There's nobody to hate in this year's big game the Super Bowl | IXGAMES

Ten days before the Super Bowl that will make history as the first to feature a head coach named Lovie, we’re shopping for party provisions. Wine coolers, check. Salad toppings, got ’em. Doilies, here they are. Kleenex, can’t have too much crying tissue. If you expected Budweiser, five-alarm chili, paper towels, and monster-truck videos for the postgame winding down, you must be thinking of one of the other XL Super Bowls. Super Bowl XLI is shaping up as something different. It’s going to be the kinder and gentler, sweet and sensitive Super Bowl. The squeezably soft NFL championship game. Indianapolis Colts vs. Chicago Bears. Have you ever wanted to cuddle up to a Super Bowl before? Peyton Manning cried for joy after Indianapolis closed out New England, and chances are the whole country is going to be weeping softly a week from Sunday evening, so many are the possibilities for a happy ending in Miami. The coaches The Bears’ Lovie Smith and the Colts’ Tony Dungy will be the big story. They’re the first black coaches to take teams to a Super Bowl. They’re also good friends, Smith having worked for Dungy in Tampa Bay. Whoever wins, the All-American cause of racial equality wins. Whoever wins, the other guy will be happy for him. Sweet. The quarterbacks Lots of people are pulling for Manning, a nice guy and one of the best players never to be a champion. In college and the NFL. Manning finally gets past Tom Brady to reach the Super Bowl, shaking off a bad start to lead the AFC title-winning drive. Rex Grossman rewarded Smith’s faith after an up and (very) down season, following a 1-for-11 stretch with a 5-for-5 drive to the touchdown that put away New Orleans in the NFC title game. Everybody said they couldn’t do it. Then they did it. Heartwarming. The franchises The Bears haven’t been to a Super Bowl since they won it 21 years ago (with the 46 Defense and 46 points of offense), and the Colts haven’t been since they won it 36 years ago (on Jim O’Brien’s kick). Never before have both teams in a Super Bowl come off such extended droughts. Whatever you might have hated about the last Bears Super Bowl team — Mike Ditka, Buddy Ryan, Jim McMahon? — is gone. Whatever might chap your hide about the Colts — the dead-of-night move out of Baltimore? — was avenged by the Ravens’ 2000 title. These are a couple of long-suffering teams, not tiresome bullies. The cities Nobody ever chanted, “Beat In-dy!” Everybody’s kind of town, Chicago is. It’s hard to find somebody to hate in a Super Bowl without Dallas, New York or wherever Al Davis calls home at a given moment. There’s no villain, just vulnerability. There’s no giant to slay, no inflated ego to puncture. Only one player, Bears defensive tackle Tank Johnson, has been found to have an illegal cache of firearms in his house, which makes this closer to a convent than a typical Super Bowl. So far, the only controversies about this Super Bowl involve a judge’s decision to permit Johnson to play while awaiting trial, and a restaurant trade group’s protest that a scheduled commercial starring Kevin Federline is demeaning to fast-food workers. Clearly, what we need in the next week is for Manning to moon the photographers, Grossman to issue some sort of guarantee, the Colts to announce they’re moving to Los Angeles, or Terrell Owens to blow into Miami and open his mouth. Otherwise we’re looking at a Super Bowl week in which all the intrigue is about how the best offense in one conference (the Colts’) will perform against the best defense in the other (the Bears’). Well, that won’t do. That won’t do at all. What a precious little Super Bowl, full of nice people on nice teams trying to make nice towns happy. If you’re coming to the party, bring your own herbal tea. Super Bowl Betting, Superbowl Odds, NFL Football only at:  Bodog Sportsbook