Tuesday Morning Quarterback

[stwasm]

The reader's revenge, plus the lost episode of NYPD Blue!

By Gregg Easterbrook

Special to NFL.com

(Aug. 30, 2005) -- Early this month, after the Hall of Fame banquet in Canton, I found myself chatting with Hall of Fame coach Bill Walsh. As it happened, we talked about the ever-increasing size of NFL linemen. This was two weeks before the sudden collapse of San Francisco guard Thomas Herrion, whose cause of death remains unknown. But lineman size was on the minds of football observers well before the Herrion tragedy. Twenty years ago, NFL offensive linemen averaged about 265 pounds. Today the average in college is perhaps 300 pounds, while the offensive line average in the NFL has bloomed to perhaps 320 pounds. I asked Walsh three things: if increasing size poses a medical risk to football players, if bigger players will force football to adopt a bigger field, and what might reverse the trend toward endless weight gain.

On medical risk, Walsh said he felt it would eventually be proven that making yourself unnaturally big for football, or any sport, is dangerous. Pro football players gain muscle mass by relentless pumping of iron and by forcing-feeding themselves steaks, tuna, protein shakes; steroids are not a factor, as the NFL tests for them regularly. Via weight lifting and heroic eating, bulk can be gained the old fashioned way, without drugs. Yet the result is what scouts call "unnatural size" --- the player who is 50 or even 100 pounds bigger than his frame should carry. "Skin too tight for his body," scouts say of players who have forced themselves to become unnaturally large. Anyone carrying "unnatural" bulk places the heart under stress, since while muscles and waistline increase in diameter, the heart does not.

Linemen keep trying to get bigger because football size is an arms race: the other guy is bulking up, forcing you to bulk up. The fad for spread offenses is driven partly because the middle is now jammed by inflated linemen. Thus my second question to Walsh: If players keep getting bigger, will fields have to be bigger? Walsh shook his head. Not only would stadiums need to be extensively re-engineered, purists would complain that records were invalidated. Field dimensions, Walsh believes, won't change.

Then what might stop linemen of the future from averaging 350 pounds, or 400 pounds? Medical studies, Walsh said. His suspicion is that research will show a specific statistical correlation between excessive athletic bulk and reduction of life expectancy. When a coach, Walsh was distinguished by his analytical mind. Now, pondering the weight issue, he takes the analytical approach, seeing peer-reviewed medical studies as what could end the bulking-up arms race. If a relationship between "unnatural" athletic weight and shortened life is proven by studies, parents will think twice about allowing kids to bulk up for high-school football; colleges may impose body-mass standards on football, since encouraging players to do something that shortens life would be seen as irresponsible and be opposed by college medical schools; the NFL may need standards for weight control, if only as a precaution against liability. It's one thing for football players to assume the risk of a knee injury: to take chances with their very lives is another matter altogether.

In other news, this column contains my annual anti-basketball diatribe, interspersed with the annual readers' offseason comments about Tuesday Morning Quarterback; plus a bonus, the lost episode of NYPD Blue. Next week will be season predictions -- which means the real thing, the absurd artificial universe of NFL football, is about to resume. I can't wait! Now, where did I put those cheerleader calendars …

Team Basketball Lives!

Pro basketball is approximately one percent as interesting as pro football, so each year Tuesday Morning Quarterback tosses a percent or so of space to the NBA. Here is this year's NBA Big Point: the league's minority of team-oriented teams are clobbering its majority of undisciplined show-off clubs.

About a decade ago the NBA made a disastrous decision to start drafting high school players en masse. Quality of play promptly declined, then ratings declined as the night follows the day. The pro basketball television audience keeps shrinking because most NBA contests are crummy games: five guys take turns going one-on-one, more concerned about their endorsement contracts than their team's W-L. There was one strong counter-argument to my position: if high-school kids lead to crummy games, why were so many NBA clubs drafting high-school kids? Wouldn't management be smart enough to figure out that team-concept basketball is more likely to produce victories than squads of pouting showoffs?

An amazing number of NBA clubs still don't seem to have figured this out. But coaches and managers of two teams have: the San Antonio Spurs and Detroit Pistons. They've won the last three NBA championships, and done so by eschewing the star system to play team basketball. When the Spurs and Pistons, the league's two most team-oriented teams, met for this year's title, network mavens groaned that neither fielded flashy glamour players. The reason they were meeting for the title is that neither fielded flashy glamour players! Because NBA contracts are fully guaranteed -- gentlemen paid the same regardless of how well or poorly they perform -- NBA coaches have no leverage to force their charges to play team ball. Many NBA players simply ignore what coaches tell them and launch crazy shots the instant they touch the ball. But the San Antonio and Detroit coaching staffs, at least, have convinced their charges to play unselfishly. The result is three consecutive championships. Other NBA teams need to start asking themselves: do you want strutting show-offs or do you want victories?

TMQ Praised for Length, Dullness

Readers have complained that the printable Tuesday Morning Quarterback -- many print TMQ to read during critical business meetings -- does not contain cheerleader pictures and other graphics. Paraic Reddington of Perth, Western Australia, wrote to praise this very lack. Because the printed version appears to be some dense, overly long report on a weighty topic, "this version is very passable as legitimate office work when viewed from 'over the shoulder,'" Reddington wrote. Susan Weir of Overland Park, Kan., wrote to note, "Last season, I started blocking out time in my Outlook calendar so people wouldn't schedule me into meetings when I only wanted to be reading TMQ." Susan, just print it and read during the meetings!

Latte Without Milk, Please

Last season Tuesday Morning Quarterback ran items on redundant food names. "Grilled carne asada steak" sold at Taco Bell, for example, means "grilled roasted meat steak;" the "chi latte with milk" offered at Starbucks means "tea with milk with tea with milk." Comes now Meg Gallagher of East Aurora, New York, to point out the "au jus" often appended to descriptions of prime rib means "with the juice." But the menu usually says "with au jus," meaning "with with the juice." Recently in Buffalo, yours truly snarfed a beef on weck at Charlie the Butcher's, which serves the best beef on weck I've ever savored. (Though, Charlie the Butcher sounds like someone who should be on trial at The Hague.) The sandwich was delicious, and on the wall were signed photos showing Regis Philbin and Denise Austin had eaten at Charlie's too! What did the menu board offer? "Beef on weck dipped in au jus."

Kids, Your Motivational Speaker Will Begin As Soon As She Changes Into Her Bikini

Natalie Glebova, Miss Canada, recently was named Miss Universe. You'd think it would be too cold in Canada for bikinis, but you'd think wrong. In her photos section, be sure to click "national costume." My parents were Canadian, I've spent some time in the frozen north, traveled as far as James Bay near Nunavik and Yellowknife on the Great Slave Lake, never met anyone dressed in this native costume! According to her official bio, Glebova's occupation is "motivational speaker to grade-school and high-school students." Motivational speaking in grade school? "Come on kids, finish coloring those pictures, I know you can do it!" Glebova bested punters' favorite Cynthia Olavarria, who entered as Miss Puerto Rico despite the fact that Puerto Rico is not a country. Unless this was the Miss Self-Governing Commonwealth pageant, Olavarria should have competed as Miss United States. The judging was held in Bangkok, and controversy ignited when the contestants posed in thong bikinis at Wat Arun, a magnificent Buddhist temple. (Sorry, the link is to Wat Arun, not to the bikini pictures.) Some outraged Thais called having a bevy of nearly naked babes putting it out there at Wat Arun an affront to their national religion. But the outraged could not have been much advanced along the Buddhist path, or they wouldn't have cared who posed in front of the temple! Attachment to the symbols of the world can only bring sorrow, and Buddhist sanctuaries themselves number among the mere transient material objects that Buddhists are supposed to let go their concerns over.

You've already missed the annual music festival and cribbage tournament held in Kuujjuaq, capital of Nunavik. There was a golf tournament, too -- location listed as "sandpit on dump road." Kuujjuaq is two degrees north of the Arctic Circle. Tourist information Kuujjuaq, including its "state of the art conference center" and "several eating places," is here.

This Season's First Thong-Based Item

Stefan of Cologne, Germany, notes that NFL Shop is offering a sale on thongs with the Tennessee Titans logo.

Ah, Mexico: So Far From God, So Close to Arizona

Mike DeCleene of New York City notes that a gentleman from TMQ's favorite obscure college, Indiana of Pennsylvania, was taken in the draft -- LeRon McCoy, selected by Arizona. Since McCoy played for Indiana of Pennsylvania and now joins a Phoenix team that will perform this season in Mexico City, DeCleene writes, "Clearly, he was brought in help the Arizona team understand how to play for two disjointed geographic entities simultaneously." In fact, DeCleene suggests, this season why not call the Cardinals' franchise Arizona of Mexico? Mr. Data, make it so!

Why You're Better Off Not Being a Teenaged Millionaire

The NBA's new labor compact specifies that beginning in 2006, players be no younger than 19. In most cases this will require prospects to spend at least one year in college before turning pro. This is good news for basketball, since the decline in NBA popularity and ratings syncs pretty much exactly with the league's disastrous decision to begin drafting high-school players en masse. NBA quality of play has declined because high school kids are unskilled in the fundamentals and lacking the maturity gained in college. Quality of play, and hence the NBA's viability as a business, would have been better served had the minimum age been raised to 20, but in negotiations you take what you can get, and the players' union was adamantly opposed to a 20-years minimum. This is puzzling since raising the age minimum is in the interest of the majority of players.

Consider Amir Johnson, a California high school player taken by Detroit just before the end of June's NBA draft. Johnson will be lucky to get on the court for two minutes a night, considering the Pistons, who play team ball and have no patience for show-offs, can't find minutes for Darko Milicic, selected second overall in 2003. (Milicic career average: 5.8 minutes per game.) Maybe Amir Johnson will succeed in the NBA, but odds say he is likely to languish on the bench for a few years, then be waived out of basketball while still barely more than a teenager. If on the other hand Johnson had gone to college, he would have matured physically and mentally while improving his play, and also gotten, now what's that term I am looking for, oh yes, "an education." After learning and maturing in college Johnson might have been an NBA lottery pick, become a starter, then a few seasons down the road inked a megabucks contract that set him up for life. Instead Johnson is likely to earn relatively little in pro basketball, wash out early, and forfeit his opportunity for a free college education in the process.

Occasionally prodigies such as LeBron James are able to play in the NBA out of high school, but the majority who enter the NBA too young simply end up throwing away both their college experience and long-term incomes. For every James there is a Kwame Brown or a DeSagana Diop. Brown, No. 1 NBA pick out of high school, so far is a bench-lurking who-dat; he might have become a celebrated player if he'd gone to college. Diop, a lottery pick out of high school, has a Shaquille O'Neal phyisque and might have become a great player if he'd gone to college; instead his career average is 1.6 points, because his game is stuck at the high-school level and thus he rarely gets onto the court. The new 19-years-old rule will soften this problem somewhat, but the basic dynamic won't change. Most who declare for the basketball draft after one year of college will not be ready for the pros, will falter and will end up never signing that megabucks deal. As Maurice Clarett completes his self-destruction, I don't have to point out how this logic applies to football, too.

Why doesn't the NBA players union see that its insistence on allowing teenagers into the NBA both risks the golden goose by reducing quality of play, and harms many teenagers by reducing their long-term earnings potential? It may be unrealistic to think that a teenager with NBA potential could resist declaring for the draft and getting a fistful of dollars while still basically a kid. But the union should have the players' best interests in mind, warning teen prospects that total career earnings can be increased through the delayed gratification of attending college. And please don't give me the line that age minimums in basketball are an attempt to prevent young African American men from getting rich. When teenagers take slots on NBA rosters, whom do they replace? In almost every case, a young African American man.

"Carolina, Birthplace of Wind"

TMQ described North Carolina as the "birthplace of flight." Many Buckeyes including Lisa Knepper of Canton, Ohio -- birthplace of football -- protested that the Wright Brothers did most of the work on the Wright Flyer in Dayton, transporting the first heavier-than-air craft to the Carolina shore only once the hard part was done. Ohio, she maintains, is the birthplace of flight. "Olympic feats don't belong to the country where they happened, they belong to the country of origin of the athlete," she maintains.

Bartender, Make Mine a Blueberry-Almond Tranya

Numerous readers including Jeff Moore got the obscure reference to "tranya," a drink an alien offers to Captain Kirk in a 1960s Star Trek episode. It is unlikely that actors who lost their jobs when the Star Wars and Star Trek franchises ended simultaneously are drinking much tranya, however. A single flask of tranya costs 4,000 quatloos!

Burger King to TMQ: We Are Prepared to Offer You Free Ketchup

Not fast food. Good food served quickly.

The "mid-to-high seven figures" is how much the NFL says Burger King will pay for its promotional alliance with the league, announced in May. Months before, yours truly was touting Burger King in this space. Isn't it obvious Tuesday Morning Quarterback set the whole NFL-Burger King deal in motion? Yet I didn't even receive a coupon for onion rings! For my endorsement, I would settle for a fee in the mid-to-high three figures. Note one: Burger King is now the Official Quick Service Restaurant Sponsor of the NFL. Not fast, quick; sounds like a scouting report. Note two: Burger King has an executive whose title is Chief Concept Officer.

Football Licensing Item No. 2

Pro football continues to go max-tech. In a just-announced deal, Sprint cell phone customers now can get live audio updates during games, and video highlights shortly after each game ends. Sirius Satellite Radio now offers subscribers live radio of every NFL game, and you can choose the home or visiting team's station. You can watch almost any NFL game live by signing up for satellite provider DirecTV, plus the Sunday Ticket package. Pretty soon anyone with Sunday Ticket at home, plus a broadband connection, plus a laptop, will be able to have the games beamed to anywhere the laptop is connected to broadband. If you live in Los Angeles and are sitting in a hotel room in Chicago, you'll use your laptop to connect to your home Sunday Ticket, then watch your choice of any game exactly as if you were sitting on your couch.

All of this march of technology is really great. Except let me pause for a primal scream: I STILL CAN'T GET SUNDAY TICKET! The fabulous Sunday Ticket package remains available solely to those who receive DirecTV, and I can't because my house is surrounded by Kyoto-Treaty-endorsed greenhouse-gas-absorbing trees. I am hardly the only football nut in this boat -- anyone who lives in a home or apartment encircled by trees or tall buildings can't receive satellite television, and thus cannot buy Sunday Ticket. Seriously, NFL, it's the 21st century. You're beaming video highlights to cell phones. Why can't you come up with a system that allows anyone to subscribe to Sunday Ticket?

Football Licensing Item No. 3

The Cowboys are the first NFL franchise with an official pharmacy, CVS. "Eileen Dunne, vice president of corporate communications and community relations for CVS, boldly presented [Dallas owner Jerry] Jones with a large bottle of CVS aspirin for the upcoming season," the announcement reads. What if Jones' insurer refuses to pay for the aspirin? After all, for an NFL owner, headaches are a "preexisting condition."

Sure Beats Workin'

Jim Stekelberg wrote to protest that the Monday Night Football schedule shuts out Buffalo and Jacksonville, both of which went 9-7 last season, while granting Monday night dates to Carolina, Dallas, Kansas City and Washington, all of which had losing seasons last year. Lifestyle note: Stekelberg sent me this complaint mere minutes after the 2005 sked was released. So he was sitting around in April obsessing about the NFL -- Jim, you have your priorities in order!

Also, Doug Flutie Is the Last Quarterback Still Wearing a Helmet with an AM Transistor Radio

Last week TMQ noted that punter Scott Player of Arizona is the last NFL performer still wearing a 1950s-style single-bar facemask. Years ago, the league mandated a minimum of two bars but grandfathered kickers using the single-bar, and Player was the sole one remaining. The very day the column came out, the Eagles brought out of retirement punter Sean Landeta, who also has a grandfathered permission to wear a single-bar. This was noted by Seth Caughron of New York City, among many readers.

"Leave the Engine On While I'm Speaking About Saving Fuel," Mineta Instructed His Driver

Last week, Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta announced new fuel-efficiency standards for SUVs, minivans and pickup trucks. The goal -- an 8 percent increase in the MPG of large vehicles -- seems modest, given that the National Academy of Sciences, in a 2001 report requested by George W. Bush, said vehicle fuel economy could be increased by about one third without sacrifice of safety or comfort. At least give Bush, who in five years has imposed two modest fuel economy increases on SUVs, credit for doing something. In eight years, Bill Clinton took no action regarding MPG standards.

Two aspects of Mineta's announcement struck TMQ. First, he arrived on the scene in a Lincoln Navigator, a mega-SUV that gets 15 miles per gallon and records a three on the EPA's air pollution scale, where zero is worst and 10 is best. The Navigator also emits 12.9 tons per year of greenhouse gases, one of the worst figures for a mass-produced vehicle, according to the EPA. (Go here to find the fuel efficiency, pollution score and greenhouse-gas emissions of any car.) Second, Mineta made his announcement not in Washington, D.C., but in Los Angeles, to which he flew for the event. There is no better way to waste petroleum than taking an unnecessary airplane trip! If Mineta flew to Los Angeles aboard a Boeing 777, the most fuel-efficient jetliner, about 75 gallons of fuel would have been burned to move his seat. But cabinet secretaries rarely travel alone: if Mineta traveled with three aides, then 300 gallons were wasted. And this assumes flying commercial on the most efficient plane in the sky. If Mineta took one of the government's corporate-sized jets -- and cabinet secretaries often demand this perk for ego reasons -- then petroleum waste skyrocketed. The C-20G, the government version of the Gulfstream IV corporate jet, would burn about 4,000 gallons flying from Washington to Los Angeles and back, depending on wind. That much fuel equates to a Hummer driving round-trip coast-to-coast 10 times. Let's waste petroleum in order to announce a petroleum conservation plan!

The Football Gods Chortled

Eyebrows were raised this offseason when the league awarded Denver an extra third-round draft pick as compensation for losing linebacker Ian Gold in free agency, while Indianapolis was awarded a fourth-round pick for losing linebacker Marcus Washington; Gold had a so-so season, while Washington made the Pro Bowl. Why did the Broncos get more when Indianapolis lost the better player? Fear not; the football gods grind slow, but they grind exceeding small. Denver used the bonus choice to select the perennially worthless Maurice Clarett who, true to form, immediately began to complain that the Broncos were mistreating him. Yesterday Clarett was waived, after compiling zero carries for Denver -- same as he accomplished in the last two years for Ohio State! Thus Denver's mysterious bonus choice yielded nothing for the club. Meanwhile, TMQ's jaw will drop if any other NFL team wastes even one single second on Clarett, who at this point should count himself lucky to be covering punts for the Edmonton Eskimos.

Another Reason to Fear New England

As the Broncos were cutting their losses with Clarett, New England named Matt Cassel its third-string quarterback. Minor transaction? Tuesday Morning Quarterback trembles. Cassel did not start in college; the last time Cassel threw a touchdown pass was in 1999, at Chatsworth High School in California. When New England spent a seventh-round pick on Cassel in this year's draft, yours truly wrote, "It was bad enough the Patriots used a sixth-round pick on Tom Brady, who had a fairly ordinary college career, then turned Brady into a Super Bowl MVP. Now they've used a seventh-round pick on Matt Cassel, who didn't even start in college. Please tell me New England will convert him into a defensive tackle. Please don't tell me he's another future Super Bowl MVP quarterback." Cassel was stuck on the bench behind Carson Palmer and Matt Leinart in college. Now he's had a strong training camp and may be a find. While other teams throw high draft choices out the window, New England scouts a guy who didn't even start in college, and comes up with a winner. Ye gods.

Break Up the AFC

John Bjorkman notes the AFC clobbered the NFC in 2004, going 45-20. He haikuizes,

NFC struggles

versus stronger AFC.

Future looks bleak, too.

-- John Bjorkman, Euless, Texas

Kids, You'll Go Deaf If You Keep Leaving That Refrigerator Open

TMQ has taken to saying that very loud NFL stadiums reach "experimental scramjet decibel levels" on third downs. David Aronchick of Seattle, Washington, notes that experimental scramjets make about 140 decibels of noise, while an experimental acoustics-based refrigerator generates an incredible 173 decibels, nearly the sound of the space shuttle leaving its pad. (The point of the device is very low energy consumption; if perfected for home use, the fridge will be muffled, needless to say.) Aronchick suggests "experimental refrigerator decibel levels" would better express the madhouse atmosphere of NFL stadia on third-and-10.

Beefcake Requisite

Just for you, Ms. Wu.

Michelle Wu of Austin, Texas, asks, if yours truly can vertical-jump 31 inches, why there are no beefcake pictures of me in the column? Michelle, this is for humanitarian reasons. If the NFL.com art department can superimpose my head on the bod of some ripped ultra-stud, then we'll run it.

Mega-Babe Boasts of Predicting Exact Final Score!

A few years back, Sporting News polled a large group of celebs for their Super Bowl predictions, and the sole respondent to hit the nail on the head was hot-tomato actress Catherine Bell from the old JAG show. Trent Douhett of Columbus, Ohio, points out that Bell's bio now boasts, "She's the only person to have ever correctly predicted the participants in, winner, and final score of a Super Bowl before a season began." Note to NFL.com art department: Trent Douhett of Columbus, Ohio, has just provided a perfectly legitimate football-related excuse for a cheesecake photo of Bell.

Hier an NFL.com, Ist Der Gesamte Personal Morgenmuffellen

Matt Powell, stationed at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, was perusing the Berlin Thunder website and naturally looked in the cheerleaders section. He notes that Thunder dance team member Stephanie is 21 years old and in her sixth season on the Thunder cheerleader squad. Are there no child labor laws in Germany governing flouncing? Powell adds that Stephanie's bio says her worst quality is being a Morgenmuffel -- German for "not a morning person." Isn't that a great word? Morgenmuffel should be borrowed into English to mean "not a morning person."

Also, Go For Two When Ordering Beer

This column's immutable law, Take One Till the Fourth, holds that unless an NFL team is way behind, until the fourth quarter it should take one-point PATs, even if, say, the score is 14-12 and a one-point PAT still leaves you trailing 14-13. Because the final score dynamic is unknowable until the fourth quarter, a 99 percent chance of one point is preferable to a 40 percent chance of two points, these being the NFL averages. Late in the game a seemingly trivial one point, passed up early, might make all the difference. Many's the team that goes for two when unnecessary, then later wishes it had taken one. Carolina in Super Bowl XXXVIII, for instance.

Reader Derek Cornwell of Kansas City, Mo., points out that Bill Belichick uses this incredibly scientifically advanced analysis, by Harold Sackrowitz, a professor of statistics at Rutgers University, to decide when to go for two. Sackrowitz's graphs take into account not just scoreboard but time remaining and likely number of possessions remaining. Sackrowitz, Cornwell points out, recommends an NFL or college team almost always go for one in the first three quarters -- but then start going for two in the fourth quarter. That's pretty much the TMQ immutable law. Tuesday Morning Quarterback adds that Sackrowitz's breakdown is different for high school football, where he recommends prep teams go for two in almost every situation. TMQ attends a lot of high school football games, and agrees. In high school it's more like a 60 percent chance of one point versus a 50 percent chance of two points, and that argues for regular use of the deuce try.

One Enchanted Evening, You Will Meet a Strangelet…

Previous TMQ items have questioned the wisdom of the United States and European Union expending billions of tax dollars on complex "atom smashers." Such particle accelerators appear to stand almost no chance of discovering anything of value to the taxpayers who must fund them; they seem mainly a jobs program for physics postdocs. (Yes, of course, seemingly abstract research of the past has turned out to have practical value.) Meanwhile atom smashers engage the risk of accidentally creating a novel "strangelet" particle with unwelcome properties, such as causing the entire Earth to collapse. The "strangelet" risk is small. But given that particle accelerators have no known practical value, what's the point of running any risk at all in this area?

Reader Shaun points out that the most powerful accelerator yet, the Large Hadron Collider, is under construction at the CERN research facility on the French-Swiss border. Here, see enormous superconducting magnets being lowered into the tunnels of the new smasher. The Large Hadron Collider will propel protons to almost the speed of light, then slam them together with 70 times the force of CERN's present accelerator. Let's hope the French-Swiss border does not inadvertently vanish when the machine is turned on. Shaun speculates in haiku,

Protons at light speed,

superconducting magnets:

France's doom draws near.

-- Shaun

Many NFL Teams Offer "Bonus in Lieu of Employment"

Warning, Serious Item

Last week's column discussed the fact that sudden deaths of apparently healthy young athletes usually trace to undiagnosed heart abnormalities, and asked why the inexpensive EKG test is not used to screen youths participating in sports. A number of pediatricians and heart specialists wrote in saying this wouldn't necessarily work. Dr. Jeffrey Kons of the Indiana University School of Medicine noted that attempts to use EKGs to screen young people for heart defects have mainly led to false positives -- kids and their parents are put through the fright of believing there is a heart problem, only to have subsequent tests show there is none. A superior test called the echocardiogram reliably detects heart abnormalities, but costs several hundred dollars per patient. With an estimated 1.8 million people playing all forms of organized football in the United States, if all were subjected to an echocardiogram at $300 per test, the bill would be half a billion dollars. Cost can't be dismissed as a non-issue; in the utilitarian calculus of medicine, investing half a billion dollars in primary care would likely save more lives than hunting for rare heart defects. Studies suggest, Dr. Kons reported, that one teenager in 3,000 should be disqualified from athletics based on heart abnormalities. How to find that one in 3,000? Dr. Bevin Weeks, a pediatric cardiologist at Yale-New Haven Medical Center of Yale University, says annual physicals and detailed family medical histories are more likely to pinpoint youth heart defects than mass EKG screening. Dr. Shawn Tittle, a cardiothoracic surgeon at Yale Medical Center, even put the whole thing into TMQ terms by haikuizing:

EKG not the

answer; regular checkups

make for safer kids.

-- Shawn Tittle, New Haven, Conn.

TMQ interjects that since many medical advances start off being too expensive and end up being universal, maybe someone should find a way to cut the price of echocardiograms, and then this examination could become standard for everyone. Death rates for just about everything have declined for generations. There's no reason medical science can't take on the youthful heart abnormality and knock that out, too.

In Space, No One Can Hear You Yawn

Reader Mike Cornaro of Milford, N.H, protested that when two spaceships meet in space in sci-fi shows and movies, they're always facing the same way. "Is there a top to the universe?" he asks. Starcruisers ought to move through space the way fish move through water, going in any direction horizontal, vertical or diagonal.

When Will Someone Make a Show About Los Angeles That's Filmed in New York?

The offseason saw the series finale of NYPD Blue. Yours truly hoped the finale would include appearances by the ghosts of all partners, wives, children and girlfriends of Andy Sipowicz who were killed or died of mysterious diseases. But that would have required the episode to be filmed in a convention center. Instead, for the finale NYPD Blue stuck to its established formula of incredible realism -- the police lingo, the rundown precinct house, the female detectives played by stunning former swimsuit models. For those who missed the last episode of this realistic New York City show filmed in Los Angeles, here is the script:

Sipowicz arrives at crime scene, walks through yellow police tape. SIPOWICZ: Who's the victim?

UNIFORMED OFFICER: An actor.

SIPOWICZ: Sick [expletive] city, not even the actors are safe anymore.

UNIFORMED OFFICER: No, I mean the victim is played by an actor. Medical examiner says the guy's fine. The director told him to lie still during filming.

SIPOWICZ: Sick [expletive] city, you can't even tell who's dead anymore.

Medavoy arrives.

MEDAVOY: I got jammed up on my way to the House.

SIPOWICZ: Didn't you tell them you was on the job?

MEDAVOY: Yeah. But they still jammed me.

Note: this was TMQ's last chance to use the above lines, which for years yours truly has contended could be inserted into any NYPD Blue episode at any point.

SIPOWICZ: Did you bring the yellow sheet on that mutt who lawyered up?

MEDAVOY: Yeah. And I rolled over a mule, filed my fifty-seven, packaged a white shirt, waxed a soldier and reached out to a rabbi at the Puzzle Palace.

Playwright David Mamet walks by.

MAMET: I love this unexplained street dialogue, it's so genuine. At least, I assume it's genuine.

SIPOWICZ: Yo, Mamet! You know anything about the murder?

MAMET: You'll never pin this one on me, copper. I've got an alibi. I was at the studio, dumbing down the pilot for the network's new crime drama.

MEDAVOY: His alibi checks out, sarge. I've seen the script.

SIPOWICZ: Third-grade comprehension level?

MEDAVOY: There you go.

SIPOWICZ: [Expletive] network, they [expletive, expletive, expletive].

MEDAVOY: You can say that again!

Actor Joe Mantegna walks by.

MANTEGNA: Love this authentic New York dirt. They must fly it in. Why, this is almost as realistic as my "Spenser" movies that depict Boston and were filmed in Vancouver.

SIPOWICZ: Okay, what about suspects? We gotta close this murder before the victim goes on coffee break.

MEDAVOY: How should I know who did it? There are eight million people back east in New York. In mean, in this city.

SIPOWICZ: Bring 'em all to the One-Five for questioning.

UNIFORMED OFFICER: Just do what you did in the last episode! Drive over to the suspect's building and park in the vacant space that is easily found directly in front of the door, even though this is supposed to be lower East Side Manhattan. Then go into his apartment and immediately see the incriminating evidence in plain view.

SIPOWICZ: Shut up, I'm the detective.

Lieutenant Bale arrives accompanied by a gorgeous woman whose cleavage is bursting from the décolletage of a barely-buttoned dress shirt.

LT. BALE: Sipowicz, I come to warn you. Internal Affairs wants your badge.

SIPOWICZ: Not the Rat Squad again!

LT. BALE: Yeah. Though you've solved every case you've ever been assigned and pretty much single-handedly rid Manhattan of crime, they're investigating you for the 10 consecutive season.

MANTEGNA: Say, who's the chickadee?

LT. BALE: Sipowicz, meet your new partner. Her name's Miss July.

SIPOWICZ: (World-weary sigh.) Look, lady, let's put it right on the table. You're a gorgeous young babe. I'm a balding, overweight middle-aged man with a bad personality and an outdated, single-shot weapon. So naturally, you will fall for me.

LT. BALE: She has to. It's in your contract.

SIPOWICZ: Butt out already! Miss July, you won't be able to keep your hands off me. But in one to two seasons depending on the ratings, you will die of a mysterious rare disease. Don't say you wasn't warned.

MISS JULY. Oh Andy, you make me so hot! Take me to a hotel right away!

SIPOWICZ: A hotel -- on a cop's salary?

Next Week:

Still America's only all-haiku NFL season predictions.

[Henry]

e•di•tor

n 1: a person responsible for the editorial aspects of publication; the person who determines the final content of a text (especially of a newspaper or magazine) [syn: editor in chief]

[SkinsNatsFan]

Does anyone actually read through that whole thing from end to end?

[orlskinsfan]

can someone please summerize that article...whoa!

[bcl05]

This is a prime example of why the internet (along with PowerPoint) has contributed to the downfall of the complete sentence and coherent writing. I could barely keep up with his random stream of consciousness.

Was there any point at all to any of that? Any actual fact-based reporting? Or was it just something he dreamed up sitting on the can this morning. What a load of dreck.

However, there was one nugget that cought my eye:

The Cowboys are the first NFL franchise with an official pharmacy, CVS. "Eileen Dunne, vice president of corporate communications and community relations for CVS, boldly presented [Dallas owner Jerry] Jones with a large bottle of CVS aspirin for the upcoming season," the announcement reads. What if Jones' insurer refuses to pay for the aspirin? After all, for an NFL owner, headaches are a "preexisting condition."

This is just too damn easy. Of course they have an official pharmacy. It that dude down on the corner with the sweet connections...

[stwasm]

My bad, folks. Assuming my privileges aren't revoked, I'll just clip excerpts next time. Every now and then, he'll report something profound. Interestingly, up until Gibbs' return, he refused to call the Redskins by name, instead referring to them as the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons because he thought the name was racist. However, he is a big fan of the cheerleaders, saying that they and the Eagles' cheerleaders are running neck and neck for best-looking squad.

[Califan007 The Constipated]

"Eyebrows were raised this offseason when the league awarded Denver an extra third-round draft pick as compensation for losing linebacker Ian Gold in free agency, while Indianapolis was awarded a fourth-round pick for losing linebacker Marcus Washington; Gold had a so-so season, while Washington made the Pro Bowl. Why did the Broncos get more when Indianapolis lost the better player? Fear not; the football gods grind slow, but they grind exceeding small. Denver used the bonus choice to select the perennially worthless Maurice Clarett who, true to form, immediately began to complain that the Broncos were mistreating him. Yesterday Clarett was waived, after compiling zero carries for Denver -- same as he accomplished in the last two years for Ohio State! Thus Denver's mysterious bonus choice yielded nothing for the club. Meanwhile, TMQ's jaw will drop if any other NFL team wastes even one single second on Clarett, who at this point should count himself lucky to be covering punts for the Edmonton Eskimos."

And it wasn't that long ago that the sports media world was praising Denver's FO to the hilt while laughing at the "incompetent" Skins FO...I wonder when Bailey's overhyped millions, transporting Cleveland's defensive line over to their defense, and wasting a 3rd round pick on that moron Clarett will ever start to factor into how Denver's FO is perceived...

[kharms01]

I'm Finally Done. Now I need a day of Rest.

[Canyonero!]

My bad, folks. Assuming my privileges aren't revoked, I'll just clip excerpts next time. Every now and then, he'll report something profound. Interestingly, up until Gibbs' return, he refused to call the Redskins by name, instead referring to them as the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons because he thought the name was racist. However, he is a big fan of the cheerleaders, saying that they and the Eagles' cheerleaders are running neck and neck for best-looking squad.

Nah, it goes back to when Snyder/Voldemort bought the team at least, maybe further. I used to enjoy some of his stuff when he wrote for Slate. Been downhill since then.

[Art Monk Fan]

I must be wierd, I've always liked his collumn -- very tongue-in-cheek and slightly disrespectful. He now calls the Skins by some tribe's name, or native word, or something -- I think he ran a reader's contest to choose it. Anyway, he refers to the Giants and Jets as New Jersey A and New Jersey B and the Titans as the Flaming Thumbtacks (just look at their helmets). And he hates the Bengals alternate uniforms (thinks they look like some kind of halloween costume) and ripped Marvin Lewis for having his team come out, at home, early in the season, for a hot afternoon game, dressed all in black -- talk about giving away your home field advantage.

[bcl05]

My bad, folks. Assuming my privileges aren't revoked, I'll just clip excerpts next time. Every now and then, he'll report something profound. Interestingly, up until Gibbs' return, he refused to call the Redskins by name, instead referring to them as the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons because he thought the name was racist. However, he is a big fan of the cheerleaders, saying that they and the Eagles' cheerleaders are running neck and neck for best-looking squad.

No No - you misunderstood me. Posting it is fine. Its great to have articles posted from other sites, no matter the quality of the content. It saves us the time and energy to exhaustively search the web for Skins tidbits. I know by keeping up with this site, I won't miss anything related to the team.

So thanks for posting it. Its kind of fun to read - like looking at a train wreck. You, sir, are the messenger, and shall not be slain. The "author," on the other hand, should be ashamed.