The Breeders' Cup day of racing produced more than a few surprises including the dismal performance by Riboletta and the "no-show" performances by Montjeu and Fusiachi Pegasus. But the racing was really outstanding including Kona Gold winning the Sprint in an official time of 1:07 3/5 beating the BC record by a fifth of a second and shattering the Churchill Downs track record for 6 furlongs by a full second. Rarely do sprinters get much consideration as Horse of the Year and Kona Gold is as pure a sprinter as you will find in the sport; nevertheless, I think this horse deserves as much consideration as the Classic winner Tiznow who has won exactly two Grade - 1 races this year. And reading the turf writers in various papers, I sense that Tiznow is the horse that is going to get more than a few votes. It is not that I don't like Tiznow; in fact, this was the horse that I had in the Pacific Classic about 2 months ago.

As the Wizards opened their season at home, they unveiled their new mascot. It is a guy in an inflatable suit and its name is Air G. Wiz. The fans booed it when it was introduced. Conventional wisdom says that only happens in Philly.

David Stern "Und Drang" is calling in Latrell Spreewell to find out what is going on regarding Spree's comments that Chris Webber and Spree will reunite next year with the Knicks. This is supposed to be an application of the "tampering" rule to a player and not - as is customary - to an agent or a club exec. What I can't figure out is how the Knicks will have anything near the cap room to make a reasonable offer to Webber that would not trigger the "secret deal" alarms. Forgetting the big dollars the Knicks are paying to people like Larry Johnson and Marcus Camby and Spreewell, I recall seeing some huge numbers attached to contracts they had to assume in order to move Patrick Ewing. Luc Longley and Glenn Rice and Travis Knight have multi-year deals that count against the Knicks' cap and while I don't have the numbers in front of me, I'll bet they come out to a total of close to $20 M per year. So I have no idea how this is supposed to happen unless there is a big time player for the Knicks who is in the last year of his contract and a "sign and trade" can be worked out with Sacramento.

An arbitrator ruled that the LA Clippers owe Rodney Rogers more than $700K. He ruled that the Clippers were wrong in fining Rogers for reporting to camp almost 30 lbs heavier than his contract called for because it happened during the lockout in 1998. At least there is a basis for the ruling because when I read the headlines, the first thing I thought was that the Clippers could not even get a scale to weigh the players properly and they owed the money for improperly weighing the guy. Hey, it could have happened that way; remember, these are the Clippers.

The NBA has granted the Miami Heat a special $4M salary cap exemption because Alonzo Mourning is out for the season and the Heat is expected to use it to pursue Joe Smith. This is the one of the few circumstance where it is appropriate to use Joe Smith's name and Alonzo Mourning's name in the same paragraph. One other circumstance would be to say that both are bipeds.

In the Rae Carruth saga, it seems that the Charlotte Observer has now obtained and printed the transcript of the "911 tape" that Rae's pregnant girlfriend made after she was shot 4 times. The tape evidently says that Rae was involved in the shooting. The trial is still in the phase of selecting jurors and this material in the biggest paper in the area seems to limit the rest of the jury pool to people who cannot read and who do not ever listen to local radio or TV. I did not know that Charlotte had a large population of hermits and I really do not think that the foundation in legal theory of finding impartial jurors should focus a jury search predominantly on homeless people.

Free agent Manny Ramirez has supposedly let it be known that he wants a 10 year contract with a total value of $200M. Why not just give him the Minnesota franchise and have him be a player-owner?

Juan "Population Bomb" Gonzalez turned down a Detroit offer of 8 years and $143M last year. He is now a free agent and after a season with 22 HR and 67 RBIs the only people who think he should get anywhere near this number are Juan himself and his new agent Scott "Nuclear Winter" Boras. If GMs look carefully, they will see that Juan has never been a reliable 162 game player and how often does a guy sign a big contract and then produce big numbers right AFTER the signing. A team that needs a big bat to make a run at the playoffs or series might offer him a one year deal at $8-10M but if I'm a GM, that is all I'm going to talk to him about.

College football coaching opportunities continue to open up. Don Nehlen announced that he will retire at the end of the season after 21 years at West Virginia. The Rutgers and Alabama jobs are open as are Bowling Green and Buffalo; I wonder if the OT win last week by USC saved Paul Hackett's job out in LA. It should not have.

As suspected, the Penn State fans booed the ridiculous Faculty Senate resolution in opposition to "negative cheering". Then the fans had a real reason to boo as the Lions tanked against a really bad Iowa team and lost in OT. Believe it or not, Penn State was still potentially bowl eligible until that loss. Couple that fact with the fact that Maryland is still potentially bowl eligible and Temple is still potentially bowl eligible and you will understand why I keep saying there are far too many damned bowl games!

Michigan lost to Northwestern 54-51 on Saturday and it was not an OT game. The teams combined for a total of 1189 yards of offense; neither defense decided to make it to the game. Northwestern had a RB go for 268 yards which is a monstrous performance, but in the same game the QB threw for 322 yards.

I have to give the headline writer in the Washington Post credit. Last week, I made a note that if Florida State beat Clemson in the "Bowden Bowl" I would make the comment that it proved that "Father 'Noles Best". Well, the headline writer used it in Sunday's paper proving that great minds run in similar channels - and so does sewage. One of the ESPN talking heads was commenting on the Bowden family as coaches and said that they were the only folks he knew who could conjugate the verb, "dadgummit". Good line.

In NFL action, the Steelers have been living off their defense in their 5 game winning streak. In their first eight games, their QBs had thrown a total of 3 TD passes and none of them to wide receivers. In the 4 games prior to Sunday, the Steelers defense had not allowed a TD. Well the trends continued yesterday; the Steelers got a TD pass but not to a wide receiver and the defense did not allow a TD and the Titans won by kicking three field goals. The Steeler offense produced only 167 yards. The Steelers benefited from the Titans sloppy play which produced 14 penalties against Tennessee for 115 yards. Just to give you an idea of how important that stat is, the Steelers gained only 93 yards passing for the day.

The Ravens have had to live on their defense because their offense has been missing in action. But playing Cincy cures just about anything and everything. After 322+ minutes without a TD, the Ravens scored early in the 2nd quarter. Here's how. They recovered a fumble on the Cincy 15. On third and long, the Bungles stopped them but had twelve men on the field. After a false start penalty to make it third and long again, the Ravens hit a short pass over the middle that was run in for a score. Then came more TDs and the Cincy running game that had been dominant against an injured Denver defense and an imaginary Cleveland defense managed to produce 44 yards in 27 carries on Sunday. By the way, I am now beginning to believe that Akili Smith is far less valuable than he was hyped to be or as he would like you to believe. Going into Sunday's game, he had 109 possessions in his NFL starts and had 5 TD passes. The TD on Sunday came on a trick play where Smith lined up at WR and Peter Warrick lined up at QB. Warrick ran a sweep for about 5 yards into the end zone. Smith was 15 for 27 passing which raised his completion percentage from a pathetic 42% for the season.

How the hell did San Diego lose on Sunday? Before the game, writers said that the 2-7 Seattle Seahawks looked like a team that could provide the Chargers with their first victory. Jim Harbaugh said, "We are not taking anyone lightly." That has to be the first time that quote has been attributed to the QB of an 0-8 team! On Sunday the Chargers had 398 yards of offense and held the Seahawks to 128. The Chargers had the ball almost 40 minutes. They ran 73 plays to 44 for the Seahawks. And they lost on a last second field goal. How does that happen, you ask? Bad teams find ways to lose games; really bad teams find ways to lose games to teams that are merely bad.

The Pats lost to the Bills in OT and Drew Bledsoe had to leave the game after his thumb and Sam Cowhart's helmet had a "chance encounter". Somehow the Pats made this into an OT game even though they had only 189 yards of offense and were penalized 103 yards for the game. The Bills had 315 yards of offense but most of it had to be in their own territory because they only scored 16 points in an OT game and they missed no field goals and only turned the ball over once. The Bills are still alive for a playoff spot but have a run against KC, Tampa, Miami and Indy coming up. To make the playoffs, I think the Bills need to win at least two of those 4 games.

The Bears ran out to a 27-0 lead on the Colts and then the Colts came back to trail by 27-24 with 1:36 to play. The Colts recovered the onside kick at that point and it looked like a miracle comeback was about to happen. But the Bears forced a fumble to end the game.

The Lions got handled by the Dolphins. Charlie Batch went out with a minor concussion and substitute QB, Stoney Case wound up in a shoving match with Herman Moore as the offense left the field in the 4th quarter. The Lions are 5-4 and they do not have the most daunting schedule ahead of them so whatever happened on the field there needs to be quenched by the coaching staff immediatement. Elvis was alive and passing in KC on Sunday. Grbac became the 8th QB in NFL history to have over 500 yards passing in a single game. And the Chiefs lost to the Raiders by 18. Sebastian Janikowski did not play because of a bacterial infection in his kicking foot that Jon Gruden called "cellulitis". Given Janikowski's bulk, I think he might have been referring to Sebastian's fight to conquer cellulite, but we'll hear more from doctors on this during the week.

The Saints are for real. Jeff Blake was 20-26 for 236 yards and 3 TDs to lead the Saints over the 49ers by 16 points. While New Orleans can hardly be considered a place with a great NFL tradition for winning, it is amazing what can happen when a player leaves a cesspool like Cincy and winds up in a place like New Orleans. The only negative thing to say about the Saints' record so far is that they have yet to play a team that had a winning record last year and going into as of now the combined record of their opponents this year is 23-54. But recall that the Chargers got to a Super Bowl by playing just such a schedule and then getting hot in two playoff games. Then the clock struck midnight…

After the Eagles beat the Cowboys, Donovan McNabb was interviewed and was talking about playing against Randall Cunningham in that game. McNabb was quoted as saying, "He's a guy I idolized and watched throughout his career. I tried to assimilate my game after him…" Hopefully Donovan was misquoted. If not, the Oxford English Dictionary needs to be on the alert for a new meaning for the word "assimilate" for their next edition.

But the biggest tank job of the day had to be the Redskins dismal performance against the sorry-assed no-account Cardinals. The Redskins never had to punt; they ran 77 plays to 44 for the Cardinals; they had 27 first downs and the Cards had 11; they had 431 yards of offense to 178 for the Cards (that is more than double the amount for those of you whose calculator batteries are low). Darth Snyder got his wish and Jeff George played QB. And they lost 16-15. So what happened?

1. Jeff George may be "Danny's boy", but he is a career loser in the NFL. Last year with the Vikes he was 9-3 as a starter; until last year, he had won less than 40% of his starts. With the game in the balance, George was 2-8 passing in the final possession of the game gaining no more than 20 yards.

2. The special teams which stunk last year and were wrongfully blamed for losing the playoff game to Tampa still stink. Despite "firing" the long snapper and the kicker and the punter, the teams don't get it done. This is the 3rd Redskin kicker this season and he missed a chip shot field goal yesterday. The long snapper screwed up the snap on an extra point. The kickoff coverage team yielded an average return of 36 yards. The Redskins returned two punts for a net of zero yards.

3. In the second half against a team with an outmanned defense, the Skins' offense managed all of one field goal and precisely zip in the fourth quarter.

4. For the record, the Cards kept alive their streak of 47 consecutive games without a TD in their first possession of the game.

Finally, for those who may have missed the late scores in college games on Saturday, Western Colorado State beat Colorado School of Mines 53-6. The Miners fell behind early and were never able to dig out from under…

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