What about Bob?

Was thinking back to our conversation in the Milwaukee airport when we were both stranded the day after the Giants stunning upset of the Packers in the NFC Championship Game at Lambeau.

Punched up the story and re-read it, and Anderson nailed it exactly right. He equated this game to the Giants' upset of the Bills in Super Bowl XXV, with a zillion parallels.

Shame on me for going the other way.

I agonized over this one - as I had the Giants' previous three playoff games (predicted they'd win all three) - and didn't come to a definitive decision until last Wednesday, when Newsday demanded our predictions. I kept going back and forth, leaning toward the Giants during the bye week, but then gravitating toward the Patriots as the Super Bowl week went on.

Just felt like their experience would carry them.

Instead, Eli & Co. shocked the world with one of the most compelling Super Bowl performances ever. I'm still trying to wrap my mind around what happened, as are most Giants fans. And even the players, who pulled off one of the biggest shockers ever.

I still say he would have been better off not mentioning a score when someone asked him about it the Monday before the Super Bowl.

That said, Burress backed up the talk with a gutsy performance with an injury that was far worse than the team - or Burress himself - let on. He's played with a bum ankle all season, and then suffered a slightly torn medial collateral ligament early in the week after slipping in the shower. (By the way, isn't it really, really hard to suffer an injury like that slipping in the shower? A story for another day, perhaps.)

Burress had just two catches against the Pats, but he ended up with the game-winner in the final seconds. Good for Burress. He talked the talk, but then he walked the walk (sorry for the cliche, it was a long travel day back from Phoenix).

When Burress first got to the Giants after not re-upping with the Steelers, I was skeptical, as were most Steelers fans who had seen him underachieve in Pittsburgh. But he has become Eli Manning's go-to guy, and his play-with-pain performance this season - capped off by the Super Bowl - has definitely won our respect.

So, before Richie G busts an artery defending Burress' guarantee with his assorted comments the last few days, we offer Burress and unqualified shoutout.

Well done, sir.

After the Giants' Super Bowl win over the Patriots, Giants president and co-owner John Mara received non-stop congratulatory calls on his cell phone, to the point where he didn't pick up if he didn't recognize the number.

At one point, he got a call and saw that it was from "unknown caller," so he didn't answer.

A few minutes later, the same thing happened. And then once more. He didn't pick up.

His wife's cell phone rang and "unknown caller" came up again. She picked up.

The caller asked if he could speak with John, and his wife handed him the phone.

It was President Bush calling to congratulate him on the team's Super Bowl win.

The game was all but over after the Patriots' desperation fourth down pass, and Bill Belichick ran onto the field to congratulate Tom Coughlin on the Giants' impending Super Bowl win. Tom Brady went back into the locker room.

But there was still one second left on the clock, and referee Mike Carey instructed everyone to clear the field to run the final play. It was a kneel-down by Eli Manning.

But as Manning took the snap and cradled the ball in his arms, exulting in one of the biggest upsets in Super Bowl history, Brady and Belichick were in the locker room.

Bad job by them.

I know it's a crushing blow to lose the Super Bowl. But you need to show some sportsmanship and stay on the field until the game is over. To leave beforehand, even though there's only one second left, just isn't right. You stay to the end, and then you move on. And what if, on the admittedly remote chance that there is a fumble on the play, the Patriots recover and run it back for the winning touchdown. Again, next to impossible, but that's why you play to the final gun.

I thought it was disrespectful of both men to leave early. They, of all people, should have known better.

Oh ... my ... goodness.

Eli Manning is about to be voted Super Bowl MVP.

Oh ... my ... goodness.

This might be the best low-scoring game I can remember.

The game is in doubt, but whatever happens in the next 7:54, it will be memorable.

This, ladies and gentleman, is why we all love this sport called football.

So we're out to dinner last night at a Mexican restaurant in Phoenix with two former Newsday staffers, Judy Battista and Greg Aiello (another success story out of Syosset). After dinner, we ask the waiter to call a cab.

He walks back to the table with a troubled look.

"The cab company says it will be a two-hour wait," he said.

Whoa. This is not New York.

Aiello, now the NFL's vice president of communications, takes matters into his own hands. He walks out the door and starts hitchhiking. Really.

We can just see the headline: "NFL executive and two reporters murdered day before Super Bowl."

"Are you insane?" I ask Aiello.

"What, you never hitchhiked before?"

"Yeah," I said. "When I was 18."

Continue reading "Lenny Randle gave us a ride ... yes, THAT Lenny Randle" »

Neil Best has done a commendable job offering some memories of the one and only Giants Super Bowl he previously covered, although I doubt he can top the story from our first Super Bowl back with the '86 Giants.

It was a hellish week as a journalist, mostly because it was the Giants' first-ever Super Bowl appearance, and the interest level was through the roof. I was working for the Gannett Westchester Newspapers at the time (Peter King was Newsday's NFL columnist, and he is now a world famous NFL reporter for Sports Illustrated) and we didn't have a large staff, so I can't calculate how many words I wrote.

Anyway, after an incredibly exhaustive week of writing and reporting, a few scribes were sitting around the lobby of the team hotel in Costa Mesa, Calif., our minds and fingers numb from the pre-game buildup.

Within a few minutes, a Giants fan came over, beer in hand, and wanted to talk. It appeared he'd had many, many beers prior to the one he now carried.

"Hey, man, you guys pulling for the Giants or what?" he began, his words slurring badly.

Our strategy was to simply wait him out and have him move on to someone else, which is usually how these things go. But one of the fellows in our group, former Asbury Park Press reporter Judson Hand, was growing impatient with the fan. After trying to reason with the guy, Hand blurted out:

"We mean you no harm. Leave now."

It was as if he'd poured gasoline on a fire.

The drunk fan poured his beer in Hand's face, then rubbed the bottle in Bridgeport Post writer Mark Faller's face. Faller grabbed the dude. The two were wrestling one another for a few seconds before another writer (whose name I can't recall, but whom we nicknamed "Rocky" afterward) grabbed each man and pulled them apart.

I told King about the incident later that day, and he cracked up. He actually put an item in his Newsday column about it with the headline: "Big Apple Scribes in Tiff."

You have to check out this video of Giants personnel executive Chris Mara, son of the late co-owner and president, Wellington Mara.

He does a sit-down with Giants' equipment man Joe Skiba as part of the team's behind-the-scenes series on its Giants.com website. Skiba places several helmets that Mara has collected over his years with the Giants, and asks Mara to talk about his memories from the different eras.

There are some great stories associated with them, including the one where he admits to stealing one of Gifford's helmet from Wellington Mara's home 25 years ago.

There's also a fantastic story about the time the Giants beat the 49ers in the 1990 NFC Championship Game, and how the 49ers had been so confident of beating the Giants that they'd actually moved their office furniture into the team hotel that the Giants eventually used.

Jeremy Shockey had indicated in recent days he wouldn't be at the Super Bowl, but the injured tight end might have had a change of heart.

Giants officials have heard Shockey is in town and will attend the game, although they're uncertain where he'll watch it from.

(UPDATE: Just heard from someone familiar with Shockey's plans who says he is on his way to Phoenix and is expected to arrive later today. Haven't heard whether he's dining with former teammate Tim Hasselbeck, who ripped him earlier in the week on a national radio show.)

... being so close to all these people you've watched on television growing up.

Even after so many years of covering the NFL, I still get a kick out of walking through the lobby of the media hotel and seeing Mike Ditka ... Roger Staubach ... or stepping onto the elevator and seeing Lynn Swann face to face ... or Jerry Rice walking out of the elevator.

It is cool.