"When you've spent a lifetime exploiting religion for profit and power, it's a lot harder to convince anyone that you've undergone a jailhouse conversion."

With the rotten state of our government, including our judiciary, don't be too surprised if these rich and powerful people never see the inside of a jail. These people have plenty of money and influence. To paraphrase Chevy Chase: "This breaking news just in. Kenny Lay is still free!"

This effect you are discussing is a direct result of realignment to 4 divisions. Consider that now the two weaker division winners each get to host a wild card team in this round; that there are only two wild card teams per conference, which means that the wild card teams are likely to be strong; and you have a high likelyhood that the division winner will host a team with a better or equal record in this round. This time around, New England (11-5) hosted Jacksonville (12-4); Tampa Bay (11-5) hosted Washington (10-6); NY Giants (11-5) hosted Carolina (11-5); and Cincinnati (11-5) hosted Pittsburgh (11-5). So you see that in this last Wild-Card round 3 of the 4 home teams faced a visitor with an equal or better record. When there were only 3 division winners, the division winner without the bye always hosted the weakest wild-card team, and of the two remaining wild-card teams, the one with the stronger record hosted the game, so that the likelyhood of a weak team hosting a stronger team was much lower.

This situation is rectified in the Divisional round, where two strong and well rested division winners await the survivors of the wild-card round. Hence the high likelyhood of home winners in this round.

What, if anything, should be done? Seeding the teams in the wild card round exclusively by record would fix this problem, if indeed it is a problem.

Just to add another data point to the one provided by Peter Robinett. I regularly visit Spanish sports web pages to follow La Liga, and I've seen no hype there whatsoever. Yeah, I know, Spain and winter sports... but still, I see plenty of world sports news on those sites: Formula 1, cycling, even plenty of NBA news. Just nothing about these Olympics. Weird.

"... Not only would Alito sail through, but the left would also lose the right to filibuster any future nominees to the Supreme Court as well as to lower federal courts. And, of course, Democrats could face various other political repercussions stemming from the tactic, which is something many may fear during what's shaping up to be a winning political year."

Not only is a weapon that cannot be used worse than useless, so far the prospect of losing the filibuster has itself been used as a weapon against the Democrats. And what Supreme Court nominee, pray tell, will the Democrats filibuster if they allow Alito to be confirmed? What would be the point? The Democrats must filibuster. If the Republicans then use the nuclear option, they will be on record for doing so, and the threat of the removal of this useless weapon will be removed. Finally, I'm afraid that the Democrats should fear the political repercussions should they not use the one weapon they have to stop this man.

Yes it true. Nobody really knows how a filibuster would play out. Just as no one knows how a football game will play out. But does that mean we don't play?? If the Dems do not filibuster, it would be tantamount to surrendering without even firing their weapons. It would be the culmination of the timid "be-like-them" tactics that have gotten us into this mess in the first place. This, I strongly believe, will be very damaging to any hopes they may harbor for '06. It will be the same old, spineless Dems. Why should anyone of us vote for them? On the other hand, venturing into the unknown, fighting for their (and our) principles, and finally behaving like a real opposition party, that will earn them respect. And I believe another reader was absolutely right about one aspect of this drama. Moderate Republicans may be very happy to allow the filibuster so that they do not have to go on record as voting for this extremist ideologue. But if this assessment is wrong and Dems do lose the filibuster, why, as others have pointed out, this will be a good thing come next congress when the newly invigorated Democrats will have the the Republican minority at their mercy. That would be sweet. Isn't it worth a risk?

As for any purported poll support for Alito at this time, that has to be very soft, as most people have no idea who he is. I wouldn't put much stock in it, especially if a battle puts some light on the guy.

Sometimes mistakes happen, like the pass interference call that gave Denver the ball on the NE 1 yard line. Clearly blown, non-reviewable call (of course, it did favor the home team, what do you know...)

What I am concerned with though is the effect instant replay has on referees. In many sports (I am a soccer referee) one only has at most a couple of seconds to make a determination. One must therefore rely on one's gut feeling to make the call. If it looks right, it's OK. If it looks wrong and affects play, you call it. There is simply not much time to do more than this. I'm sure it's the same when calling a close play at first in baseball. Instant replay unfortunately gives referees ample opportunity to over-think and over-analyze what happens, which leads to calls like the Polamalu reversal. (The original call was correct, after all!)

What to do? For the good of the game, please, abolish instant replay, and make NFL officials full time professionals. Sure, some calls will be blown with no recourse, but the benefits will far outweigh these.