By Stephen Silver

It's Tirico and Theissman who are supposed to team with Michaels on MNF, not Mike Patrick.  

Bring the Pain: Super Bowl Preview 

Super Bowl Week has arrived, and with it Super Bowl Hype. The Steelers and the Seahawks are in town, ready for five days of media and meaninglessness. 

Rather than the expected subject matter of "Bettis is a great guy" and "being in Detroit sucks for us," reporters' views of Monday were dominated by the news of a fender-bender sustained by the Seahawks' team bus. No one was hurt, but wow, I can't help but be reminded of George Costanza's awkward question to Keith Hernandez- "wouldn't you think that sometime, during Super Bowl Week, a whole team would just be wiped out?" 

But more importantly, there's the actual game to worry about. We've got a bizarre situation in which a #1 seed is playing a #6, yet it's somehow the six seed that's favored. East Coast Bias? Partially, but it's more that Pittsburgh is coming with greater momentum, and likely would have a higher record (and seed) were it not for Ben Roethlisberger's pesky thumb. 

I see a hard-fought game by both teams, with the lead changing hands multiple times and the outcome still in doubt going into the fourth quarter. And much as the ABC/ESPN gods are praying for a game-winning touchdown by Mr. Bettis, it'll instead be Willie Parker taking the handoff from Roethlisberger with just a minute left, and running it in for the winning touchdown. Steelers 27, Seahawks 24. 

Even more of a lock: our former editor, John Strausbaugh, will not much enjoy the halftime show. 

And in other league news. 

Tom Brady reportedly is suffering from a sports hernia. It's not expected to keep him out for any prolonged period, but it nevertheless is an injury for a guy who never gets injured, just a few weeks after the guy who never loses in the playoffs lost in the playoffs. And it's even worse news for the already-suffering Donovan McNabb- now he's not even the best quarterback in the league who has a sports hernia.

 I always thought football had the best method for selecting Hall of Famers- rather than simply have the writers vote, the NFL puts the electors in a room together and has them argue. Oh, how much I wish the NFL Network would put cameras in there- that would be even more exciting then the games they'll soon begin televising.

If, as rumored, Al Michaels neglects to move with "Monday Night Football" to ESPN, the Post reported that Tony Kornheiser may appear in the booth as the third man, along with Mike Tirico and Joe Theissman. I like Tony and like the idea, but isn't it a problem that (as every PTI viewer knows) he goes to bed early every night and likely hasn't stayed up to the end of an MNF game since 1992? Then again, if you heard the previous ESPN announcing team, a sleeping partner may come as an improvement. 

You thought Mike Heimerdinger was relieved to be getting off the Jets' staff and unto Denver's- but then came news that Mike Shanahan was meeting with Terrell Owens about a job with the Broncos. Eric Mangini's looking pretty good about now, huh, 'dinger?

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