NFL Conference Championship Games Tomorrow

Tomorrow will be the day of the National Football League conference championship games for the 2013 season.  Winners will face off in the Super Bowl.  In the National Conference, the Seattle Seahawks will be a formidable opponent at home against the San Francisco 49ers, who went to the Super Bowl last year (and very narrowly lost).  In the American Conference, the Denver Broncos will host the New England Patriots.  I like the NFC teams, largely due to their coaches, and dislike the AFC teams for different reasons.  I'm a big fan of Seahawks coach Pete Carroll and his positive enthusiasm, which is pretty infectious.  The 49er coach Jim Harbaugh is somebody that I initially didn't care for, as I felt he was a bit too abrasive.  Now I've come to a different conclusion: he is a man of his convictions and won't back off from them just to get to placate others...and he does have a blunt demeanor to his personality.  But I kind of like that, though.  I also like the San Francisco quarterback Colin Kaepernick and the way he socked it back to the Carolina Panthers in last week's playoff game.  He's got spunk, and unlike Lou Grant...I like spunk!

On the other side, I dislike Denver for various reasons.  For one, I'm sick and tired of the way their quarterback Peyton Manning, who never could beat my Florida Gators when he played in college for Tennessee, is always treated as some kind of superhuman football Einstein.  His baby brother, though, has won more Super Bowls than him and I'd like to keep it that way.  I also dislike the way that the Denver organization, led by John Elway, allowed Tim Tebow to turn the franchise around in the middle of the 2011 season from a last-place loser to a division and first-round playoff game winner...and then unceremoniously dump him in favor of King Peyton.  I do like their coach John Fox, though, and share with him the same medical situation, albeit not to the degree that he had it before he successfully underwent corrective surgery in the middle of the season.  Still, overall I dislike Denver and would have an easy time rooting against them tomorrow were they playing anyone else besides the New England Patriots, a franchise whose arrogance and historical disregard for the rules dwarf anyone else...except possibly the New Orleans Saints and their "bounty" scandal of last season.  Illegally videotaping other teams' sidelines during games in order to cheat on their strategies makes all of their three Super Bowl victories (for the 2001, 2003, and 2004 seasons) suspect in my mind.  I admire qb Tom Brady and his skill and poise...too bad he doesn't play for the Miami Dolphins, their divisional rival and the NFL team I root for the most (mostly in vain).  So I'm not sure who to pull for in this game...but right now I'm leaning toward Denver (while holding my nose).  Regardless who wins it, though, it will be the SF/Seattle winner that I will want to win the upcoming Super Bowl...