Not sure if I know how to deal with this rooting for the favorite business.

Maybe that’s because I’m scared to death of how the Patriots will handle it.

Or perhaps it’s just indelibly linked to the native New Englander’s job description.

Think this through with me for a minute. If you’ve lived in these parts all your life, you’re not used to this.

Transplanted from New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Detroit, St. Louis, even Chicago, and you wonder why I’m worried. There, being in the driver’s seat is considered a Divine right.

‘Round here, we’re typically so thrilled to hop a ride on the bandwagon whenever the opportunity presents itself that we should be forgiven if Saturday night’s tailgate buffet didn’t settle well.

Erase college hockey from the equation, whether you bleed the colors of Maine, New Hampshire, Boston College or Boston University. Those schools have a decided geographic advantage, and with the exception of two or three notable interlopers, merely must deal with each other in the Frozen Four every year.

Let’s limit the discussion to professional sports. Which means we can discount the NBA.

Only half-kidding. The Celtics’ brief reclamation of their championship tradition in the first half of the 1980s didn’t count, because any objective fan was too concerned about the just-as-talented Lakers to smell the roses. No coincidence that two of the three championships in that stretch were won after someone else took care of L.A. in the Western Conference playoffs.

The Bruins haven’t given us any dress rehearsals in this regard. The only category in which they’ve been favored to lead the NHL since the early 1970s is profit margin.

Our Red Sox are the perennial poster children for underdogs everywhere. Much is made of a world championship drought that is approaching 86 years and a laundry list of Game 7 losses during that span, but one truth is often lost in the translation.

The other team in those games has ALMOST ALWAYS been vastly superior. The Sox were blessed simply to be there. For reference, see the ’67 Cardinals, ’75 Reds and ’86 Mets. The ’03 Yankees? Well, we can debate that one until laryngitis sets in.

For now, we’ll stick to an argument that I humbly submit is rock solid, contrary to what the Peyton Manning and Brett Favre-worshipping national media want to believe: That the Patriots indisputably, unequivocally were the best team in the National Football League this season.

Not long ago, going 14-2 with a 12-game winning streak at any point in the campaign, let alone the end, would have put you smack-dab in the middle of a discussion of the all-time teams. But I guess that only applies if your quarterback is Dan Marino or Warren Moon.

Oops, almost forgot. Tom Brady already wears a certain piece of jewelry those two guys can only dream of unearthing at a pawnshop.

In today’s NFL, most of the talking heads somehow attribute the Pats’ phenomenal winning percentage of .875 to parity. Not sure I follow the logic. Guess they mean that when you throw free agency and expansion into a pot and stir it up, you discover that the difference in the recipe between the good teams and bad teams is little more than one or two ingredients.

OK, I can live with that explanation.

But there’s got to be some respect for a team that won its last dozen games and has allowed only one touchdown at home in three months. The Patriots also beat the Colts, Dolphins, Broncos and Eagles on the road and did it all while nursing more aches and pains than a team of emergency room physicians on the night of a full moon.

That makes them the best team, for now. Then again, we know the best team doesn’t always win it all, or even get to the Super Bowl.

The Patriots have proven that themselves, both in a winning cause two years ago and by pulling a fast one on the rest of the AFC only to be a sacrificial lamb for the Bears and Packers in Roman Numeral Games past.

It is with that whirlwind of emotions and negative life experiences that I file this chip-on-my-shoulder column, some five hours before kickoff of a divisional playoff game.

And I’m scared to death, primarily because the region where I grew up and the professional sports franchises residing there taught me to live that way.

Kalle Oakes is sports editor and can be reached by e-mail at [email protected].