The pressure is mounting and the anticipation is building - Super Bowl XLIX, which will pit the New England Patriots and Bill Belichick, appearing in their sixth NFL Championship Game in his head coaching tenure, against Pete Carroll and the Seattle Seahawks, attempting to join Belichick's Pats as the only NFL teams to win back-to-back championships, is now less than 72 hours away.
While the talk of DeflateGate and football inflation levels fades, discussions over key matchups and the most important in-game strategies have come to the fore.
One matchup that could prove the game's determining factor is Patriots All-Pro tight end Rob Gronkowski against the variety of Seahawks defenders tasked with keeping him under wraps, according to Peter King of Sports Illustrated.
"Whenever you have a main target that you know the quarterback loves to go to and you know that you're gonna be on him, you know you've got to stand up," said Seahawks linebacker K.J. Wright, the man most likely to be tasked with sticking with Gronk on Sunday. "You know the ball is coming this guy's way, with everyone watching-you don't want to get exposed."
Wright and the Seattle defense fared well against another game-changing tight end in a short span during the 2013 season. New Orleans Saints tight end Jimmy Graham was held to 50 yards and four catches on 15 targets in two games against Wright, Seahawks safety Kam Chancellor and corners, Richard Sherman and Byron Maxwell.
"Different players don't like physicality," Wright said. "At that time, last season, he [Graham] was one of them. He struggled with press coverage. When you watched film of him, guys would just play off of him and just let him run seven-on-seven routes. You can't let him get a running start or he'll just have a field day with you. But I believe Gronk is different. I believe that he excels sometimes in physical coverage. He excels in off-coverage. He does good with both of them. For the most part what I've seen is that guys that are up on him have more success than versus off."
Graham is built more like a big wide receiver than tight end. His game is more finesse, whereas the Gronk prefers a more, physical approach - Graham recently referred to his tight end counterpart as "unguardable."
"It's a physical game," Gronkowski, who finished this season with 1,124 yards and 12 touchdowns receiving, told ESPN. "That's enjoyable to me.''
Wright, Chancellor and the Seahawks' back seven will be tasked with limiting the free releases off the line Gronkowski seeks. They'll double him. They'll do everything in their power to make him fight through the traffic and trash within the first five yards of scrimmage and, hopefully, limit his effectiveness.
"[Gronkowski] is a very important piece of the puzzle," said Wright. "So am I. It's gonna be a battle out there. I expect to win every matchup I'm out there against him."
It will be no small task for Wright and could prove the difference in Super Bowl 49.
