Last week, headed into the NFL Conference Championships, I figured I would be fed up with the Pennsylvania football history stories, as it seemed evident we were headed for a Philly-Pittsburgh Super Bowl.  But I was wrong again about the Arizona Cardinals.

I don’t know if I am gonna make it four-for-four yet by going against the Arizona Cardinals in the Super Bowl, but I surely wouldn’t have made any money if I were a betting man.  Their story is amazing, unbelievable and inspiring.  Unfortunately, it is also, in some ways, becoming predictable and stale.

At the beginning of the season the Cardinals were a great story.  The former league MVP went into camp as the back-up and won the starting QB role in pre-season.  The division was extremely weak and by the beginning of December, the Cardinals knew that not only were they going to the playoffs, but that they would be hosting a first-round game.

Arizona won nine games this season, six of them were against division opponents.  Their other three wins: Miami, Buffalo and Dallas.  And those three non-division wins were before Halloween.  The Cardinals outscored opponents in the regular season by one point.

So, with that said, guess what card some of the Arizona players are using?  Yep, the “we get no respect” card.  Wow, who didn’t see this coming?  The only thing more tired than the “no respect” card is a wide receiver complaining about something/anything, but more on that in a few.

We are talking about a 9-7 team from the worst division in football complaining about not getting respect.  We are talking about a franchise that has hosted three playoff games in the last 61 years.  Two were this year and the other was in 1947.  We are talking about a franchise that has annually been listed as one of the worst-run in sports.

This is sorta like Gary Numan complaining about people only wanting to hear him play “Cars” or Dexy’s Midnight Runners not playing “Come On Eileen”.  If your organization has a history of not performing well, and this year will probably be more of a fluke than the beginning of a trend, the media isn’t going to laud your team as one of the best.

The other predictable aspect of the Cardinals success is the one player who seems to be hanging out by the side door not really wanting to be a part of the party is (drum roll please) a wide receiver.  Who would have thought anyone on that team could find any reason to be unhappy, but leave it to a WR to find something in the fairy tale to complain about.

The Cardinals have been playing spin doctor with the incident involving Anquan Boldin and offensive coordinator Todd Haley.  Honestly, I don’t care if a wide receiver doesn’t think he is getting the ball enough.  Instead of looking at the scoreboard and rooting for his team to score the go-ahead points late in the game, Boldin decided to let his coach know that he wasn’t happy with his role.

This is the same Boldin who missed five games, including the playoff game against the Panthers, and didn’t finish the second quarter of the first-round game against the Falcons.  He is a great piece of the puzzle for a championship team, but he isn’t the greatest piece.  It is just so frustrating to see these gifted athletes act like such immature prima donnas.  

Football is the ultimate team game and in 2009 we are still having to watch and listen to wide receivers explain and excuse their selfish behavior.  You would think Boldin would have looked across the locker room to Edgerrin James.  James left the Indianapolis Colts for the money.  The Colts won the Super Bowl soon after.

You could say that James is now there and should be happy he proved he could do it.  Except, James took time during the playoffs to complain about his role on the team and how he wanted out.  Maybe Boldin did look across the locker room and just got the wrong message.

With no football Sunday, why not check out the NHL All-Star game.  Alexander Ovechkin of the Washington Capitals is an absolute beast.  While the game won’t feature the checking associated with a regular season or playoff game, Ovechkin’s skills will be on display and he is a treat to watch.

- Jim Clark