Home field a playoff disadvantage

Not to go all “Animal House” on you, but:

Indianapolis … dead!

Dallas … dead!

And who knows what corpses the upcoming conference title games will produce? When the defending NFL champs and the top seed in the NFC can get drummed out of the playoffs on the same day — in their own stadiums, no less — it’s hard to think of any team as a Sure Thing, even one with a 17-0 record.

Has there ever been a year when the home-field advantage meant so little in the NFL? Besides the Colts and Cowboys, the Steelers and Bucs also lost on their own turf, and the Seahawks (down 14-13 to the Redskins with less than seven minutes left), Chargers (down 6-0 to the Titans at the half) and the Packers (down 14-0 to the Seahawks with barely five minutes gone) also had some anxious moments.

Even the Perfect Patriots were pushed for 60 minutes before escaping with a 31-20 win over the Jaguars. Just a wild, wild couple of weeks.

But maybe we should have seen this coming. Maybe, instead of worrying about whether the Pats were truly worthy of being 16-0, we should have been worrying about whether Indy, Dallas and Green Bay were truly worthy of being 13-3. After all, there was an infirmity about each of them — the Colts because they had lost Dwight Freeney and weren’t getting much out of Joseph Addai and the Cowboys and Packers because, well, they played in the underwhelming NFC.

Everybody was obsessing about New England’s inability to run the football, but what about Indy? In fact, I’m still trying to figure out how Addai made the Pro Bowl. Here are his rushing stats for the last half of the season: 112 attempts, 368 yards, 3.3-yard average, five touchdowns. And here are his stats in Sunday’s 28-24 loss to San Diego: 13 carries, 43 yards, 3.3-yard average, no TDs. (This, with two weeks’ rest.)

It may be that Addai isn’t the workhorse Edgerrin James was for so many years for the Colts. He certainly wasn’t much of a factor down the stretch — or in the playoff game. And that just puts more of the load on Peyton Manning, who threw for 402 yards and three scores against the Chargers, but it wasn’t enough.

Speaking of running backs, that’s another strange theme about this postseason. I mean, is it just me, or do they seem more interchangeable (read: replaceable) these days? Consider:

• San Diego gets a mere seven carries out of LaDainian Tomlinson on Sunday before he exits with an injury … and yet the Chargers hang on to upset Indianapolis.

• Tiki Barber retires after a 1,662-yard season … and yet here the Giants are in the NFC title game.

• Desperate Green Bay turns to obscure rookie Ryan Grant in late October, he rushes for 1,130 yards in the next 11 games … and here the Packers are playing for the NFC championship.

It’s kinda shocking that there are all these functional backs lying around — Michael Turner and Darren Sproles in San Diego, Brandon Jacobs, Derrick Ward and Ahmad Bradshaw in New York, Grant (a Giants castoff ) in Green Bay. But then, we saw it in Washington last year when Ladell Betts filled in so capably for Clinton Portis. If you’ve got an offensive line that can create holes, a lot of guys, apparently, are capable of running through them.

Just as big a story in these playoffs as the Replacement Running Backs, though, are the Difference-Making Receivers each of the conference finalists has added since last season. We all know the impact Randy Moss, Wes Welker and Donte Stallworth have had on the Patriots’ record-breaking offense, but what about the production Chris Chambers has given the Chargers since he came over from Miami at the trading deadline? He’s scored touchdowns in three of their last four games (and in the game he didn’t score, he caught six passes for 121 yards).

Then there’s Amani Toomer, who has rejoined the Giants after missing half of last season and put the ball in the end zone twice in the 21-17 victory over the Cowboys (and once the previous week against the Bucs). And while Greg Jennings might not qualify as an “addition” in Green Bay — he was with the Packers all of 2006 — his increased output (from three TDs to 14, counting the playoffs) is most definitely an addition. With Jennings to throw to now, Brett Favre might never retire.

Yup, it’s been a fascinating postseason so far. Indeed, there have been so many interesting developments that I’m just getting around to Norv Turner, Dan Snyder’s erstwhile piata, who has found his way to the AFC title scrum with San Diego. Between the playoff loss to the Seahawks, Joe Gibbs’ unexpected retirement and Norv being one game from the Super Bowl, this has to be the worst month of Dan’s life.

And when you take into account the last nine years, that’s really saying something.