Lots of stuff happened over the weekend in the NFL over and beyond the literary lesson learned by Terrell Owens - - you can't go home again - - so let me begin by wondering how Nick Saban got so dumb so quickly. After the Dolphins went on a five or six game winning streak to finish last season, Saban was anointed as a certified NFL coaching genius after dealing with a very limited sample of hardships. Most of his acolytes pointed to his coaching lineage and how he came "from the Bill Belichick tree" and how he was possibly even more focused and more monomaniacal than Belichick when it came to the details of running a team.

This year the Dolphins stink; I didn't think they'd be nearly this bad, but they are. Now there are rumblings that Saban and Duante Culpepper may have strained their relationship because Joey Harrington got the start last weekend against the Pats. That move didn't work because the Dolphins lost even though they held the Pats to only 213 yards of total offense. The point here is that Saban was not a genius last year and he's not a dolt this year. The Dolphins feasted on some weak competition down the stretch last year and now have to live with the unrealistic expectations that the winning streak brought on.

Please remember earlier this summer when Nick Saban turned down the opportunity to have dinner with President Bush because he was too busy to take a couple of hours off from the first couple of days of training camp. Politics aside, maybe that little vignette will send a message to the hyperactive workaholic coaches in the NFL about the law of diminishing returns. There is a minimum amount of work a coach needs to do in order to be successful - assuming he has the players necessary to be successful in the first place - but each additional hour over that threshold of poring over details does not yield the same level of on-field improvement as the first hours do.

While I'm thinking of it, wasn't Dennis Green supposed to be a certified football genius when the Cardinals hired him to run the show in Arizona? After all, he'd been successful in Minnesota and had made it to the NFC Championship game not that long before he wore out his welcome in Minnesota. And of course, he'd spent his time out of the NFL traveling "on the high road"; that's where he said we'd always find him. Guess what, the Cards are now 12-25 with Dennis Green at the helm. Once again, it's the players on the field that matter here; the Cardinals are a bad football team.

Please remember that they are a bad football team as the Cards enter a really soft part of their schedule just in case a torrent of accolades goes their way over the next month. In the next five weeks, the Cards face Chicago [tough game], Oakland [easy game], Green Bay [easy game] BYE week [not difficult], Dallas [hard game], Detroit [easy game]. The Cards are 1-4 now; they could well be 4-6 then. Dennis Green is no smarter or dumber today than he will be five weeks from now.

By the way, now that Matt Leinart seems to have acquired the starting QB job, maybe it's time for Kurt Warner to use this situation to ponder the direction of the next phase of his life. Does he want to be a coach? Does he want to stay involved in football in a front office capacity? Does he think broadcasting has any appeal for him? The reason that might be a useful endeavor is that this has to be his last stop where he has a realistic shot at being the starting QB for an NFL team. I mean even Al Davis isn't going to bring him in thinking he's the catalyst that will elevate a team to championship status - or would he?

You can forgive the fans in Seattle a bit of angst over their Seahawks. Ten days ago, the Seahawks lost to the Bears by more than four TDs on national TV. Shaun Alexander's foot will keep him out of the upcoming game this weekend against the surprising St. Louis Rams who lead the NFC West at the moment; the bye week didn't heal that broken foot completely. Here's another tidbit for Seahawk fans to add to their agita. Since Mike Holmgren arrived in Seattle, the team is 1-6 after a bye week. No, I have no explanation for that. I doubt that it is because Mike Holmgren doesn't spend enough time sweating the details of running the team during the bye weeks. And I'm sure that he doesn't lose any IQ points on the morning of the game coming back off those bye weeks.

The Ravens lack of offense - they ranked 28th in the league in total offense going into last night's game in Denver - finally caught up to them. Even though the defense held the Broncos to 3 points for the first 52 minutes of the game, the combination of a very good Denver defense and an anemic Ravens' offense produced a 13-3 loss. The Ravens' defense did their job; they held the Broncos to 222 yards of offense and produced a turnover. Put this loss on the offensive side of the ledger.

Going into last weekend's games, the Ravens offense ranked ahead of Houston, Cleveland, Tampa and Oakland. Going into last weekend's games, those four teams had a combined record of 2-12; only Houston did not lose last weekend because they were on their bye week. The Ravens' defense carried them to a Super Bowl about five years ago and this year's version of the Ravens' defense looks awfully good; nevertheless, this team is still badly unbalanced.

One more item relative to the Ravens, three of their starters who are contributing significantly to the team are Steve McNair, Samari Rolle and Derrick Mason. All three of them played for the Tennessee Titans for a long time and were let go by Tennessee. When you look at the Titans' less than stellar record last year and what will be a less than stellar record this year, shouldn't someone ask the front office folks why they couldn't have found a way to keep some of that talent?

Now that the Albert Haynesworth head-stomping incident has receded a bit from the headlines and particularly since Cowboys' center, Andre Gurode was able to play last weekend, maybe it's worth looking at that incident from a less emotional vantage point:

Titans' coach Jeff Fisher on FOX Radio: "[Haynesworth's] not in the building; he may never be in the building again. He's gone for five weeks; I don't know what he's going to do. Is he going to go out and gain his weight back or come back in shape? I don't know; at this point, I don't care."

Scott Ostler in SF Chronicle: "If you want an expert analysis of a person's character, TV sports commentators will never let you down. From more than one of these guys, we learned that 'Albert Haynesworth is not a criminal.' There you go. Albert is just a monstrously huge sweetheart teddy bear given to the occasional psychopathically violent rage."

Finally, Greg Cote in the Miami Herald put the Albert Haynesworth situation and the Terrell Owens situation into a blender and came up with this observation:

"Titans defensive tackle Albert Haynesworth was suspended five games for stomping on the head of Cowboys center Andre Gurode last week. Had it been T.O.'s head, Haynesworth would be mayor of Philadelphia by now."

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

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