Sorry. I’ll be organizing my closets or taking a nap during this one. There is a reason the NFL “flexed’’ this game out of prime time into a pedestrian 1 p.m. time slot: The Colts are terrible. They are 0-11 and their quarterback this afternoon is the immortal Dan Orlovsky.
Wise guys say that Peyton Manning has made his best case for league MVP this year. His absence has turned the Colts into a joke. When Tom Brady got hurt, the 2008 Patriots were able to go 11-5 with Matt Cassel at quarterback.
The Colts without Manning have folded up like the September Red Sox. They are on a collision course with the No. 1 draft pick, which means that Andrew Luck can be the successor to Manning. Meanwhile, we get this dog of a game today in Foxborough.
Too bad. I miss the good old days of the “18-12 Overture,’’ the days when Patriots-Colts was Ali-Frazier. The Patriots-Colts game was the annual highlight of the schedule. They played every year, often meeting a second time in the playoffs.
Patriots-Colts gave us Willie McGinest and that fabulous goal line stand in 2003. It gave us that terrific 24-14 AFC Championship joust in the ’03 season when Ty Law caught three of Manning’s passes and Colts GM Bill Polian (who hates the Patriots the way Belichick hates Charley Casserly) successfully petitioned the league to change the rules on jamming receivers at the line of scrimmage.
It was the Patriots-Colts AFC Championship game of January 2007 at the Hoosier Dome/RCA Dome that indirectly led to the undefeated Patriot team of 2007. When the Patriots blew a 21-3 lead and lost, 38-34, Belichick went back to work and assembled the uber-team (remember Randy Moss) that went 18-0.
The 2007 regular-season match between the Patriots and Colts - played at Lucas Oil (Can Boyd) Stadium - was billed as the NFL’s regular-season game of the century. It did not disappoint, as the Patriots walked out of Indy with a 24-20 victory en route to a big scare for Mercury Morris and friends.
