Whose #1?

Lately, the only conversation I hear around football is the search for the best team in the league. More specifically, who is better, the New England Patriots or the Indianapolis Colts? People from each side have great reasons for their decisions, but the honest truth is that those teams are in a dead heat. Neither team is better than the other, and if they are, it's by the slightest margin. Even if one team dominates the other come November 4th, it won't matter, because the real game won't come until they meet again in the AFC championship game.

The big thing I keep hearing that the Colts are the better team because they are the defending champs and they have played and beaten better teams than the Patriots. I can basically agree with both statements, but I don't think you can dock the Patriots, who don't create their own schedule, for beating the teams they've been asked to beat. And really, look at who these teams have played. The Colts have beaten the Saints, Titans, Texans, Broncos, Bucs and Jaguars. The Patriots have beaten the Jets, Chargers, Bills, Bengals, Browns, Cowboys and Dolphins. Looking at who each team has beaten, both have 3 or 4 quality wins in my mind and both got lucky by playing good teams (i.e. Saints and Chargers) before they got things relatively back on track. Both teams have won 3 games against divisional opponents and both have beaten good NFC teams.

The truth of the matter, is that if both teams win this week and we get an amazing undefeated match-up in Week 9, whichever team comes out victorious has a great chance to go for a perfect season. We should all just forget the talk about who the better team is and be more impressed at how great these teams have been for so long. It's easy to overlook these two juggernauts because they have been SO good for SO long, but don't forget to look around the league and see how hard it is to be good year after year in the NFL. That means you, Philly, Chicago, San Deigo, New York, Pittsburgh, Cincinnati, Dallas, Baltimore, New Orleans, Seattle and everybody else who follows a 12 win season with a 5 win stink bomb.