stretch."
But even with that big-picture scope, Key still wants the Seahawks to beat the Giants?
"Yeah, because I want to win my division," he says, simultaneously patient and exasperated that you even have to ask. "That's to start with. Then, at the end of the day, I'd like for San Diego to beat Washington . . . the fact that I beat San Diego, that'll help us with all that funky tiebreaker crap . . . plus I need Indy to go in to Seattle (on Christmas Eve) about 14-0 to have something to go for, to play to go 16-0. But that's later on down the line."
Well, at least it's nice to know it's not just us get-a-lifers who do all this. And we know from years of wasting time that it means nothing if the Cowboys don't take care of their business. Even Keyshawn admits, "I wouldn't be going through all this if we were 3-7."
To win these games, Dallas is going to need every weapon on both sides of the ball and in the kicking game (welcome back Billy Cundiff, and hurry back Patrick Crayton.) And with so many young players playing such key roles, it might be a worry that a substantial part of the roster has no real idea what these playoff-race stretch run games are like.
It might be a worry, unless you were in the meeting rooms and practices with them.
"These young guys that we have, man," says Johnson, one of the veterans expected to lead, "I don't believe they think like that. They're with us 100 percent. I trust our young guys. Like, I trust our young guys that play. I trust them a lot."
What's different about these youngsters? "Well, first of all," Keyshawn says, "they're his players," and Bill Parcells' name not even need be mentioned. "The fact that they're his players, they're going to do what he wants them to do. Everybody here is pretty much his hand-picked guys. They talk, walk, act like him."
That may be a notion that scares you, but if the object is winning football games, it can't hurt.
Darn it! I just realized: I forgot to ask BILL who I'm for in the Giants-Seahawks game. Keyshawn, I'm trusting you.
