Network, but 36+ hours of coverage and they don't have the game. That's just crazy.

 Now that doesn't mean this game isn't interesting. It is very interesting. A defending Super Bowl champion coming into a home game undefeated and a 6 point underdog. Two great teams. However, it's still just November, and early at that. This is not the Super Bowl. It counts for the exact same 1/16th of a season that every game does. Chances are that whichever coach does a better job convincing their players of that, wins the game. My money is on Belichick and his evil hold over everything including his players minds. He probably just will hypnotize them or something to think its game two of the season and the Colts are the Dolphins.

 Both the Patriots' Bill Belichick and the Colts' Tony Dungy have proved themselves masterful at focusing their teams on one week at a time. THis game does have playoff implications if only for home field, the Colts have a lot more reason to win than the Patriots do. Where would you rather play in January?

 None of this justifies the myriad of journalists that are talking about this as the game of the century. I mean we are only 7 year into the century, and my guess is that most of the people involved will tell you that its not as big as oh say the Superbowl.

Information provided in NFL Roundup has been gathered from A.P. reports, ESPN.com, Sportsline.com, NFL.com and numerous other e-sources.