Different How?

There is a small corner of the city jampacked with people who think the New England Patriots are going to win a Super Bowl at the Superdome.

At the corner of Decatur and St. Peter’s, right in the heart of the French Quarter, is The Corner Oyster Bar & Grill. In the window the sign says, “Danger Patriot Fans Partying.” And they are.

Brad Darr, a native of Memphis, Tenn., is the 32-year-old owner of The Corner and a passionate Patriot fan. More than 1,000 Patriot fans already have come to The Corner. Darr was expecting an additional 3,000 for a New England pep rally Saturday evening.

At the pep rally, there was to be no mention of Super Bowl XX played at the Dome.

That game, on Jan. 26, 1986, featured William “The Refrigerator” Perry, defensive tackle of an indeterminate weight, throwing a rollout pass from a goal-line offense; blocking on quarterback Jim McMahon’s touchdown run and blowing linebacker Larry McGrew out of the hole; scoring his own touchdown on a one-yard belly flop of a dive.

That touchdown made the score 44-3 Chicago, and if that seemed as if the Bears were mocking the Patriots, as McMahon said after the Bears’ 46-10 victory, “Tough...”

The Patriots didn’t get into a positive yardage situation until their last possession of the third quarter. Perry had gained more yards (one) than Patriot fullback Craig James. Perry became a folk hero. Bear Coach Mike Ditka bragged for two weeks about how no team could beat the Bears. McMahon filled up the French Quarter with rowdy and very public high jinks.

And it didn’t matter. The Patriots were patsies.

“We didn’t belong on the same field with the Bears in ‘86,” said New England fan Bobby Ferzoco of Norwell, Mass.

A Patriot season-ticket holder since 1984, Ferzoco attended the 1986 debacle. Wearing the No. 11 jersey of quarterback Drew Bledsoe, Ferzoco insists today’s game will be different.

“This team is a lot different,” Ferzoco said. “We have a great coach, we’re unappreciated, well-disciplined and we have two all-pro quarterbacks.”

And the Patriots are 14-point underdogs to the Rams, same as the 1986 Patriots were 14-point underdogs to the Bears.

In that game, New England gained seven yards rushing. The quarterbacks, Steve Grogan and Tony Eason, combined to complete 17 passes in 36 attempts. Eason had six of the attempts and none of the completions. Before the game, Eason was called “the dullest headliner ever to play in the Super Bowl” in one story. This was not an inaccurate characterization.

The day after the game, Ditka said, “There’s no question who the better football team was. You can analyze it any way you want to.”

Yep. Or, as Bear safety Gary Fencik had said: “New England took it as an insult that we didn’t take them as an equal. We proved they aren’t.”

At halftime, the Patriots were losing, 23-3, had one first down and 19 yards of offense. Super Bowl XX most valuable player Richard Dent had it figured out.

“I think they knew it was finished at the half,” he said after the game. “The Fat Lady was beginning to sing.”

The singing was earsplitting after the Bears scored 21 third-quarter points.

And wouldn’t you know, the Patriots’ second trip to the Super Bowl brought them back to the Superdome and into another matchup with an NFC powerhouse.

The Green Bay Packers hadn’t been to the Super Bowl for 28 years until Jan. 26, 1997. The Superdome was filled with “Cheeseheads,” those Packer fans who wear giant foam cheese slices as headgear. “There were three to four Cheeseheads for every Patriot fan here,” Darr said of the Green Bay invasion.

At least the Packers didn’t score three to four times as many points as the Patriots. The Packers beat the Patriots, 35-21.

New England led, 14-10, after the first quarter. Keith Byars caught a one-yard pass from Bledsoe. Tight end Ben Coates caught a four-yard pass. Adam Vinatieri was the kicker on that team. “It was a great first quarter,” Vinatieri said. “Both offenses were so efficient. There was a great atmosphere. It was very electric.”

It had been an electric week. Patriot Coach Bill Parcells was involved in a very public feud with New England ownership. Parcells was angry about many things, mostly having to do with not getting his way on every little thing, and also with Parcells wanting very much to escape his New England contract so he could coach the New York Jets.

“I don’t think the controversy around our coach had anything to do with the game,” said Bledsoe, who completed 25 of 48 passes for 253 yards and two touchdowns. “But it did make for a very interesting week, that’s for sure. Actually, it kept a lot of the questions away from the rest of us.”

The hero of the game, the MVP, was Packer special teams player Desmond Howard. Howard had 244 return yards. He had a 99-yard kickoff return for a touchdown, the game’s final score. It came after New England had closed the score to 27-21 and seemed to have some momentum.

After he scored, Howard did one of those Heisman Trophy end-zone poses, continuing, it seemed, the Patriot tradition of having their Super Bowl opponents embarrass them while pounding them. Earlier in the game, after he had caught a 54-yard Brett Favre pass for a touchdown, Andre Rison had done the duckwalk across the goal line.

And that somehow all seemed just. The petulant Parcells was denied the honor of becoming the first coach to win Super Bowls with two different teams. It was, Vinatieri said, “kind of a blow, especially after the way the franchise had played in its first Super Bowl.”

So the Patriots are back. In the Superdome. In the Super Bowl. As heavy, heavy underdogs.

“We know what people were saying after we beat Pittsburgh last week,” Vinatieri said.

“We know what people are expecting from us. There’s no point in talking much about what we’re going to do until we do something.”

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