The Denver Broncos have the AFC’s No. 1 seed, the home-field advantage, a regular-season season win over the New England Patriots and the league’s No. 1 defense in a number of categories.
But the Orange & Blue don’t have the backing of oddsmakers or certainly the overwhelming majority of the national prognosticators heading into Sunday afternoon’s AFC Championship Game.
Despite a 30-24 overtime loss to the Broncos in Week 12, Tom Brady and the defending Super Bowl champs were immediately established as point-spread favorites earlier this week. The line has risen to as much as 3.5 points before settling in at a field goal here two days before kickoff, making the Patriots only the ninth conference-championship-round road team to be favored in the last 30 years.
But, hey, that’s somewhat understandable when you’re talking about the Bill Belichick-coached defending champions hailing from the East Coast and making their fifth straight AFC title game appearance with a full complement of weapons for one of the game’s all-time great QBs.
A little more puzzling – and disrespectful to a 13-4 Orange & Blue squad which has posted a league-best 6-2 mark against fellow playoff teams – is the near-landslide of national pro-Patriots media projections which have followed.
Of the 13 ESPN “experts” forecasting Sunday’s title-game winners, only two – Seth Wickersham and (naturally) Bronco Ring-of-Famer Tom Jackson – are siding with the Broncos.
The same ratio holds on the USA Today NFL picks page where six of the seven prognosticators are going with the Pats.
The most lopsided major national prediction, though, we’ve come across was Greg Bedard’s forecast of a 42-17 New England blowout in the current issue (cover date Jan. 25) of Sports Illustrated.
And we’re sure the 18-3 pro-Patriots ratio we’ve discussed so far pales in comparison to the “edge” in the New England media, who seem to be equating the Brady-over-Peyton Manning advantage as all there is be said about the matchup.
Some of the Broncos’ players haven’t helped but notice.
“Oh, you know, ‘We don’t have a chance,’ ” running back C.J. Anderson told the media throngs Thursday. “If that doesn’t motivate you, then you are in the wrong business. We are supposed to go out there and get killed on Sunday, which is funny to me.
“Just go out there and play business. That’s why you play the game.”
On that last part, teammate T.J. Ward agrees.
“I try not to listen to all of the noise,” Ward said Thursday. “You hear some of it, but it is what it is. We have to go out there and prove it. We’re not world champs. We haven’t been world champs. We’re going against the defending world champs, so it’s only right.”
