Final Thoughts before the Super Bowl

With only hours to go before the last game of this season, some football musings:

-What does the NFL think it's accomplishing having a regular season game in London? Are British fans suddenly so hardcore that pre-season games aren't good enough for them? As a measure of how excited Brits are over this, the Feb. 2 announcement was unreported in the London Times. And of course the loss of one of only eight home games is significant for both the team and the fans.

-I don't even want to think about how many Ted Johnson-type stories there must be out there.

-Nice to see Thurman Thomas get his induction to Canton. The guy was definitely one of the NFL's elite RBs, along with Emmitt Smith and Barry Sanders, for a good number of years, and was a versatile weapon in the Bills' no-huddle offense. Recent all-purpose backs like Marshall Faulk and Reggie Bush must have especially high respect for him. Still, you wonder if the reason that he didn't make it in on his first try is that the most enduring image of him is, unfortunately, this one.

-While we're on the subject of the Hall of Fame, call me a homer, but Kuechenberg got robbed.

-Why is Terrell Owens hugging Donovan McNabb at a party in Miami a news story?

-Nice call getting Prince for the halftime show. Should be the complete opposite of last year's tepid, phoned-in performance by the Stones.

-Bill Parcells: all the guy did was turn around one franchise after another. Retires as one of the all-time coaching legends, in the same class as Lombardi, Shula, Walsh, and indeed Belichick.

-Colts 30, Bears 17.