According to an item yesterday from Charlie Walters' column in the St. Paul Pioneer-Press, the Minnesota Vikings' employees' holiday party will be held today at the Bearpath Golf and Country Club. After the famous “Carnal Cruse” and the subsequent 77-page code of ethics for the Vikings, don't you think there might just be a couple of reporters staking out this event?

I read a report that said that even after the Tennessee Titans did their housecleaning at the end of last season, the team will still be $7M over next year's projected salary cap and I wondered how that could possibly be. Then I read somewhere else, that Steve McNair's contract had not been reworked recently and it was hugely back loaded when he signed it years ago. McNair's cap number for next year will be just under $28M just for him. That would mean that Steve McNair would consume about 30% of the salary cap space for the entire roster next year if nothing happened and that just cannot happen. If he retires, the only cap number he will count for is the prorated share of his signing bonus; if he decides to play, he'll have to rework the deal or be released.

As I sat through the miserable Packers/Lions game last night – it went to overtime and it was still a horrid game – I kept thinking about “flexible scheduling” for the NFL's national games in December. So I checked the schedule. Monday Night Football is a flagship for the NFL; it is the vehicle that showed the league and the networks that NFL football could expand its coverage successfully and that it could generate a lot of fan interest in a national game. After more than 30 years on ABC, MNF will bow out on that network in a couple of weeks and move over to ESPN next year. So, how did the schedule-makers do in terms of getting MNF off of ABC with a modicum of grace and dignity and possibly with a bit of excitement? Consider the data:

Tonight the Falcons play the Saints. The Falcons are mediocre and the Saints are miserable. We'll hear over and over again that Michael Vick is the most dangerous player in the league and that the Saints have had to overcome sooo much this year - - except their record is 3-9 and they haven't overcome much of anything. Sixty percent of the East Coast viewing audience will be nodding off by halftime.

Next week the Ravens visit the Packers. If this compost heap of a game were to be played in a blinding snowstorm with a wind-chill factor in the “negative teens”, maybe it would be interesting for a while. Then again, maybe not.

After that, we will be graced with the Pats and the Jets. The Pats will have won the division by then and won't care much; the Jets are just horrible.

And in the finale - - oh, there isn't a Monday night game in the final week of the year so it will end with the Pats and Jets. MNF is getting the Rodney Dangerfield treatment – no respect. Well, maybe it could have been worse. The first MNF game on ABC was the Jets and the Browns. We could have had to endure that game as the finale if the schedule makers had a masochistic streak in them.

Speaking of miserable football, imagine for a moment that you really love NFL football and you happen to be from or live in the San Francisco area. The Raiders are 4-9; the Niners are 2-11; the Raiders need to be blown up and started over; the Niners have been in the “starting over” process for a couple of years now. Football fans there must be turning their attention to area collegiate teams - - except the Bay Area collegiate teams are Stanford and Cal. Neither of them is worth much attention either.

Speaking of Stanford, remember that they lost to UC-Davis in football. Well, the men's basketball team at Stanford seems to have caught whatever befell the football team because UC-Davis beat Stanford in basketball by 6 points a week ago.

I'm glad that Reggie Bush won the Heisman Trophy last week. Let me explain; I really don't care who wins that award but I had more than enough of the chatter about who should win and who ought to win and why only offensive players get serious consideration for the award. Enough already! Now it is over and the trolls that run that publicity machine surrounding the award can go back to their homes under a bridge somewhere. By the way, Bernie Lincicome of the Rocky Mountain News explained very succinctly why defenders rarely get any consideration for the Heisman Trophy:

“Tacklers do not win. You don't give the gold medal to the hurdles.”

Here is another succinct summary of an issue that has been in the news far too much over the past 9 months. Tim Kawakami wrapped up the latest happening in the Terrell Owens soap opera thusly in the San Jose Mercury-News:

“He's an elite athlete being denied the chance to play. Basically, a modern-day Muhammad Ali, but without the cause, the courage, the wit or integrity.”

In the NBA, I noticed that the NY Knicks have signed Qyntel Woods. He is the former TrailBlazer who once tried to use his rookie trading card for identification when stopped by a police officer for a traffic incident. I believe that he didn't have a driver's license because it had been suspended, but I'm not positive about that. Somehow, I think that the tandem of Stephon Marbury and Qyntel Woods will generate just a bit of stomach acid in Larry Brown. What he needs now is to find a way to get Derrick Coleman on the team…

Finally, the LA Times reported that former USC WR, John Jackson, picked USC to beat Texas in the Rose Bowl this year even though Texas thinks they will win the game. Jackson told the Pasadena Quarterbacks Club:

“I played for the Arizona Cardinals, so I know what it is to think you're going to win.”

But don't get me wrong, I love sports...

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