You Don't Want to Say It, but . . .

Yesterday the dream died at CenturyLink Field when Arizona administered a 17-10 drubbing of Seattle, its first home loss in two years. To be sure, the Cardinals are an excellent team. They have ten wins. But who loses at home, let alone the home of the ballyhooed 12th Man, after picking off the visiting quarterback four times? I'll tell you who. A team with a weak offense. And it was on display yesterday. No speed -- at running back, at the wideouts -- and a quarterback who has trouble seeing downfield. Seattle hasn't been able to move the ball consistently since the first half of the game against the 49ers at Candlestick. And really you would have to look to the game prior to that one, the Monday night demolition of the New Orleans, to find a game where Russell Wilson was in command.

It is not as if there haven't been warning signs. Though Seattle shares the best record in the NFL at 12-3 with Denver, the Seahawks have been the recipients of an amazing amount of good luck this season. Going through their schedule, five games jump out, starting with the season opener road win at Carolina, that easily could have gone the other way. Wins against Carolina, Houston, Tennessee, St. Louis, Tampa were gifts. Turn it around and chalk them up as losses and you're looking at a team that is struggling to end the season at .500.

But Seattle didn't lose those games. The Seahawks kept winning even when they should not have. This created an aura of invincibility locally. You had people coming out of the woodwork to hop aboard the band wagon.

I got off the train downtown after work one Friday night. There was some sort of high school Christmas caroling competition. Pine Street was blocked off to vehicle traffic. Everyone was sporting Seahawk gear. Parents, children, shoppers. It was noteworthy.

At first I was skeptical about Seattle's good fortune, telling a coworker, "You don't want to rely on luck to win games because luck usually runs out by the time you get to the playoffs." But it is hard not to sample the Kool-Aid when your team has the best record in the NFL and your quarterback has never lost at home and it looks certain that the road to the Super Bowl is going to have to travel through Seattle.

And that's what came crashing down yesterday afternoon. The logic that has driven Seahawks fans this season -- as long as we keep winning, we'll secure home field for the playoffs; we secure home field for the playoffs, we're going to the Super Bowl -- was shown to be faulty. The Seahawks led by Russell Wilson can be beat at home. Arizona proved it. The Cardinals did it with a gimpy cast-off quarterback who threw four interceptions.

Arizona did it with defense. The Cardinals stacked the line of scrimmage but also dropped some linebackers into coverage. Seattle receivers were not able to win the one-on-one battles and Russell Wilson was not able to make the throws.

Now, as I see it, a team very similar to the Cardinals, the St. Louis Rams, comes to town on Sunday and, once again, we'll most likely need luck to beat them. The St. Louis defensive line is even better than the Cardinals' and Zac Stacy is a running back who hurt Seattle last time the teams played.

Even if the Seahawks win and get the first-round bye and home-field advantage, Toto in the form of Calais Campbell has pulled the curtain back and exposed Oz. There is nothing at the end of the rainbow. For those of us in the Emerald City who have been assuring each other that "It is our year," Sunday offered a night of fitful sleep.

And herein is the silver lining. Better to be unencumbered of fantasy with one game to go in the regular season. Better to acknowledge that the Seahawks have talons of clay prior to the playoffs. Now, after yesterday, one cannot be blindsided.

This Seattle team is not the juggernaut that at the end of last year racked up multiple 50-point wins on its way to the playoffs. This Seattle team is not nearly as good as the Holmgren team, the 2005 Seahawks, that lost to Pittsburgh in the Super Bowl. This Seattle team, truth be told, is merely a better-than-average team that has found a way to win with an aging power running game, a small quarterback, and no number one wideout. There is some peace in accepting one's limitations.

In a way a loss to St. Louis, another loss at home, which would force Seattle on the road in the playoffs as a wild card, assuming San Francisco wins its final two games, would be a fitting way to enter the playoffs. It would likely entail a trip to Green Bay or Chicago, one that would atone for all the lucky bounces that benefited the team in the regular season. It would mean a long, suffering road to New Jersey. But after the dark, despondent Sunday this bachelor -- a victim once more of emotional transference to the home team -- just went through, I don't think there can be any other way.