INDIANAPOLIS -- The late, very great Robert Altman (I feel almost embarrassed to have to list his credentials, this is the director of "Nashville," "Short Cuts," "M*A*S*H," "The Player") once noted that there are really only about six or seven different stories, the rest is about character development. I think he was right in that observation about film, and he'd be right if he were talking Patriots-Giants. At the end of the thousands of hours of talk and millions of page views and predictions there are going to be four topics that will dominate the Super Bowl landscape this week. 

So here's one man's take on what we'll all be talking about, with some character development tossed in the mix.

1. Will Rob Gronkowski play?

Get ready for a week of absolute reckless speculation. There's about 5,000 of us in the Boston media here this week, and on this topic we don't have a clue. Some will pretend to, of course, but that's all it will be. Bill Belichick will tell us nothing, Rob Gronkowski will tell us nothing, but we'll read into what wasn't said, body language, level of limping, size of boot, all that stuff. But we'll know nothing about Gronkowkski until about 6:30 on Sunday night. Best guess? He'll play but won't be 100 percent. Everyone who knows tells us that a high ankle sprain is a four-, five-week injury. Gronkowski did come back after the Bernard Pollard tackle, but only as a blocker and just for a couple of snaps. Again, only a guess, but I expect Gronkowski to be limited on Sunday. That's the best I can do.

2. Is revenge a factor?  

Here's my problem with this one: It implies that the Patriots want to win the Super Bowl more than the Giants. Why would that be true? There are a million guys in both locker rooms that have nothing to do with that game. Sometimes we get so caught up in "our team" that we forget there is another team in the middle of its own journey. Because the Giants beat Tom Brady and Bill Belichick once in a Super Bowl means they somehow have less desire to do it twice? And I simply reject the idea that Tom Brady is going to think of 18-1 when he's trying to complete a pass on third down in the second quarter on Sunday. He -- and the rest of the Patriots -- want to win the Super Bowl because it's the Super Bowl. Same with the Giants. Also this: A win on Sunday doesn't erase the loss four years ago. That's the worst loss in Boston sports history, a chance for immortality wiped out.

"The only thing I'm focused on is winning this game," Wes Welker said on Sunday. "Does it take care of what happened [in 2007]? I don't think so, no, but at the same time I'm not worried about that." 

It's a nice story for the week -- and I'm sure Belichick will mention it to the team once or twice -- but what happened in Glendale will have no impact on what happens in Indianapolis. Zero point zero (mark that down -- the first time in Boston history a sports columnist has referenced "Animal House").

3. What a win means for Tom Brady

If he has a truly great game -- think 330 yards, three TDs and zero picks -- I don't know how he can't be looked at as the best quarterback in NFL history. The only other QB members of the Four Rings Club would be Terry Bradshaw (terrific, obviously, but had an all-time defense and a Hall of Fame running back for all four) and Joe Montana (had maybe the best player in history -- NFL Network thinks so -- as a wide receiver, and the guy who took over for him put up the same if not better numbers and won a Super Bowl himself). Brady has maintained a higher level of excellence for a longer period than those two guys, and it's very possible that he could win four Super Bowls without a single Hall of Famer as a teammate on offense. 

But if he loses, my list will still start with Montana. Sure, Steve Young and Jerry Rice and Roger Craig and Dwight Clark, but I can't get past this -- Montana was 4-0 in Super Bowls. In those games he threw 11 touchdowns and zero interceptions. His worst rating in a Super Bowl was 100.0 (his rating for the four wins was 127.8). Yup, Brady will have three rings and better regular-season numbers, but two losses to Eli and the Giants is enough in this rarified air to knock him down at least a spot. From a historical perspective, no one is playing for more than Brady this week. I don't think that's going to be a factor in his performance, just something to think about this week.

4. What a win means for Eli Manning

Hall of Fame, plain and simple.  

Here's the list of quarterbacks with two Super Bowls:

Bart Starr

Roger Staubach

Bob Griese

Jim Plunkett

John Elway

Ben Roethlisberger

Tom Brady

Troy Aikman

Joe Montana

Terry Bradshaw

If we assume that Brady's a lock and Roethlisberger is really close, only Jim Plunkett (72-72 career record, 164 TDs against 198 INTs) is forever on the outside on the Hall of Fame list. 

Eli Manning has never been -- at least until now -- on anyone's serious list of the five best quarterbacks in the NFL. No All-Pros, no MVP votes, not in the Brady/Brees/Rodgers/Big Brother class. But that's not really the Hall of Fame standard when it comes to quarterbacks. Winning Super Bowls (plural) means more than statistics. Troy Aikman was never an All-Pro, led the league in exactly one category (completion percentage, 1993) during his 12-year career. If he played in Seattle and never won a playoff game he'd be Dave Krieg. Same goes for Bob Griese. If Eli wins on Sunday and stays healthy for another five or six years he'll have at least two Super Bowls, somewhere north of 40,000 yards passing and over 300 touchdowns. He's not Tom Brady or Joe Montana, but he isn't Jim Plunkett, either. There is no way a player with those credentials is going to be left out of Canton.