I think I thought I saw you bet on the Colts

Sports Illustrated/HBO/NBC's Peter King -- noted latte lover, youth softball coach and NFL bon vivant -- has made his Monday Morning Quarterback column a weekly must-read for those of us with pigskin fever. His trademark feature (note: not actually trademarked) is "10 Things I Think I Think." I'm going to blatantly rip off Mr. King's bit with tonight's blog post, which I call "Sunday Night Quarterback, As In I Want My Quarter Back That I Bet On The Friggin' Colts."

10 Things I Think I Know, Saturday Edition

10. I think I know that football is more fun in the snow. Every postseason should have one snow game like the Packers and Seahawks staged on Saturday. I only wish I had seen it in HD, although I was spared the obligatory shots of frozen snotsicles dangling from Mike Holmgren's mustache.

9. I think I know that Breffarve loves to play football. Wait a minute -- I know I know that, because I've heard it multiple times in every Packers game I've seen since 1992. "Breffarve loves to play the game of football," or some such derivative of that sentence, has replaced "Joey Browner has the strongest hands in the NFL" as the must-gush line of choice among football broadcasters.

8. I think I know that Marcus Pollard is regretting his decision to sign with a non-dome team. True, it was a road game so it wouldn't have mattered if he'd been a Viking or a Ram or a Colt on Saturday, but have you ever seen a football player more ill-equipped to play in wintry conditions? He dropped more balls than Dick Clark on Saturday. I think one of his fingers actually shattered on the last miscue.

7. I think I know that the Packers are on a roll. How many teams have you seen fall behind 14-0 in the first five minutes of the game and still cruise to an easy victory? I mean, they were down two scores before the antifreeze had started to settle into their fans' bloodstreams, but they had the lead before the first Cheesehead had peed in his snowmobile suit. That, my friends, was impressive.

6. I think I know that Ryan Grant rebounded better than Moses Malone in his prime. Let's assess young Mr. Grant's first NFL playoff game: Two fumbles on his first three touches. Then 201 yards and three touchdowns the rest of the way. And the Packers got him from the Giants for a sixth-round draft pick? Well, before Mike McCarthy, Ted Thompson and the ghost of Curly Lambeau start sucking each other's popsicles, let's recall that Grant languished behind Deshawn Wynn, Brandon Jackson and Vernand Morency on the depth chart before they decided to take a flyer on him in Week 8. So it's not like the Packers braintrust exactly knew what they had in Grant from Day One.

5. I think I know that if anybody can put the fear of God into this year's Patriots, the Jaguars did just that on Saturday night. With young quarterback David Garrard playing the game of his life, the Jags matched the Juggernaut punch-for-punch deep into the third quarter. Garrard appears to be the real deal, Fred Taylor and Maurice Jones-Drew are the top running back tandem in the NFL (sorry AD and Chester), and the defense has enough power and speed to keep up with most mortal offenses. They're going to be the sexy pick to dethrone the Colts in the AFC South next year.

4. I think I know that the Jaguars prove the NFL's Pro Bowl is a fraud. How can a team that went 11-5, beat the Steelers twice on the road and gave the Pats all they wanted in Foxboro have exactly zero Pro Bowlers? I know, Taylor was added as an injury replacement, but come on, can't we all just agree that Pro Bowl voting is a completely fraudulent exercise and the game should be scrapped for good?

3. I think I know that when the Jaguars had to settle for a field goal that cut the Patriots' lead to 21-17 with 4:08 to play in the third quarter, the game was over. You could just feel it -- they'd been matching the Pats score-for-score, and when New England opened the second half with a long touchdown drive, everybody expected the Jags to follow suit. But after marching down to the New England 21, the Jags blinked. Dennis Northcutt dropped a catchable ball at the goal line and the drive stalled, resulting in a Josh Scobee field goal. And sure enough, on their next possession the Patriots went 76 yards in six plays, capped by Tom Brady's ridiculous fake Statue of Liberty TD pass to Ben Watson, giving the Undefeateds a 28-17 lead. And Jacksonville never again had the ball with a chance to tie or take the lead.

2. I think I know that the Patriots just passed their toughest test on the road to 19-0. Or at least the toughest test left on the slate. They went toe-to-toe with a healthy, young, explosive Jacksonville squad and came away with a double-digit win. If you think they're going to get a better game from the banged-up Chargers next week, you're sitting in Dwight Smith's car too much. As for the Super Bowl, there's a reason the AFC has been a two-touchdown favorite over the NFC -- no matter which teams make it -- since midseason.

1. I think I know that the Patriots handled Laurence Maroney just right this year. All season the pundits fretted about the Pats' seeming inability to run the ball, and wondered aloud about Maroney's durability and toughness. But Bill Belichick knew that he didn't need Maroney in September, October or even November -- why rush him back into heavy duty when Tom Brady, Randy Moss, Wes Welker and the rest of the crew could play pitch-and-catch in good weather? Once the tough sledding arrived in December, Maroney was ready to shoulder the burden, and once again Belichick looks like a genius.