In every sport, there’s a team that we love to hate.

In hockey, it’s the Detroit Red Wings. In baseball, it’s the Yankees.

And in professional football, the advent of the newest team we love to hate has come—in the form of the New England Patriots. Beyond the nationalistic conundrum that comes from hating the symbol of our freedom as a nation, it’s easy to hate on a team like the Patriots.

They fit all the criteria: First, they win. A lot. They are making a habit of going to the Super Bowl. They have the requisite egotistical athlete (or two, or three). They have too many big names at one franchise. They have a coach who plays by his own rules.

There are other reasons, falling somewhere in between logic and whining—putting Brady and Moss on the same team should be against the rules. Belichick is a dirty rotten video-taping cheater. Party-boy Brady’s pastimes include impregnating models and endorsing cologne and fancy bottled water.

On Sunday, the Patriots, in all likelihood, will complete the perfect season—to the chagrin of the seven remaining Miami fans in existence. This record has been waiting to be broken, or even tied, for 36 years. The day for that may have come. That, however, is exactly why the Patriots are becoming so despised: they may be perfect.
It isn’t fair. Only once before in history has a team so utterly dominated the rest of the clubs in the NFL that they could complete a season unbeaten. At least in the other 87 years that the league has existed, the team who takes the prize has had a loss.

But more than anything, we don’t really believe in perfection anymore, in a league with athletic, talented players and with millions of dollars spent by every team to have a fighting chance. We certainly don’t believe in perfection in the form of the Patriots. There’s something internal that makes it hard to believe that any team, no matter how talented, deserves to go undefeated. Something instinctual tells us that they shouldn’t be allowed to do it. It breaks the rules.

But even the Pats have some imperfections. Patriots players are not the only ones going to the Pro Bowl. The team’s reputation, after the “Videogate” ordeal and an unnecessarily thorough trouncing of the Redskins, is not favorable. Because the team doesn’t have the face of a good old boy like Peyton Manning, nobody wants them to go down in history as the team to break the record.

Yet, regardless of whether you hate the Pats, the public will be equally let down if they lose. The mighty Goliath hath fallen, due to a very accurate and perhaps extremely lucky pop shot from the Eli of York. It seems impossible. With the extremely notable exception of the playoffs this year, little Eli has had a tendency to melt under pressure. While he’s improved by leaps and bounds from his rookie season, he surely can’t forget that the Giants’ last loss was to the Patriots merely weeks ago. Memorabilia vendors probably haven’t even printed a reserve of “Giants: National Champions” T-shirts just in case. And up until this game, the Giants hardly commanded an enterprising fan base.

Now, fans of every team are going to be both cheering against perfection and cheering for history. It’s a split. Come Sunday, I know where I’ll be. I will be sitting in Woodbridge, donning my blue number 12 jersey, enduring evil glares from my peers, who will undoubtedly all be heckling Tom and Bill for the entire game. But let the haters say what they will. This is going to be one for the history books.

The author is a Barnard College sophomore.