WASHINGTON — At a time when patriotism in sports is all the rage, NFL.com posed an interesting question back in September: What does it take to be “America’s Team?”

With all due respect to the writer (and longtime Cowboys front office legend) Gil Brandt, tossing Johnny-come-latelys like the Jacksonville Jaguars and Philadelphia Eagles into the conversation is a bit shortsighted — as is the question itself, to an extent. America is about freedom of choice, so coming to a consensus on a single team is nearly impossible when you consider every corner of the country will be looking at this from different perspectives.

Thus, the question isn’t who is America’s Team — it’s how many such teams are there?

Since America means different things to different people, I think it’s appropriate to have different teams represent the specific regions defined by the U.S. Census Bureau. Sure, people in close proximity but in different places don’t necessarily have the same tastes, but I don’t have the time and you don’t have the attention span to read me make a case for each of the 32 teams.

So here are the four teams from the four regional divisions. [custom_gallery]

If you disagree with these choices … well, that’s probably the most American part of this whole exercise. After all, there’s not a single president, congressman or senator that’s received 100 percent of the vote, so why would we all agree on the football team we like?

I mean, not everything can be as universally loved as the NFL Week 7 Recap.