“You have two guys who get put in the showcase in just about every game because they do so much for their team,” Dungy said of Manning and Brady. “It’s just the flavor that you like. Julius Erving or Larry Bird.

Typically, it is Brady who has tried to tamp down the expectations of the public, however, despite the implications of home-field advantage for the playoffs.

“You would love to hype this thing up like it’s the AFC Championship, but it’s really just another game on the schedule,” Brady said. “We’re really not even halfway through the year. It’s important in the long run, but it’s not like if you lose this one you’re eliminated from the playoff contention.”

Manning has thrown for over 300 yards three times in nine games against New England and had a quarterback rating in excess of 90 in five of the nine. Significantly, four of those were in the last four regular season contests between the two teams, all played under reasonably good weather conditions. In those games Manning has thrown 10 touchdown passes and three picks yet still ended up 1-3, in large part because Brady had eight TD throws himself and only three interceptions while twice exceeded Manning’s quarterback rating.

What has turned everything sour for the Colts during this stretch though are Manning’s two abysmal performances in the postseason, both times in cold, raw, snowy weather. In those games the usually reliable Manning has one TD pass and five interceptions, quarterback ratings of 69.3 and 35.5 and put up only 17 points to New England’s 44.

But the larger factor this time may be Indianapolis’ abominable run defense.

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Denver rushed for 227 yards on the Colts a week ago and Indianapolis is allowing an average of a ridiculous 167.9 yards rushing per game. If you can’t stop the run against the Patriots the only way you win is if your offense can score at so rapid a pace New England has to abandon the run all together. It’s possible with Manning at quarterback but it’s difficult to accomplish because if New England can pound the Colts with Laurence Maroney and Corey Dillon while Brady keeps pace with Manning, as he’s done in the past, then the advantage swings to New England because even with the improved running of Addai it’s not likely Indianapolis will move very far on the ground against one of the best run defenses in football (New England is allowing only 78.3 yards rushing per game).

Worse for the Colts, during this 7-2 stretch New England has averaged 29 points per game. If they hit that Sunday it would take the kind of performance Manning and the Colts have put up only twice in that nine-game stretch just to match it. So the bigger question may not be how Manning plays, although he’s always a major factor, but how the Colts’ defense plays. It has allowed an average of 21.9 points a game and remains its Achilles heel, and there is nothing Peyton Manning can do about that but put points up. He better be prepared to put up a lot of them.