By MIKE HERNDON
Hey, did you hear that a bunch of politicians aren’t going to watch the Super Bowl because they don’t like Bad Bunny?
If you said “me neither,” you can stop reading (if you even got this far – I know that first sentence had a couple big words in it). If you said “so what,” please continue because we’re now going to discuss something those pandering politicians care nothing about: football.
There’s a game being played Sunday, if you haven’t noticed, and the Seahawks and Patriots make for an intriguing matchup. It’s a rematch of Super Bowl XLIX, when Malcolm Butler jumped a slant route and picked off Russell Wilson in the end zone to seal a Patriots win and leave Marshawn Lynch and the rest of the country wondering why he didn’t get the ball.
It should make for some interesting moments if the Seahawks have the ball at the 1 again on Sunday. Different players, different coaching staffs, but you know what the announcers will be talking about.
Super Bowl LX could be the crowning moment in one of the better comeback stories in all of sports – the rebirth of Sam Darnold. Given up for dead in New York, benched in Carolina, Darnold was written off as a bust before he spent a year as a backup in San Francisco and then led Minnesota to a 14-3 record last season.
The Vikings decided to let Darnold walk and promote former first-round pick J.J. McCarthy to the starting role. And now former Minnesota GM Kwesi Adolfo-Mensah is unemployed and Darnold is in the Super Bowl. He can add the final line to this fairy tale with a victory over New England on Sunday.
Or the game could be the next step to superstardom for Drake Maye. The second-year pro has come into his own under the tutelage of Mike Vrabel, whom the Titans inexplicably ran off two years ago, and Josh McDaniels, who remains as good an offensive coordinator as he is an awful head coach. Ever comfortable in the pocket and unafraid to roam out of it, he’s played well enough to push his name into MVP contention while flipping the Patriots’ record from 4-13 to 14-3.
While the quarterbacks dominate the headlines, there are several other key matchups that should be factors in Sunday’s outcome:
- Can the Patriots run on a Seahawks defensive front that allowed an NFL-low 3.7 yards per carry this year?
- Can Christian Gonzalez and the Patriots’ secondary find a way to contain Jaxon Smith-Njigba?
- Can the Seahawks’ offensive line protect Darnold, who has struggled against pressure in the past, against a Patriots’ pass rush that has been disruptive, particularly in the interior line?
To me, however, what’s going to determine to this game is clear – turnovers. Both teams have occasionally had trouble with them. Darnold has historically been turnover-prone when pressured, and the Seahawks had five turnovers in their three losses this year. New England had seven turnovers in its three losses (five against Pittsburgh) and only survived its three turnovers in the divisional round against the Texans because its defense forced five.
Whichever team turns the ball over the fewest times will win this game. It’s not rocket science, I know, but when these two teams have lost, it’s usually been turnovers that did them in. Stands to reason, that’s what will get one of them on Sunday.
I’m thinking it’s New England that will get got. The prediction: Seahawks 27, Patriots 24.
The only real losers, though, will be the Vikings and Titans – and anybody upset because the halftime performer at the Super Bowl “should be American.”
Categories: NFL
Sportschasers 
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