This is it people. It all comes down to one final game.

Four years after the epic Super Bowl showdown between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants comes the much-anticipated Super Bowl sequel in Super Bowl XLVI this Sunday in Indianapolis. The players insist this is a completely new chapter from the first championship meeting, won 17-14 by the Giants in Glendale, Arizona.

In many ways, that’s true. Neither team is trying to complete a historic perfect ride like the 18-0 New England Patriots were that season, only to be thwarted in the final minute by the Giants. It’s just hard to ignore that 16 Giants and eight Patriots (seven active) are returning from Super Bowl XLII. The carryover is obvious, even if no one is willing to admit it.

The sides met during the regular season, with the New York Giants coming out on top, 24-20, in Week 9. With the stage set, can the Patriots really beat these guys? Because jeez, they are coming into Super Bowl XLVI with the Giants carrying a win over them the last time they met in the grandest stage of football and another win the last time they met each other in the field.

Of course, leading the way for the Patriots is still Tom Brady. By his own admission, Brady was not sharp in the AFC championship game against the Ravens. He threw a pair of picks, not the recipe for success in the postseason. Usually that means someone pays the next game, and Brady vowed as much, telling Patriots owner Robert Kraft he would make up for it in the Super Bowl.

On the other side of the field is Eli Manning, a guy looking to cement his…

Read More » NE Patriots – NY Giants Rematch in Super Bowl XLVI

And for those of you looking for a nip slip, Madonna already made sure there won’t be any.

In an interview with Jay Leno Tuesday night, Madonna was asked what everyone can expect of her on-stage at Super Bowl XLVI this Sunday, to which the pop queen replied, ”Well, for sure no nipples.”

The ‘Material Girl’ is acutely aware of how important the Super Bowl is to American pop culture. ”First of all, it’s the Super Bowl,” Madonna said. ”The Super Bowl is kind of like the holiest of holy in America. I’m going to come in halfway between the church experience, and I’m going to have to deliver a sermon that’s going to have to be very impactful.”

Rumors are all over the internet that Madonna will perform with Nicki Minaj and M.I.A., who joined her in the recording of ‘Give Me All Your Luvin,’ at the halftime show of the Super Bowl rematch between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants. Other songs Madonna will sing for sure are Vogue and Ray of Light.

”I have to say that over 25 years of performing, I’ve never worked so hard or been so scrupulous or detail-oriented,” she said from the JW Marriott Downtown. ”I’m really excited to be here. I feel very welcomed. I’ve been inside the stadium, and the stadium is great. I just keep pinching myself.”

The singer wouldn’t divulge many details regarding her impending show…

Read More » Madonna to perform in Super Bowl XLVI Halftime Show

It’s that time of the year when companies take advantage of the biggest sporting event of the year.

And in case you didn’t get it, the biggest sporting event of the year is Super Bowl XLVI between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants. And guess what, Jerry Seinfeld will be back on TV, and this time it will actually be funny. Sure, it is just a commercial, but that is far better than the travesty he called The Marriage Ref.

Seinfeld is starring in an ad for the new Acura NSX as the car manufacturer amps up the advertising budget and goes all in for the Super Bowl rematch between the New England Patriots and the New York Giants.

They certainly won’t be the only ones. The Super Bowl breaks the advertising budget for many companies. The results are always mixed, but that ads that work leave a lasting impression. Here are three that are going to work and will have the highest ratings when the New England Patriots and the New York Giants mix it up again.

Acura’s Seinfeld Ad. Say what you will about Jerry Seinfeld, but the man clearly knows value. That’s why he was willing to go to all ends of the earth to be the first man to own the Acura NSX. Seriously, watch for yourself. The man he was negotiating with clearly knows how to get the most out of a deal.

Next we have Honda’s Ferris Bueller Ad. Broderick parodies his…

Read More » TV Commercials you’ll see in Super Bowl XLVI

Because just betting on the game itself is boring.

Just like every year, the rest of the world will once again be on a standstill as the two final teams in the NFL decide who will be this year’s champions in Super Bowl XLVI.

And every year, the whole shebang gets started by a famous person tossing a coin into the air. The team winning the toss gets to decide whether they want to begin the game on offense or defense. Theoretically this choice might produce an advantage. If so, would be interesting to know how much. The same thing happens in physics – just how much signal is hidden in the random noise of an experimental apparatus?

Let’s take a look at the numbers and try to see what kind of advantage the toss-winning team has. Yeah sure, both the New England Patriots and the New York Giants probably won’t admit that they pay attention to this mumbo jumbo, but I have a feeling they do.

The data is pretty straightforward – in 43 coin tosses, the winner has gone on to win 20 games and lose 23 games. As such, it would seem that winning the toss is a disadvantage. But is it, or is the seeming disadvantage just a matter of the random fluctuations inherent in a small sample size?

Keep in mind that the fairness of the toss itself isn’t really the issue. If they all came up heads that wouldn’t necessarily have any bearing on whether winning that biased toss was actually an advantage in winning the game. We just want to know if a toss win has any bearing on game outcome.

If there were no relationship between wining the toss and…

Read More » Betting on the Coin Toss in Super Bowl XLVI?

Because the last time they were the underdogs heading to a Super Bowl, they actually won the damn thing.

New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin has shrugged off many suggested comparisons to his Super Bowl winners from four years as he prepared his players for Sunday’s National Football League (NFL) title rematch against the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XLVI.

Yet the New York Giants coach said on Thursday he was still tapping into one of the underlying themes used to motivate his players for their upset of the then-unbeaten Patriots in the Super Bowl.

”It’s still us against the world,” said New York Giants head coach Tom Coughlin, recalling the rallying cry used by the 12-point underdog Giants who denied New England’s bid for the first 19-0 season four years ago in Super Bowl XLII. ”That’s the way we play it, period. We’re still the underdogs. We still have an awful lot to prove.”

The New England Patriots, riding a 10-game winning streak, are three-point favorites over the Giants, who powered themselves into the playoffs after a four-game losing streak and are bidding to become the first 9-7 team to win the Lombardi Trophy.

”Talk is cheap, play the game,” added Coughlin, using another of his…

Read More » NY Giants love being the underdogs of Super Bowl XLVI

Yeah, it looks like Brady just earned a new group of haters.

And come Super Bowl XLVI, those guys will root for the Patriots’ opponents, that’s for damn sure. Yes, Tom Brady just made one innocent but insensitive remark that created quite an uproar in Buffalo. Sure, Brady probably didn’t mean to offend anyone by it but just because he’s the quarterback everybody loves to see fail, they’re ganging up on Brady like a five-dollar whore.

You see, in case you didn’t know, a throwaway remark aimed at thanking his parents for supporting his career has made Tom Brady ”the most-hated man in Buffalo.”

During a media session on Wednesday, the New England Patriots quarterback was asked to describe the commitment made by his father, Tom, Sr., in the early days of his career. Brady had no idea he was about to stumble into a storm of controversy, at least in the proud New York city by the Canadian border.

”My dad was always there to support me,” Brady said. ”He’s been there every step of the way. Then I went to school a long ways from home (University of Michigan) and he and my mom were there at every home football game that they could possibly be at and a lot of road games, too.”

”And even when I started my pro career, he traveled to Buffalo…

Read More » Buffalo is not good enough for Tom Brady

Probably because he’s been in quite a lot of them.

Tom Brady glides through media day heading to Super Bowl XLVI as though he’s a contestant on one of those rigged game shows from the early days of television. He knows what the questions are going to be. He knows the answers. He plays along. He wins the giant jackpot.

And so it was yesterday morning at Lucas Oil Stadium as veteran Patriots quarterback Tom Brady took part in his fifth Super Bowl media day. He was funny if your presence required him to be funny, humble when you needed him to be humble.

Need a comment about our armed services? Madonna? Haircuts? You came to the right place. And if you were from Brazil, from Mexico, from Canada, from Germany, Tom Brady was able to say something that made it seem like he grew up there. What’s that, a Japanese reporter wanted him to give a shout-out to his show’s host back home in Toyko?

”I’ve been to Tokyo,” the New England Patriots franchise quarterback said…

Read More » Tom Brady knows the drill heading to Super Bowl XLVI

Yeah, because four years ago in Super Bowl XLII, the Patriots simply were unable to.

From studying videotape of the Giants’ defense this season, the New England Patriots know they must protect Tom Brady this Sunday in Super Bowl XLVI. This revelation was disclosed Monday by their center, Dan Connolly, who concluded that it will take ”work and effort” to shield Brady from a pass rush from the team that pummelled him four years ago in Super Bowl XLII but, in what must be a relief to New England fans everywhere, ”yes, I think we can do it.”

In answering everything but saying nothing, Connolly sounded positively Belichickian — if, in fact, the dour coach of the New England Patriots were acting at all like himself. For the second consecutive day, Bill Belichick treated his interview session like a fireside chat, as lively as his fuchsia tie. If you closed your eyes, you could have envisioned him sitting in a rocking chair, telling stories — about his early shortcomings, his respect for the Giants, his admiration for Coach Tom Coughlin — before a rapt audience.

Yes, Bill Belichick was reflective, expansive, even humorous: a reporter from Germany, before asking about right tackle Sebastian Vollmer, told him that everyone back in his country would be rooting for the Patriots on Sunday. ”Great,” Belichick said.

Belichick said that Vollmer, out since injuring his ankle in Week 12, could play Sunday — and the Patriots could use his strength, especially if he is matched against Justin Tuck. It was Tuck who had two sacks in Super Bowl XLII — one of five recorded by the New York Giants defense, which also forced a fumble — and it was Tuck who last week said of Brady, ”the way to kill the snake is to take off his head.”

In that regard, the Giants are like every other New England opponent…

Read More » Patriots to protect Brady better against the Giants?

Yep, he sure loves the spotlight.

While football fans prepare for Super Bowl XLVI this Sunday in Indianapolis, football fans from the area have another thing on their minds lately and that’s the possibility that their beloved Indianapolis Colts just might decide to show the city’s most beloved hero, Peyton Manning, the door.

Based off the Tuesday TV sitdown with ESPN’s Hannah Storm, Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay pretty much said the Colts won’t pay injured Peyton Manning the $28 million bonus he’s due March 8, and may show him the door in Indy and let him walk as a free agent.

Storm showed a clip from Tuesday’s “SportsCenter Special: NFL Face to Face” (9 p.m. ET) on Monday morning’s SportsCenter. The special features Storm interviewing Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay, Cam Newton, Aaron Rodgers and others.

Manning’s endured three neck surgeries. In the clip shown by Storm on Monday’s SportsCenter, Irsay says it’s a ”health issue” not a money issue. Peyton Manning made about $18 million this season but never played a down.

”This is not a knee, not a shoulder or an ankle. This is a neck. It’s my responsibility as an owner to make sure that if I’m going to put a player back on the field, that it’s in his best interest.” Irsay says he has ”great loyalty” to Manning and won’t trade him. At the same time, he can’t afford to make major financial decisions on a ”sentimental” basis.

”This isn’t fantasy football,” says Irsay…

Read More » It’s Super Bowl XLVI and they’re talking about Peyton?

It’s back to Hawaii for NFL players who missed out on playing for the big dance.

That’s right, before the New England Patriots and the New York Giants resume their Super Bowl rivalry from four years ago in Super Bowl XLVI, the rest of the NFL heads back to Hawaii for the annual showcase of the league’s best.

It’s the 2012 NFL Pro Bowl people. And while these players may have missed out on playing in the big dance, at least they have an opportunity to end their year on a high note against some of the league’s best.

The league deciding to schedule the Pro Bowl on the weekend before the Super Bowl in 2010 is a brilliant idea. Well, not so brilliant since they should’ve done this a long time ago. I mean, come on, would you still watch the Pro Bowl after all the hype leading up to the Super Bowl is over? I certainly won’t. The Super Bowl is supposed to be the ultimate football game and as far as I’m concerned, it is the game I would like to watch last.

Last year, the NFC handed the AFC with a 55-41 loss so it is safe to say that the AFC will want to even the score come Sunday.

Leading them this year at quarterback is Ben Roethlisberger. After his Pittsburgh Steelers got unceremoniously booted out of the playoffs by Tim Tebow and the Denver Broncos, you know Roethlisberger will be out looking to prove something the rest of the league.

Unfortunately for him, there’s this one quarterback from the NFC who…

Read More » The 2012 NFL Pro Bowl is on this weekend