Eli to assume hero status a la Bucky Dent

Editor's note: My name is Francis McCabe. I'm 31 and have been a New York Giants fan since I watched them lose to the Chicago Bears in the playoffs in January 1985. (It helps that in 1986 the Giants won the Super Bowl.) The Giants will win today because God, like everyone else, loves New York and dislikes Boston. God is still bitter about being stuck in Beantown traffic because of the Big Dig.

All hail the New England Patriots, Super Bowl XLII champions.

Boston city officials are planning the victory parade. The Boston Globe already is selling the book "19-0" in honor of the Pats' perfect season.

Next thing you know, Patriots quarterback Tom Brady will announce he's on his way to Disney World.

Wait a second. What do you mean they haven't played the game yet?

We've seen this type of bravado before from Boston sports fans. All the more in recent years, with baseball's Boston Red Sox proving there was no curse; they just sucked for 86 years.

These Pats are not the lovable figures of Boston sports lore. These Patriots lack the likability of the Red Sox' Carl Yastrzemski, the humbleness of the Celtics' Bill Russell or the respectability of former Patriot John Hannah.

They're smug. They run up the score.

They cheat. They spy on their opponents and hook up with hot models after dumping the hot actresses they impregnate.

They have phony fans. Those claiming to be Patriots fans are just Red Sox fans waiting for pitchers and catchers to report. If I'm wrong, then why is it that after the Patriots won their first Super Bowl, the crowd at the parade started chanting, "Let's go Red Sox"?

They're dirty. They employ the dirtiest player in the league, safety Rodney Harrison.

And football fans watched with disgust as Pats linebacker Mike Vrabel leg-whipped San Diego Chargers quarterback Philip Rivers during the AFC Championship Game. Rivers had knee surgery a week before the game, which makes the kick by Vrabel, who was pre-med at Ohio State, all the more cowardly.

These are the type of Bostonians who made Benjamin Franklin want to leave Massachusetts and move to Philadelphia. (Apparently, Philly was a step up.)

The Patriots have become the evil empire of the NFL.

On the other side of the field today will be an upstart team that no one believed would be playing in the Super Bowl.

The Giants weren't even the fourth-best team in the NFC this year.

I still remember the day I started rooting for the New York Giants.

I was 8, sitting on our couch in Brooklyn, N.Y., with my dad and a family friend, Gus, and we were watching the Giants take a pounding -- not dissimilar to what happens in prison movies, as I recall -- by the Chicago Bears.

It was Jan. 5, 1985. The Giants lost 21-0 in that divisional playoff game.

Before that moment, I was a one-sport kid. New York Yankees baseball meant the world to me.

I had a Bucky Dent T-shirt before I knew about the home run that the easygoing shortstop from Georgia hit in Fenway Park to knock the Red Sox out of the playoffs.

Most people believed Dent didn't stand a chance when he stepped to the plate that fall.

Most people aren't giving the Giants much of a chance today.

New York fans will rely on another Southerner to add to the immortality of the New York-Boston sports rivalry.

A quiet, unassuming Louisianian with professional football blood running through his veins will be taking snaps for the G-men.

I won't deny that it will take the Giants and Eli Manning playing near-perfect football to defeat the near-perfect Patriots.

But I'm nervous for only one reason: I believe they can win.

Contact reporter Francis McCabe at fmccabe@reviewjournal.com or (702) 387-2904.