GLENDALE, AZ--After decades of futility, The Arizona Cardinals are finally headed to the Super Bowl. And, like most Super Bowl teams, the Cards are flaunting their success in the faces of those who doubted them. They are also repeating a refrain they have posted in the locker room: “Nobody gave us a chance, because we weren’t very good.”

“When the playoffs started, nobody gave us a chance to win even one game,” said defensive end Bertrand Berry. “And all because we weren’t very good during the regular season and, in fact, appeared to be falling apart at the worst possible time. But we ended up winning the NFC anyway! It just goes to show that the so-called ‘experts’ don’t always know what they’re talking about, because they only believe in the teams that are actually playing halfway decent football.”

According to Berry, the players were furious when the talking heads in the media wrote them off following their 47-7 debacle against New England.

“Man, when we opened the newspaper the next day people were killing us,” said Berry. “It was like we suddenly forgot how to play football. Hello? We clinched the division. We were division champs. And you’re going to write us off just because we displayed a shocking inability to even compete in games on the east coast? Hey, doubt us if you want, but the guys in that locker room believed in us. Except for coach s He kept saying we'd be one and done.”

Even after the Cardinals won their first playoff game against the Atlanta Falcons, the doubters said they would never make it past the Carolina Panthers. But once again the Cards got the last laugh by routing the heavily-favored NFC South champs.

After the game a jubilant Cardinals locker room dedicated the victory to “all the doubters out there.”

“This is for all the doubters out there!” shouted receiver Larry Fitzgerald. “Nobody, nobody gave us a chance to win this game! Everybody was all ‘the Cards got lucky in Atlanta but they can’t handle the defense of the Panthers!’ But guess what? We didn’t just handle them. We kicked their asses! What does that say? It says that you should never try to predict how a team will perform based on regular season results because the postseason is a small sample size, one-and-done tournament affected by wild statistical fluctuations as well as random chance…MOTHERFUCKERS!”

The next stop for the Cardinals is the Super Bowl, and though they’ve finally made believers out of the doubters, they're still a 6.5 point underdog going into the game. As expected, the Cards are using the slight as a motivational tool.

“6 and a half points? That’s ridiculous. That’s almost a whole touchdown,” said Berry. “We just beat the best the NFC has to offer and they’re not even giving us a chance. Oh, I know: the Steelers have a great defense, right? Sounds familiar. I tell you what: I guarantee we will win that game, or at the very least cover the spread. As long as it doesn't fall under five points.”

Copyright 2009, The Brushback - Do not reprint without permission. This article is satire and is not intended as actual news.