Here's the scenarios, from most likely to least, imo:
1) Pats win in a blowout (+21 pts or more). I think, unfortunately, this is most likely to happen. And if it does, you can turn off football for the rest of the season. At that point, the only thing that could stop the Pats is a season-ending injury to Brady.
2) Pats win in by 7 to 14 pts. This is almost as bad as option 1. If they dominate the Colts but don't run up the score, then the effect is nearly the same. Again, nothing stopping them at this point except Brady getting hurt.
3) Colts win in a squeeker. From a football fan's PoV, this is probably the best thing that could happen. It builds drama and sets up a titanic rematch in the AFC championship game, at which point you can then ignore the superbowl completely, just like last year.
4) Colts win in a blowout. Heh. Even if this were to occur, I think it tracts the same as 3. The Pats seem so otherworldly that even a blowout against them here could be channeled into 'motivation' or some other stupid analyst-speak quantity for the AFC championship game. But this seems really unlikely to me.
5) Pats jet crashed on the way to Indy, an unknown team of hardscrabble and over-the-hill replacements dons the Patriots uniforms, discovers that the original team made a deal with Satan, repudiates this deal and loses by a field goal to Indy, but at the same time earns the respect of Peyton Manning and millions of television viewers. Hardscrabble replacement QB reconciles with his amputee wife at the end. Hey, wanna see my screenplay?
