Select Category Birthdays Blog-ing Colorado Concerts/Music Culture Education Film Food/Drink Friends/Family Hong Kong House and Home I Can Read! Illinois Japan Louisiana Mao Quotes Mortimer Movies NYC Oregon Photos Politics Randolph Random Rants Sports Taiwan Tech TMQ Travel TV Work

I wonder if this hat will look good with my mop-like hair.

Since this site hosts the archives of Tuesday Morning Quarterback (as mentioned by TMQ himself), the site owner now possesses the hat of TMQ - including signature. How very exciting.

- Read here for links to all the TMQ coverage you could possibly want.

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 6:58 PM

2
Comments

The football gods have shown their mercy (even though Disney has not) and TMQ is back! An entire column written by Mr. Gregg Easterbrook himself! This week, it resides on Football Outsiders (which happens to be a great site), next week, who knows.

If you read on, there is some cool stuff that TMQ says about my site. I'll just paste it here for you to read in case you don't get to the TMQ column.

"Note: thanks to the efforts of Tien Mao, a New York City construction guy with a severely cool personal website, you can still read my Maroon Zone column here. Mao has rescued everything the Ministry of Bristol tried to drop down the memory hole, though without the cheesecake and beefcake photos, sadly. Isn't this just the beauty of the Internet? One guy working alone in an apartment in New York, greatest city in the world, single-handedly frustrates the attempt of a huge corporation to make something disappear."

I just want to thank Gregg and Aaron for their kind words (Aaron in his maroon zone analysis). It should also be noted that I am not really a "construction guy" even though I work in the field of construction. I am more of an "office guy."

- previous communiqué with Gregg
- the TMQ controversy
- the TMQ archives

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 1:50 PM

6
Comments

This morning, after voting, I came into work, checked my email and to my surprise, I had an email from a "geasterbrook." With my curiosity piqued, I opened this email first. It was from none other than Gregg Easterbrook - TMQ himself!

The email:

Dear Tien, Many thanks for archiving the TMQs -- I was starting to wonder how I myself would ever get them, until I realized you had done this. You have no legal worries. My ESPN contract says that on termination the rights revert to me, and I'm definitely terminated. Send me a mailing address and I will send you one of the last Slate-era TMQ baseball caps. Let me know if you want it signed. It's really nice of you to have saved all these from the scrapheap of history. Best, Gregg Easterbrook

I've posted plenty about this, but if you didn't know, Easterbrook lost his job at ESPN.com about a month ago over some things he wrote on his blog on The New Republic site. I then archived all his old ESPN columns on my site as a service to his fans, many of which appreciated the efforts. Good to know that Easterbrook also liked the thought. It's also good to know that I will not be getting sued by Disney.

- The original TMQ controversy.
- The TMQ archives.

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 11:05 AM

1
Comments

Ever since the sad day that ESPN.com fired TMQ, his loyal readers have looked for a source of amusement. Some, have come to the "little read book" (my most traffic ever), others have sounded off on other sites. Last week, TMQ writer Gregg Easterbrook surfaced on Football Outsiders, which will serve as his temporary home, with some news about the TMQ column. Football Outsiders also started a TMQ contest for the public. The column by the fans has been posted, including some writing by TMQ himself.

- Read the column.

***This just in. From the end of the column, I am mentioned***
"Hidden TMQ Archives of the Week: Earlier in this column, we joked about the TMQ archives disappearing from ESPN.com. Actually, blogger Tien Mao has taken it upon himself to try to archive as many 2002-2003 TMQ columns as possible. Please go visit and bookmark his site. "

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 12:11 PM

0
Comments

In a quest to serve the public, I'm going to try to put all of the old TMQ articles as entries on my site. I finally finished with all the articles I found. The links that were in the articles are gone, as are the pictures. Unfortunately, no pictures of cheesecake.

They will be linked from this entry.

***TMQ update: All my "coverage" on TMQ news.***

New key to success: the Maroon Zone (10.14.03)
TV policy causes TMQ more pain (10.7.03)
Run amok: Soldier Field, Terrell's ego (9.30.03)
Cowboys' win better than ice cream (9.16.03)
Highlights, lowlights and ugly unis (9.9.03)
Hangin' with the cheer-babes (9.9.03)
Most accurate NFL predictions anywhere (9.2.03)
NFC preview: Pass the potatoes(8.26.03)
AFC preview: not blacked out(8.19.03)
I am back with offseason highlights (8.12.03)
Divine intervention (7.01.03)
Next stop, avoiding reality (6.17.03)
The Rust Age of the NBA (6.10.03)
Life in the NFL doldrums (6.3.03)
Wiz choose err over Air (5.9.03)
Making the grade ... with ease (4.29.03)
Making a mockery (4.22.03)
Near naked and not complaining (2.21.03)
LeBron-gate (2.13.03)
Derelict predictions (1.29.03)
Why are you punting? (1.28.03)
The weekend the gods winced (1.21.03)
Blitz happens (1.7.03)
Affiliate follies frustrate NFL fans (12.31.02)
NFL's 88 percent solution (12.24.02)
NFL talking heads stuck in reverse (12.10.02)
Pass the turkeys out of Dallas, Detroit (11.26.02)
Don't say you haven't been warned (11.19.02)
Muddling along the NFL's middle (11.12.02)
Dishing out the dirt about DirecTV (10.29.02)
There's nowhere to run to, baby! (10.22.02)
Honk if you're from St. Louis (10.15.02)
Shrink-wrapped help for your teams (10.8.02)
Always read the fine print (10.1.02)
Losing is alien to Rams, Steelers (9.24.02)
Florida foibles and football fumbles (9.17.02)
Dumb, dumber ... and Dwayne Rudd(9.10.02)
Haiku me? No, haiku you!(9.3.02)
New map points to NFC treasures(8.27.02)
Previewing the fall line for the AFC (8.20.02)
Delusions of grandeur in preseason (8.13.02)
Offensive and boring(6.4.02)
Lies, Damned Lies and Hundredths (4.23.02)
A real mockery of a draft(4.16.02)

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 9:18 AM

4
Comments

New key to success: the Maroon Zone
By Gregg Easterbrook
Page 2 columnist

Football purists obsess over the red zone, but what about the Maroon Zone? Often it is where the manly men are separated from the individuals who merely have XY chromosome pairs.

The Maroon Zone is the area from the opponent's 40-yard line to 30-yard line -- where logic usually dictates going on fourth down, since it's too far for an easy field goal, but too close to punt. Once in the Maroon Zone, make a first down and you've converted a mere possession into a scoring opportunity; fail to get the first and it's either an embarrassing turnover on downs, a long-shot figgie try that gives the opponent great field position if it fails or, worst, launching a ridiculous, mincing fraidy-cat punt. In the Maroon Zone, the team that wants to win simply must get a first down.

In Sunday action, Denver had three Maroon Zone possessions, from the Pittsburgh 30, 34 and 38. Result? Two scoring drives, one for a touchdown and one for the winning field goal as time expired. Winning Maroon Zone performance!

Kansas City had three Maroon Zone possessions, from the Green Bay 31, 32 and 38. Result? Two scoring drives, one for a touchdown and one for the tying field goal at the end of regulation. Winning Maroon Zone performance!

In the same game, Green Bay seemed Maroon Zone invincible -- its four touchdowns followed Maroon Zone possessions at the Kansas City 31-, 35-, 40- and 40-yard lines. Then in the middle of the fourth quarter the Packers entered the Maroon Zone for the fifth time, ball spotted on the Chiefs' 36. An interception returned for a Kansas City touchdown made it Packers 31, Chiefs 28 and this (plus Mars and Uranus being unusually close to Earth) spelled eventual home-team defeat.

Chiefs-Packers
As the Chiefs showed the Packers, it's all about the Maroon Zone.

When Maroon Zone penetrations fail, calamity follows. Leading 3-0 late in the first quarter at Jersey/B, Buffalo reached third-and-inches in the Maroon Zone at the Jets' 32. Pass incomplete on third down; run stuffed on fourth down; Jersey/B, energized, drives the length of the field to take the lead. Trailing 20-3, the Bills reached third-and-3 at the Jets' 30 early in the third period, comeback hopes on the line. Sack, turnover on downs. Maroon Zone failures doomed the Bills to humiliating 30-3 defeat by a previous winless team.

Last night on Monday Night Football, the Atlanta Typos trailed 10-0 late in the second quarter and faced a critical Maroon Zone moment, third-and-1 on the Rams' 32. Incompletion, incompletion, blocked field-goal attempt. Maroon Zone failure doomed the Typos to a humiliating 36-0 defeat on national television. (Note: TMQ calls Atlanta the Typos because their new all-black uniforms look like a printing-press error.)

Yes, things can go well in the Maroon Zone and defeat still knock on the trainer's-room door. The Colts had three Maroon Zone possessions for three scores against Carolina, yet left the stadium mumbling "&%$#@!" Tuesday Morning Quarterback does not claim the Maroon Zone is a flawless predictor of outcomes. But it is the place where possessions either become scoring drives, or end badly. Time to start tracking the Maroon Zone.

In other NFL news, the evil Lord Voldemort (Dan Snyder) got to watch Brad Johnson, the quarterback whom Snyder personally ordered discarded by the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons, pound on Snyder's team in its house. Since Voldemort's canny decision to discard Johnson -- in order to start the always-failed-everywhere Jeff George! -- the Persons have gone 19-23 and made no postseason appearances. The Bucs, starting Johnson, have gone 27-14 and won the Super Bowl. Once again TMQ asks, how did Dan Snyder become a multimillionaire? Every management decision he has made with the Persons has been a boneheaded blunder.

And in still other NFL news, this Sunday was the worst-ever for programming gaffes by network affiliates. Local affiliates showed a menu of cringe-worthy woofer games while the two marquee contests of the week, Panthers-Colts and Chiefs-Packers, both of which turned out to be overtime thrillers, went unseen almost everywhere: details below. What's the solution? Move to Canada or Mexico, where, unlike in the United States, NFL Sunday Ticket is available to anyone. Or move to Iran -- where, it turns out, NFL Sunday broadcasts are better than in United States! Iranians get better NFL games than the American taxpayers who make NFL profits possible? See below.

Steve Smith
Who thought the Panthers would be celebrating like this every week?

Stat of the Week: Stretching back to last season, the Panthers are on a 9-1 run.

Stat of the Week No. 2: Stretching back to last season, Oakland has followed a 9-1 run with a 2-5 run.

Stat of the Week No. 3: Arizona held Jamal Lewis to 131 yards rushing.

Stat of the Week No. 4: Dick Vermeil has reached 6-0 with the Eagles, Rams and Chiefs.

Stat of the Week No. 5: Buffalo has gone four consecutive games without scoring a touchdown in the first half.

Stat of the Week No. 6: Green Bay, Jax and the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons surrendered a combined 55 points in the fourth quarter, all at home.

Stat of the Week No. 7: The Panthers and Ravens, combined record 8-2, have run 356 times and passed 249 times, a 59 percent rushing percentage.

Stat of the Week No. 8: The Bills and Persons, combined record 6-6, have passed 415 times and run 297 times, a 42 percent rushing percentage.

Stat of the Week No. 9: For two consecutive weeks, Oakland has scored a touchdown on its opening possession and then not scored another touchdown in the game. The Raiders lost both.

Stat of the Week No. 10: Brett Favre is 0-3 against Kansas City; he has at least one win against every other team the Packers have faced during his tenure.

Stat of the Week No. 11: Tiki Barber has fumbled eight times in his last seven regular-season outings.

Stat of the Week No. 12: Miami lost more yards on penalties (149) than it gained passing (143).

Holli
A nurse and a Colts cheerleader! Holli makes TMQ wish he were suffering from the same injuries as Edgerrin James.

Cheerleader of the Week: Many readers including James Etling of Indianapolis have proposed Holli of the red-hot (actually, blue-hot) Indianapolis Colts, so here she is. The Colts don't put much about their cheer-babes into cheerleader bios, though we do know that Holli is a nursing student. A nurse and a cheerleader -- fantasy overload.

Sweet Play of the Week No. 1: Leading 3-0 late in the second quarter, Les Mouflons faced second-and-goal at the Atlanta Typos' 3. St. Louis quarterback Marc Bulger came to the line and saw that the Typos had no middle linebacker on the field -- they'd gone to a dime defense despite a likely-run situation -- and that both Atlanta defensive tackles were on the outside shoulder of Rams guards. This meant there was no defender directly in front of him. Bulger called the "instant sneak," the high-school play on which the QB taps the center's butt and just takes the ball himself, while the rest of this team stands there. Uncontested three-yard touchdown, and Les Mouflons never looked back.

Sweet Play of the Week No. 2: Trailing Oakland 7-3 in the third, the Cleveland Browns (Release 2.1) lined up for a field-goal try. The holder flipped the ball to kicker Phil Dawson, who ran 14 yards for the first down. Cleveland scored its only touchdown, the winning points, on the next snap.

Sweet Play of the Week No. 3: Game scoreless, the Seattle Blue Men Group faced third-and-7 on the San Francisco 24. Seattle formed a screen right, Matt Hasselbeck pumped right, and then Hasselbeck threw left to Bobby Engram behind a second screen. Engram got the first down, and Seattle scored a touchdown on the next snap. What made this play so sweet? The pump-faked-screen is a San Francisco play! It comes directly from the Niners' playbook, and once was Steve Young's favorite call. Niner acolytes in Green Bay also used the pump-faked-screen play for Ahman Green's 11-yard touchdown against Kansas City.

Sour Play of the Week No. 1: Trailing 17-3 early in the fourth quarter, Jersey/A faced fourth-and-8 on the New England 16. The Giants took the field goal. Accomplishing what? Instead of being down 14, they were still down 11. Trailing big in the fourth quarter on the road, you've got to take some chances and cause some pressure on the home team. Fourth-and-8 from the 16 isn't bad considering that if you miss, the opponent is pinned deep.

New York Giants
Kerry Collins was distraught after Jim Fassel called for the FG instead of going for it.

Then, having chosen tactics based on cutting the margin to 11 points -- meaning a field goal and a touchdown plus a deuce are required -- on its next possession, Jersey/A reached fourth-and-6 on the New England 26. The Giants went for it. Interception, and Jersey/A never threatened again. Having chosen tactics based on cutting the margin to 11 points, aren't you locked in to the field-goal try at this point?

Sour Play of the Week No. 2: Leading 17-10, the Blue Men Group faced second-and-24 on their own 24. Hasselbeck played-faked a run, then threw an interception; San Francisco scored a touchdown on the possession, setting up the close ending. Who's going to fall for a play fake on second-and-24?

Oh, What Might Have Been: Two plays before Kansas City's winning touchdown in overtime at Green Bay, Darren Sharper of the Packers dropped an interception with nothing but grass in front of him. One play before Denver's winning field goal at double-zeros, Steeler safety Brent Alexander dropped an interception. And the pass that Ricky Manning intercepted and returned to the Indianapolis 28, setting up the touchdown that started the Carolina comeback, was perfectly thrown to Colts' back James Mungro, off whose hands it bounced into the air.

Where Was the Defense? One of TMQ's immutable laws is Play-Fake on First. Reaching the goal line, play-fakes work on first down because the defense is thinking run; they rarely succeed on second down, when the defense has just stuffed a run and is thinking pass.

Trailing the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons 3-0, the defending champion Bucs reached first-and-goal at the Persons' 1. The run on first down was stuffed. On second down, Tampa play-faked; easy touchdown pass to tight end Todd Yoder. After stuffing a run, why wasn't the defense thinking pass? Later, leading 14-13, Tampa reached first-and-goal on the Persons' 6. The run on first down was stuffed. On second down, Tampa play-faked; easy touchdown pass to tight end Will Heller. After stuffing a run -- and after seeing a run followed by a play-fake in the identical situation earlier -- why wasn't the defense thinking pass?

Stupid Movie Physics: A consistently delightful Internet site is Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics, which details how Hollywood represents flight, explosions, space travel and other phenomena in ways that violate physical law. Guns that fire hundreds of rounds without being reloaded are a staple complaint. The site often harps on how falling and jumping are depicted in the movies in physically impossible ways, regardless of strength.

A review of the BS (Beyond Stupid) dragons-attack-London movie "Reign of Fire" pointed out that if the dragons had scales so thick that modern surface-to-air missiles bounced off, they'd be much too heavy to take wing. And go ahead and assume that fire-breathing animals can exist; but if they do, "any energy transferred out of the dragon in the form of flames must first go into the dragon in the form of food." The scene in which a dragon melts an entire tank convoy would require, the Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics reviewer calculated, the equivalent of at least 100 gallons of petroleum for flame energy, which in turn would require the dragon to ingest the equivalent of 12,000 milkshakes. Ridiculously, we are told the dragons subsist by consuming ashes from the fires they ignite. But ashes have, by definition, already lost most of their energy content.

Spider-man
The only thing more insulting than stupid movie physics are teams that always pass on third-and-short.

Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics also took apart a scene that represents, to TMQ, the epitome of movies depicting something impossible in physical terms, regardless of superpower. In "Spider-Man," the sinister Green Goblin is standing atop the Queensboro Bridge, holding the comely Mary Jane in one hand and a cable supporting a cable car full of tourists in the other hand; Spider-Man is supposed to choose which the Goblin will drop and which he will spare. Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics calculated that if the cable car weighed two tons and the cable is at a five-degree angle to the horizon, the side force at the Goblin's arm would be 23,000 pounds. "Even if we suspend our disbelief that the thin material in the Goblin's armor could support 23,000 pounds," there's no way this force, counterweighted only by the nubile Mary Jane, could fail to pull the Goblin sideways off the bridge.

What happens next is one of the "endless falling" scenes that drives TMQ crazy -- people in movies plummeting downward through the air for far longer than physically possible, often calmly doing something as they plummet. When Spider-Man refuses to choose, the Goblin drops both the cable car and the charming Mary Jane. Spider-Man executes a series of dramatic web-swings to catch both. Set aside that the cable car, now accelerating under gravity, when grabbed by Spider-Man would transfer hundreds of thousands of pounds of force to Spidey's arm. Set that aside and just count the seconds. The Queensboro Bridge is 350 feet high. Free-falling objects in Earth's atmosphere accelerate at 9.8 meters per second per second. This means Mary Jane and the cable car would take four seconds to fall from the top of the Queensboro Bridge to the surface of the East River. The scene in which Spiderman swings into position to catch them is 15 seconds long.

Best Use of TMQ: Tuesday Morning Quarterback advised in its NFC preview, "Tip to Eagles opponents: Philadelphia onside kicks in unexpected situations," especially to start games. Three years ago, the Eagles onside kicked to open their game at Dallas. On Sunday they did the same; Cowboy Randal Williams snagged the rock and ran it 37 yards for the touchdown. Cowboys' sideline gentleman Bruce DeHaven, one of the best special-teams coaches in football annals except for one play -- his Buffalo charges gave up the "Music City Miracle" at Tennessee -- knew about the Eagles' onside tendency, surely from reading TMQ! DeHaven had the Dallas return unit in the up position, expecting an onside; Philly failed to notice this. The football gods chortled.

According to the official Game Book, Williams ran the ball 37 yards in three seconds. That's the equivalent of a 3.2 time in the 40-yard dash.

Revenge of the Chicks, Part Two: Reader Amy Botello of New York City has conducted an incredibly scientifically advanced of cheesecake and beefcake in Tuesday Morning Quarterback columns this season and found, "So far your stud-to-hot-chick ratio is 3-to-16. And I have to say even though that was a great display of abs and pecs, Terrell Owens is soooooo obnoxious he can't be considered truly yummy, so it's really a 1-to-8 ratio. Not good." She protests in haiku,

Where is the beefcake,
what about the promised studs?
Eye-candy for all!

-- Amy Botello, New York

Brad Pitt
Amy, this is for you.

Amy requests shirtless poses of "Brad Pitt, Matt Damon or Ashton Kutcher, not the aging Harrison Ford or Sean Connery. For every Britney, give us a Justin." Amy, I'd trade you Britney for Justin, just to get rid of Britney! At any rate, your wish is my command -- here's your beefcake.

Best Blocks: All highlight reels showed Miami QB Jay Fiedler cleaning the clock of Arleigh Burke-class Jax DE Tony Brackens on the Ricky Williams reversed-field run that was the Marine Mammals' initial touchdown. TMQ counted one-thousand one, one-thousand two, one-thousand three, one-thousand four, one-thousand five, one-thousand six on Steve McNair's first touchdown pass to Derrick Mason; one-thousand one, one-thousand two, one-thousand three, one-thousand four, one-thousand five on McNair's second TD to the same gentleman. On Mack Strong's 21-yard touchdown run for the Blue Men Group, blocking was magnificent, especially by guard Steve Hutchinson. It's pretty fun to run when everyone in your path has already been knocked to the ground.

Tis Better to Have Rushed and Lost Than Never to Have Rushed At All: Trailing 13-7, the Raiders faced third-and-1 on the Cleveland 24 with 33 seconds left, holding a timeout. Pass incomplete, pass incomplete, game over.

Tis Better to Have Rushed and Lost Than Never to Have Rushed At All No. 2: Last December the Dolphins' season crashed and burned when they went incompletion, incompletion, incompletion on their final possession at New England, rather than running into the line for no gain and keeping the clock moving; the Patriots tied the score with mere ticks to spare, and won in overtime. This season, TMQ continues to feel spooked that the Marine Mammals are not simply handing the ball to Williams in clock-grinding situations. Leading 17-10 at Jax, Miami threw incomplete on third down on each of its last two possessions, twice stopping the clock and leaving 2:18 for the Jaguars' last-ditch attempt from their own 21. Had Miami simply run into the line for no gain on both snaps, Jacksonville's last-ditch attempt would have begun with the clock nearly drained.

The Hulk
Amy, does a shirtless, computerized Hulk count as beefcake? (See, we could have taken the sleazy route and ran a partially nude Jennifer Connelly.)

Moviegoers Learned Why Producers Took the Word "Incredible" Out of "The Hulk": Disclaimers for "The Hulk" warned of "partial nudity." What is "partial" nudity -- aren't you either naked or not? Mega-babe Jennifer Connelly is the one who was partially naked in the movie. TMQ would have preferred to pay $8 just to look at her, with the rest of the movie deleted.

The concept of "partial nudity" recalls the Department of Agriculture concept of the "partial whole" strawberry. According to this USDA manual for grading strawberries, "a partial strawberry is a berry in whole style that is less than three-fourths of a whole strawberry." This means some shipments of strawberries are labeled "contains partial whole strawberries."

Worst Blocks: The extremely overpriced Potomac Drainage Basin offensive line -- three of the highest-paid linemen in the league, and most sacks allowed in the league -- gave up four sacks to Simeon Rice alone. On one play, extremely overpaid tackle Chris Samuels turned inside to double-team the rarely-sacks Warren Sapp, leaving only a tight end to block Rice, who blew in for the sack. On another play, extremely overpaid tackle Jon Jansen turned inward to help extremely overpaid guard Randy Thomas double-team rarely-sacks Anthony McFarland, leaving only a running back to block Rice, who blew in for the sack.

The Football Gods Promised An Investigation: I don't wish to alarm you, but not only are the Dallas Cowboys third overall in offense, they are third overall in defense.

TMQ, Grammar Snob: Amtrak advertising for the new Acela train boasts "faster travel times." Time is a means of measurement, neither "fast" nor "slow." Trains can be slower or faster, trips can be shortened or lengthened, but times cannot be faster, no matter how flashy Acela looks.

Amtrak
If you read TMQ on the Acela, would it mean you finish it faster?

Exception: Einstein showed that at very high velocities, time passes more slowly from the perspective of the fast-moving observer. This sort of thing doesn't apply to Amtrak, which presumably does not reach relativistic speed. Outrunning bicyclists is normally Amtrak's velocity goal.

The Bank of America branch near the Official Office of TMQ, in downtown Washington, D.C., has a giant banner in the window reading, LONGER HOURS. Longer than 60 minutes?

Any Physics Post-Doc Who Inadvertently Destroys the Universe Will Receive an Incomplete for the Course: Relativistic effects are rarely observed outside the particle accelerators found in physics labs. Sir Martin Rees, the noted British astronomer, declares in his new doomsday book "Our Final Hour" that it might be possible for an error at a particle accelerator to destroy the entire universe by converting all 50 billion galaxies into a single, minutely small "strangelet." Alternatively, Rees writes, an accelerator experiment might inadvertently create a zone of the mysterious nothing-anything condition that existed before the Big Bang: the inadvertently created not-anything would spread outward at the speed of light, eventually deleting the entire cosmos. A minor accelerator error, Reese muses, might merely convert the Earth into "an inert hyperdense sphere a hundred meters across."

Best Clocking-Grinding Drive: Leading the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons 14-13, the defending champion Bucs took over on their own 9 late in the third quarter. Tampa held the ball for 12 plays, scoring for a 21-13 lead and grinding so much clock the Persons were forced to go pass-wacky, to their woe.

Best Nine-Straight-Passes Drive: Trailing by a touchdown with three minutes left, the Lucky Charms got the ball on their own 9. They moved to the tying touchdown, Peyton Manning to Reggie Wayne with 25 seconds remaining, improbably passing on nine consecutive snaps.

Best Nine-Straight-Runs Drive: Trailing by three, Kansas City took over the ball with 2:43 remaining in regulation. For the remainder of the contest, won in overtime by Kansas City coming back from a 31-14 deficit, the Chiefs ran 22 offensive plays to one for Green Bay. What changed? The Chiefs switched to the run -- the last thing you'd expect from a team trailing late on the road. To the moment Kansas City took over with 2:43 in regulation, the Chiefs had more points (31) than rushing yards (30). Nevertheless they ran several times on the tying drive. Getting the ball on their own 29 to start overtime, Kansas City ran Priest Holmes on nine consecutive downs, moving the ball to the Green Bay 30. Next came an exchange of turnovers. The Chiefs' field-goal attempt was blocked, then the Packers fumbled the ball back; Trent Green threw the winning touchdown strike on the next play. The nine-straight-runs drive put the overtime into Kansas City's control.

Shorna
Shorna loves talking forestry with Peyton Manning in her spare time.

Assistant Professor Cheerleader of the Week: Speaking of the blue-hot Colts, many readers, including Stephen Terry of the Plasma Physics Laboratory at Princeton University, have pointed out that one of the Indianapolis cheer-babes is Shorna Broussard, an assistant professor of forestry and natural resources at Purdue University. According to the Colts' cheerleader profile -- which dryly notes, "occupation: professor" -- Broussard's most recently read book is, "Wilderness and the American Mind." This is slightly north of the "Who Moved My Cheese?" titles that dominate cheerleader reading lists.

This Associated Press article dryly declares of the Colts cheer-babes, "Broussard is the only assistant professor on the squad." The article further explanations that Broussard tried out for the Colts' cheerleaders because she had been taking dance classes since childhood, and wanted a hobby that was different from teaching natural-resource management. Broussard told the Associated Press she "is interested in the political aspects of environmental policy." Shorna, I've written a book about environmental policy, so maybe you and I could ... oh, forget it.

Disturbing sidelight: they're reading Tuesday Morning Quarterback in the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. They're gawking at cheer-babe pictures at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory. Please be sure to keep an eye on the dials of the particle accelerators, OK?

Programming Outrage of the Week: Undefeated Carolina at undefeated Indianapolis, the last pairing of unbeatens in the 2003 season! (Unless you believe Kansas City and Minnesota can both be 15-0 when they meet Dec. 20.) So did New York City, largest city in the nation, see this monster game? New York did not. Did Los Angeles, second-largest city in our great nation, see this monster game? Los Angeles did not. Did Chicago, third-largest city, see this monster game? Chicago did not. Did Washington, capital of our great nation, see this monster game? Washington did not. The list goes on in awful detail.

Did Fox, which had the call, even feature Carolina at Indianapolis as its game of the week? Fox did not. Fox sent its lead announcer team to the Bucs at Persons collision, combined record 5-4, which it beamed to most of the country rather than Panthers at Colts, combined record 9-0. Bucs at Persons turned out to be a snorefest, Panthers at Colts an overtime thriller; no, there's no way to know in advance which games will be good, but combined record is the best leading indictor. Last week, CBS had a chance to show two undefeateds, Denver at Kansas City, and instead chose a lesser game as its nationally featured contest. This week, Fox passed on what was almost surely the final pairing of undefeateds that will occur in the 2003 season, in order to air a lesser pairing. Ye gods.

Jennifer Connelly
Just because: thought we'd slip in a photo of Jennifer Connelly anyway (although not a partially nude one).

At times, TMQ has promoted the notion that Los Angeles is the best place in the United States to watch the NFL on television because, lacking a home team, City of Angels local affiliates can pick the best games. This Sunday, Los Angeles became the City of Woofers. Instead of Carolina at Indianapolis, combined record 9-0, Los Angeles Fox affiliate KTTV showed Eagles at Cowboys, combined record 5-3. Instead of Kansas City at Green Bay, combined record 8-2, Los Angeles CBS affiliate KBCS showed Oakland at Cleveland, combined record 4-6. Ay caramba.

Many cities did not see Carolina-Indy because the home team was playing at the same time on Fox. Did cities at least see the excellent Kansas City at Green Bay pairing -- another overtime thriller, and which involved no network conflict? Most did not. In Washington, rather than show the excellent Kansas City at Green Bay pairing, to which it had the rights, local CBS affiliate WUSA showed: infomercials! Wait, isn't there a NFL league-promotion spot in which Zach Thomas of the Dolphins declares that if it weren't for pro football we would have to watch infomercials on Sunday? That's what our nation's capital saw on Sunday, infomercials, rather than the Kansas City at Green Bay overtime thriller.

Baltimore beheld the woofer Oakland at Cleveland pairing, combined record 4-6, rather than the excellent Kansas City at Green Bay pairing, combined record 8-2. This is an example of the local affiliates' absurd habit of showing bad divisional games -- the Browns (Release 2.1) are in the same division as Baltimore's Ravens -- rather than the best contests.

Did most major cities see the solid Pittsburgh at Denver pairing, a down-to-the-last-second thriller which came in the 4 p.m. slot and involved no home-team conflict in most locations? Chicago, at least, saw this game. But instead of Pittsburgh-Denver in the late afternoon slot, our nation's capital got the woofer Baltimore at Arizona pairing, combined record 3-6. That's the third Arizona Cardinals game to air in our nation's capital this year. Does WUSA, Washington's CBS affiliate, even know that the Cardinals have been moved out of the NFC East? Only 24,193 people who live in Arizona wanted to see the Cardinals' game, based on attendance; but all of the nation's capital was assumed, by WUSA, to wish to behold this contest. Meanwhile Washington has yet to get its first glimpse of the Panthers, who are not only 5-0 but located 2,000 miles closer than the Cardinals.

I'll spare readers repetition of TMQ's grievance that the NFL stages fabulous games like Carolina at Indianapolis and Kansas City at Green Bay, then elaborately prevents people from seeing the fabulous games. The NFL prevents most Americans from seeing the best games by limiting NFL Sunday Ticket to the satellite monopoly DirecTV: which only 10 percent of American homes get, and huge numbers cannot receive for technical reasons. And I'll spare readers repetition of TMQ's grievance that, while access to the top games is elaborately denied to most Americans owing to the DirecTV monopoly, Canada and Mexico forbid such monopolies; there, anyone can order Sunday Ticket on cable. This means Canadians and Mexicans have far better opportunity to view the NFL than Americans.

Iran football
And we don't mean Iranians are watching this kind of football!

No, I won't repeat those complaints. But I will add -- now even Iran gets better access to NFL games than Americans! Numerous readers including Diana Sophronia of Cyprus have flagged TMQ that Middle East TV, which broadcasts to Iran, Egypt, Turkey and other nations, has a much better track record of picking NFL games than do most U.S. local network affiliates. On Sunday, for example, the Middle East TV pro football doubleheader was Chiefs at Packers followed by Steelers at Broncos . That's a far better Sunday card than was shown in New York, Los Angeles, Washington or most major American cities. Mullahs sipping Arabian coffee in Tehran got better viewing access to NFL games this Sunday than people living in the United States!

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! Leading 24-10 in the third, the Flaming Thumbtacks faced second-and-9, pinned on their own 3. Since the average pass attempt yields about six yards, all the Texans needed to do was played straight defense -- anyway, it's a blitz! A 44-yard completion to Justin McCareins, touchdown two snaps later. The Titans go 98 yards in five plays, and the rout is on.

Yes, the blitz sometimes works -- Dallas blitzed six on the Donovan McNabb fumble that sealed the Cowboys' win, and New Orleans blitzed six to cause the Kordell Stewart fumble that set up a Saints' field goal. My point is that the blitz backfires at least as often as it works. Most of the time, you're better off playing straight defense.

Those Who Fail to Learn From Game Film Are Doomed to Repeat It: For two consecutive columns, TMQ has noted Buffalo's pass-wacky tendency in the Maroon Zone. Three times in Weeks 4 and 5, the Bills faced third-and-1 or third-and-2 on an opponent's 32 or 33. In no instance did they pound, pound for the 90-percent-likely first down. Each time the third down call was a pass; each time (incompletions, fumble, missed field goal) the possession ended without points. Did the Bills coaching staff learn the lesson of the last three failures in this situation, and on Sunday pound, pound in the Maroon Zone situations noted at the column top? Pass attempts on both third and shorts; incompletion, sack.

Want to See Good NFL Games? Move to Iran ... or Portland, Ore.: Reader Alison Fowler of Portland, Ore., reports that the top matchups are usually aired by her local network affiliates. "Portland is not much of a football city, so maybe indifference is the key to getting the good games," Fowler suggests. On Sunday, Portland saw Chiefs at Packers, Steelers at Broncos and Bucs at Persons -- TMQ would have settled for that card in a heartbeat. Fowler also gloats, in haiku, that Portland got the monster Week 5 games that went unseen throughout most of the United States:

City of Roses
saw Broncs-Chiefs, Seahawks-Packers.
No Ticket needed.

-- Alison Fowler, Portland, Ore.

Making Reality TV Worse Was a Big Ratings Success, So Why Doesn't Making the NBA Worse Attract Viewers? Today the San Antonio Spurs are at the White House. Good for them, but the Spurs-Nets NBA Finals was the lowest-rated NBA championship ever in prime-time. The Nielsen mark for the series was just 6.3, terrible for prime time: a top series like "Friends" rates about 15, while NFL Sunday afternoon broadcasts rate around 10. In the last five years alone the "share" -- the percentage of turned-on television sets that are tuned to a particular broadcast -- for the NBA Finals has fallen from 32 percent to 12 percent. Every other denominator of NBA popularity is in free-fall, too. And what is the response of the league? So far as TMQ can tell, the NBA thinks the solution is to dumb the game down even more, chucking out quality and emphasizing hype: though it's the dumbing-down that started the NBA ratings slide.

All this is worth bearing in mind as Maurice Clarett sues to overturn pro football's rule that draftees must be at least 20 years old. If the doors are opened to immature me-me-me players such as Clarett, an inevitable cycle of dumbing-down, declining quality and lost ratings will arrive for the NFL, too.

As this column has pointed out, the drop in NBA popularity coincides with the league's decision to start admitting high-school players en masse. Every year the quality of NBA play goes down, owing to more callow athletes who lack schooling in the fundamentals, who'd rather strut and point at themselves than listen to coaches. Every year, the NBA response is to draft still more high-schoolers and dumb things down further. The NBA thinks fans are too stupid to notice the ongoing decline in pro basketball product quality. Check the ratings: fans have noticed!

The solution for the NBA is to get the high school kids off the court and back into college, which would be good for the sport and good for them personally. As regards the NFL, it is essential that the league fight Clarett with everything it has. Ruin the kid's life if necessary: Clarett's I-don't-care-about-anything-in-the-world-but-me-me-me act begs for a retaliatory strike. Clarett is the carrier of a deadly disease. Keep him out, and prevent the cycle of product-quality decline from coming to pro football, too.

Did I Hallucinate This? On ESPN's Monday Night pregame show, correspondent Chris Mortensen delivered, without a hint of irony, a report saying that in the wake of the Philadelphia loss at Dallas, Eagles players "are beginning to question Donovan McNabb's ability."

Oh Ye Mortals, Trifle Not With the Football Gods: During the offseason, Buffalo DT Pat Williams boasted, "No one will run against the Bills this year." Buffalo is 23rd against the run, and Sunday allowed 118 rushing yards by Jersey/B, which entered the contest as the last-ranked rushing team in the league. During the offseason, Bills coaches, criticized as pass-wacky, promised a commitment to running. After running for just 53 yards against the Jets' 32nd-rated rushing defense, which entered the game surrendering 174 yards per contest, Buffalo now takes over from Jersey/B as last-ranked in rushing.

Wacky Food of the Week: According to this article, trendy New York City eateries have begun to offer grilled chocolate sandwiches: "At the Chickenbone Cafe in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, Zakary Pelaccio grills bittersweet chocolate between slices of rich brioche, creating a density akin to the most elegant cake." Grilled chocolate sandwiches are promoted as a breakfast option.

Volvo
If it's a truck, where's the gun rack?

"Swedish Wagon of the Year" Just Didn't Have the Same Snap: If it weren't SUV-like, I would name the Volvo XC90 the Official Car of TMQ. Why? Volvo is promoting the XC90 as winner of the "North American Truck of the Year" award. The XC90 is neither a truck nor built in North America.

TMQ Insider Exclusive! Tuesday Morning Quarterback has learned on an exclusive basis that Jon "I Was Teenaged Coach" Gruden was asked to leave a Tampa-area Hooters -- Gruden carries a Hooters VIP card http://espn.go.com/page2/s/tmq/030114.html -- when he declared he "was groping for answers to the Bucs' problems." Remember, this is a Tuesday Morning Quarterback exclusive.

Running Items Department

Obscure College Score of the Week: McKendree 59, Iowa Wesleyan 13. Located in Lebanon, Illinois, McKendree's slogan is "Where Quality Matters". Its previous slogan, "Where Quality Doesn't Matter," failed to test-market well.

Bonus Obscure College Score: Northwestern State 87, Southeast Louisiana 27. Northwestern State, which has outscored opponents 146-27 in its last two games, recorded 12 touchdowns, including five on runbacks of interceptions or blocked kicks. Postgame speech of Southeastern Louisiana coach Hal Mumme:

"Well, boys, you held them under 90."

Located in Hammond, Louisiana, Southeastern's slogan is, "We Have A Place for You". So if you can't get into McKendree because of that quality thing, call Southeastern.

Double Bonus Obscure College Score: Edinboro 28, Indiana of Pennsylvania 20. TMQ's favorite obscure team fell from the undefeated ranks as the Indianans of Indiana of Pennsylvania were caught looking ahead to next weekend's monster showdown against California of Pennsylvania. You can listen to the Indiana of Pennsylvania at California of Pennsylvania monster showdown over Web radio here. And really, is there anything more important that you would be doing on Saturday at 3 p.m. Eastern than listening to Indiana of Pennsylvania at California of Pennsylvania?

The Football Gods Guffawed: Since being on the cover of Sports Illustrated, the Oregon Ducks have lost three straight and been outscored 131-43.

New York Times Final-Score Score Once again, the Paper of Guesses goes 0-14 in its quixotic attempt to predict an exact NFL final score, bringing the New York Times Final-Score Score to 1-921 since TMQ began tracking. The goal of 1,000 inaccurate predictions, once just a dream, comes ever-closer to reality for the Multicolored Lady.

Reader Animadversion: Got a complaint or deeply felt grievance? Register it at TMQespn@yahoo.com.

Recently, TMQ proclaimed another immutable law, Clang on First Bars Run on Second. My contention, backed with seemingly airtight stats from games played in Week 3, was that teams that feel they must run on second down after an incomplete pass on first down "might as well tell the refs they are waiving second down and proceeding directly to third-and-10," because a second-down rush after a first-down incompletion is routinely stuffed. Stats from Week 3 showed that runs on second down, following first-down incompletions, averaged less than one yard gained.

Comes now the Football Outsiders website, a wonderful new stats-obsessed site run mainly by sports nut Aaron Schatz. The Football Outsiders crowd has come into possession of some kind of incredibly scientifically advanced database of every conceivable stat from every NFL game. Let's hope this technology does not fall into the wrong hands! Using its database, Football Outsiders scanned every game played in 2002 for rushes on second down following an incompletion on first. The numbers show an overall average of 4.6 yards gained per rush attempt, somewhat higher than the league average for all carries.

So does this disprove TMQ's immutable law? Not necessarily; Football Outsiders also found that 38 percent of second-down rushes following first-down incompletions were stuffed, gaining two yards or less, while only 28 percent of second-down rushes following a completion were stuffed. Of course, the offenses that throw lots of incompletions also tend to be the offenses whose runs are stuffed. At any rate, the Football Outsiders scan of the entire 2002 season seems to support TMQ's contention that a second-down run after a first-down incompletion is a predictable play that often leads to a third-and-10. And readers are advised to keep an eye on Football Outsiders, a stat-lover's paradise.

On the subject of Arnold Schwarzenegger's height -- he calls himself 6-foot-2 but is surely less -- reader Michael Kovaka writes, "A few years ago, I had a locker next to him in the fitness center at the ANA Hotel in Washington, D.C. Both of us were buck naked, thereby ruling out any aid either of us might have received from footwear. Arnold was vastly more buff than I; however, at 6-1, I loomed over his 5-10-or-so frame. Modesty prevents me from making any further physiological comparisons." Michael, if only you had your camera-equipped cell phone at the ready, TMQ could now be satisfying the beefcake-demanding chick reader faction.

Last Week's Challenge: How does one become a "celebrity chef?" TMQ asked readers to pose a test.

Nicholas Scrivani of Downers Grove, Illinois, proposed that "to become a celebrity chef, one must learn how to cook and marinade everything with Cristal Champagne. Every celebrity I have ever seen on MTV Cribs has Cristal stocked in the refrigerator."

Three readers proposed tests in haiku:

Celebrity chef?
Create disgusting entrée,
get people to pay.

-- David Bouchillon

Lighting food on fire;
keeping hair-piece free of flame;
knowing fowl from fare.

-- Sam Pfeifle, Portland, Maine

Celebrity chefs
have but one prerequisite:
a zany accent.

-- Jeff Marion, Eugene, Oregon

Tim of Minneapolis supposed, "To become a celebrity chef, you must cook something that Calista Flockhart would eat." But there is no such thing!

Many readers proposed that that making food for, or perhaps waking up next to, Paris Hilton would cause one to graduate to celebrity chef. One reader haiku-ized,

Paris Hilton
Is Brian Urlacher ready to pop out of one of the cakes?

Celebrity chef:
one who has prepared breakfast
for Paris Hilton.

-- Shayan Hussain, Chicago

Check this brief bio of Hilton at the Ask Men website; it calls her a "high-society party girl, part-time model and quasi-actress." Quasi-acting -- isn't that how you become wealthy in Hollywood?

Reader Jean-Pierre Gagick of Paris, France, wins this Challenge by declaring that to become a celebrity chef, one must do a turn in the kitchen of the Hotel les Mouflons in southern France. Previously featured in TMQ, the Hotel les Mouflons -- "hotel of sheep" -- is the official resort hotel of the St. Louis Rams, known to this column as Les Mouflons. According to the Babel Fish automated translator, the first paragraph at the center of the Hotel les Mouflons web page declares,

At the exit of the medieval citè of Besse in Chandesse, at five minutes of Super Besse and its ski pistes, you will be able to combine the pleasure of the old stones and inheritance with that of the great extents and the sport.

The pleasures of the old stones! Can't wait. Again according to Babel Fish, the hotel also promises,

The truffade, the trout and beef de Salers are here the specialities, declined on several simple receipts and of quality. We also propose a chart to you where gastronomy and soil will be accompanied by best believed.

Only a celebrity chef could prepare trout declined on simple recipes, so the Hotel les Mouflons must be the place.

This Week's Challenge: "Partial nudity" makes no sense -- you're either starkers or you are not. What other phrases, in everyday usage, make no sense? Submit your witty proposal to TMQespn@yahoo.com.

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 4:27 PM

0
Comments

TV policy causes TMQ more pain
By Gregg Easterbrook
Page 2 columnist

The hottest four minutes of football this season was on national TV for anyone to see -- not that anyone did, all right-thinking people having switched off Monday Night Football last night when it was Tampa 35, Indianapolis 14 with four minutes remaining. Heidi was still watching! Special Colts' comeback analysis below.

But though the best moment was out there for all to see, NFL Week 5 otherwise was an all-time low for bad network choices. Two marquee games highlighted the Sunday card: undefeated Seahawks at Green Bay, and undefeated Broncos at undefeated Chiefs.

So New York City, our nation's largest metropolis, the greatest city in the world, must have seen these monster games? New York City saw neither.

Washington, D.C., our nation's capital, must have seen these monster games? Washington saw neither.

Los Angeles, our nation's second-largest city, must have seen these monster games? Los Angeles saw Hawks-Packers, but not Broncos-Chiefs.

Chicago, city of Big Shoulders, third-largest city in the nation, must have seen these monster games? Chicago saw neither.

Houston, fourth-largest city in the nation, and Dallas, ninth-largest city in the nation, must have seen these monster games? Houston and Dallas saw neither.

Let's see: two undefeated teams or ... the Jets!

Fast-growing Phoenix, seventh-largest city, must have seen these monster games? Phoenix saw neither.

While Fox showed about half the country the Blue Men Group at Packers, much of the rest of the nation was forced to endure the woofer Arizona-at-Dallas pairing (combined record 3-4 before Sunday). Washington, DC, was among the victims of Arizona at Dallas, while Baltimore was also hit, reader Marc Nelson Jr. writes.

The Southwest, reader Zach of Scottsdale writes, saw Arizona vs. Dallas, San Diego vs. Jax and Detroit vs. San Francisco -- teams with a combined record of 4-18 going into Sunday.

CBS showed much of the country the Dolphins-at-Jersey/A game, not a bad pairing (combined record 4-2) but one that paled in comparison to Broncos at Chiefs (combined record 8-0) and paled further when considering that Kansas City is so far the season's most entertaining team. CBS even put the Dolphins-Giants game in HDTV and sent its number-one announcing team, Greg Gumble and Phil Simms, to New Jersey rather than to Arrowhead. That is to say, CBS passed on a battle of undefeateds in order to show a lesser pairing.

This season, the Washington area, where TMQ lurks, has witnessed every tedious snap of every tedious Cowboys game -- and Washington hates Dallas! -- plus every tedious snap of every tedious game of the winless Jets, while still getting no glimpse of the Seahawks or Panthers (combined record now 7-1) and just one look each at the Chiefs and Vikings (combined record 10-0). Other major cities have been similarly afflicted with bad pairing after bad pairing, while monster games go unseen.

It continues to amaze Tuesday Morning Quarterback how the NFL spends billions of dollars to field a high-quality product, then prevents viewers from actually seeing the games. This doesn't even make economic sense: Surely the propensity for showing woofer games when great games are available drives down ratings, and hence drives down advertising revenue.

And, as Tuesday Morning Quarterback may possibly have mentioned, the solution to the problem of local affiliates airing woofer games -- NFL Sunday Ticket, which allows viewers to pay $209 per season to watch any contest -- continues to be available strictly on a monopoly basis to subscribers of DirecTV, the satellite service. Only about 10 percent of American households subscribe to DirecTV; many millions of American households cannot receive the DirecTV signal for technical reasons, regardless of willingness to pay. (TMQ keeps a running count: Of those people I personally know who have tried to subscribe to DirecTV, three have been able to get the signal and eight found it impossible to sign up, including yours truly.) Bad pairings air on free TV; the best games are often shown only via a monopoly service that 90 percent of Americans can't or don't get.

The Sunday Ticket part seems like total lunacy until you take into account that DirecTV is in the process of being sold to Rupert Murdoch, who thrives on establishing media cartels. Murdoch is paying the league about $400 million a year to maintain this particular monopoly. So the NFL gets many dineros, and Murdoch adds a monopoly to his portfolio. But with all the talk of Congress being opposed to media consolidation, TMQ continues to wonder why Congress doesn't investigate the DirecTV monopoly over Sunday Ticket. The primary effect of the NFL's deal with the DirecTV devil is, after all, to shaft American taxpayers whose tax monies make NFL stadiums and profits possible.

"Peyton, who says we can't win a big one!"

Now, because of the Colts' comeback, there is another battle of the undefeateds this weekend -- Panthers at Indianapolis. Please, please tell me the local affiliates won't screw up yet again and not show this monster collision. Only one other battle of undefeateds is possible in the 2003 season: The Chiefs meet the Vikings on the Sunday before Christmas, but odds are both will not be 15-0 at kickoff. (Actually the Colts or Chiefs might meet the Panthers or Vikings in the Super Bowl and both might be 18-0; but if you think that can happen, you think the Cubs and Red Sox could meet in the World Series!) Undefeated Panthers at undefeated Colts. Affiliates, don't screw up again; show this game.

In other football news, despite their struggles this year -- a combined record of 1-9 -- Dan Reeves and Marty Schottenheimer are the league's winningest active coaches, with a total of 365 career victories. They have also been fired a combined five times, and may both be shown the door at year's end. It's the coaches who have never been fired that TMQ worries about.

Special Lucky Charms Comeback Analysis: Key point: The Bucs did not switch to a prevent defense Monday night, as sports nuts have been assuming this morning. During the final, fateful four minutes of regulation, the defending champs had their corners play soft. Otherwise, it was conventional defense, including two blitzes.

Maybe Tampa should have switched to the prevent, because on the comeback's killer snap -- Peyton Manning to Marvin Harrison for 52 yards to the Tampa 6 with 57 seconds left, setting up the tying touchdown -- Harrison was able to get behind the Tampa secondary. There's a minute left. The Colts are on their side of the field. They have no time outs. Where, oh where, oh where might the pass go? Maybe toward the end zone!

Yet Harrison blew by corner Tim Wansley, who made no attempt to cover him deep. The play didn't involve complex action, just a standard "up" -- Harrison ran a straight line toward the Tampa goal. Wansley, inexplicably, was busy making the high-school mistake of "looking into the backfield," watching Manning instead of watching his man. The Tampa safety on that side, Jermaine Phillips, paid no attention whatsoever to Harrison as he roared deep. Harrison only had an all-time-record 143 receptions last season; why would you think the Colts might throw to him? And Phillips ignored Harrison going deep, despite the fact that Wansley, the corner on that side, was a sub for an injured starter. Harrison was a good 10 yards past Phillips before this gentlemen started chasing him.

How is it physically possible, in a must-go-deep situation, to get behind an NFL zone defense? Here's how: if the corner and the safety both ignore the other team's best receiver. Ye gods.

Wait, Vanderjagt's jersey isn't properly tucked in! Where's the flag?!?!

Also key to the comeback: Indianapolis propitiated the football gods by running when Tampa expected passes. The Colts ran on fourth-and-one with 3:43 left, trailing by 21, and got a touchdown. Poised at the Tampa 6 with 57 seconds remaining and no time outs, the Colts ran on consecutive snaps and got a touchdown. The football gods smile on those who keep their heads and run while all others around them are losing their heads and going pass-wacky.

The Bucs, for example! Getting the kickoff to start overtime, Tampa had its chance to take back the momentum of the game by pounding straight at the surely-tired visitors. Instead, Tampa coaches called passes on seven of the Bucs' nine snaps. The defending champs punted and never saw the ball again.

TMQ agrees that the leaping call against City of Tampa, giving the Colts another field-goal try after a miss in overtime, was ticky-tacky at best. The boys should decide the outcome, not the officials. It was well after midnight, and you could tell the officials just wanted to go home. Handing Indianapolis another free shot, in hopes of calling it a night, made the zebras look bad.

But, Tampa faithful, get serious. You've got a 21-point lead with less than four minutes left, in your house, and the league's top defense. If you can't hold that lead, do not coming cryin' about no refs.

And bear in mind the two personal fouls committed by Tampa players in the final three minutes of regulation. Offensive tackle Kenyatta Walker childishly went after a Colt after the whistle; defensive tackle Warren Sapp carelessly roughed Manning after a pass was away. Both these penalties stopped the clock, preserving precious seconds for the Colts' comeback; and both had huge impacts on field position, one forcing a Tampa punt, the other moving the Colts out of a hole in their own territory when it looked like they were beaten.

The Bucs, especially Sapp, have done a lot of dancing, taunting and pointing at themselves since the start of the season. Last night, the football gods exacted vengeance. If you commit stupid personal fouls with the game on the line, do not coming cryin' about no refs.

And you thought Dante Hall was the best-looking thing on the Chiefs.

Cheerleader of the Week: TMQ always approves when an NFL cheer-squad adopts the skimpy-outfit look, and the latest to do so are the cheerleaders of the Kansas City Chiefs -- whose skimpy-outfit appearance Sunday in the battle of the undefeateds went unseen by most of the country, exactly as the Chiefs themselves were unseen.

This week's TMQ ESPN Cheerleader of the Week is Kim of Kansas City, a college student majoring in criminal justice. Kim, cuff me! Kim plays golf and tennis regularly, and says the person she would most like to meet is Garcia Burnham, the missionary who was held captive in the Philipine jungle. Kim attended Raymor-Peculiar High School, which must be the butt of unlimited jokes.

Stat of the Week: Since losing 41-0 in last year's playoffs, Indianapolis has won five straight and outscored opponents 158-82.

Stat of the Week No. 2: In their last two trips to Pittsburgh, the Cleveland Browns (Release 2.1) have jumped to a combined 30-3 lead.

Stat of the Week No. 3: Jamal Lewis was held to no yards rushing. (The Ravens had a bye.)

Stat of the Week No. 4: Carolina's Stephen Davis has more yards rushing (565) than the entire Panthers team has passing (499).

Stat of the Week No. 5: The Cardinals had more punts and penalties (11) than first downs (9).

Of course, TMQ couldn't actually see Hall's return as it happened.

Stat of the Week No. 6: Dante Hall of Kansas City now has four kick-return touchdowns in five games -- tying the NFL season record set in 16 games. (But why has the sports-announcer world not pointed out that Hall benefited from an obvious clipping no-call just as he broke away for Sunday's 93-yard score?)

Stat of the Week No. 7: Buffalo now has the most overtime wins in league history, 17.

Stat of the Week No. 8: The Chiefs, Dolphins, Panthers, Patriots and Vikings won by a combined 41 points, despite being outgained by a combined 442 yards.

Stat of the Week No. 9: The Cowboys and Dolphins are 4-0 in Giants Stadium this season; Jersey/A and Jersey/B, the stadium's tenants, are 1-4 there.

Stat of the Week No. 10: Stretching back to 2002, San Diego has followed a 6-1 run with a 2-12 run.

Tis Better to Have Rushed and Lost Than Never to Have Rushed At All: Trailing the Cleveland Browns (Release 2.1) 23-10 early in the third period, the Steelers faced third-and-one on the Cleveland 32. The home crowd was roaring at military-afterburner decibels; Pittsburgh staged a big comeback against the Browns the last time the teams met; there was almost a full half remaining in the game. Plus, this is the part of the field where logic dictates that you go for it on fourth down. So did the Steelers pound, pound for the almost-certain first?

You know what they did.

TMQ's reaction: "aaaiiiiiiiiyyyyyyyyeeeeeeeeeeee!"

Tommy Maddox dropped back to pass, and it wasn't a 1960s-Packers-style attempt to hit the home run; no, some guys ran quick dodge routes designed for short gains. The Pittsburgh Steelers, playing at home, thought they had to throw a short junky pass because they could not run for one single yard against the team that just allowed Jamal Lewis the NFL's best-ever rushing day. Ye gods. That the pass was intercepted and returned for a Browns' touchdown, breaking open the game, was the direct intervention of the football gods: This pass-wacky moment could not have gone unpunished.

Sweet Play of the Week: With the unseen battle of the undefeateds scoreless in Kansas City, Denver took over on first-and-10 at its own 20. Receiver Rod Smith took the end-around running right, then threw a pass 30 yards in the air to tailback Clinton Portis; Portis went 72 yards, setting up the game's first touchdown. Downfield blocking was superb. TMQ cannot explain why, but trick plays seem to work best if they come on the first snap of a possession.

Sweet Play of the Week No. 2: Play-faking against Denver in the unseen battle of the undefeateds, Kansas City QB Trent Green "crouch"-faked -- bent his body over to hide the ball -- then hit Johnnie Morton for a 28-yard touchdown. Crouch fakes are often effective, yet few pro QBs are coached to crouch-fake. The crouch-fake is always in style in Kansas City, though; the previous QB, Elvis Grbac, used to execute this play well under the previous coach, Gunther Cunningham.

James McKnight had 68 yards on one carry while Ricky Williams had 39 yards on 22 carries.

Sweet Play of the Week No. 3: Miami's James McKnight took a reverse from Ricky Williams and went 68 yards behind fabulous downfield blocking from the Marine Mammals receiver corps. This play is worth watching over again just for the sight of half the Jersey/A defense continuing to chase Williams long after he has surrendered the ball.

Sweet Blocks of the Week: Jax's Fred Taylor got fabulous blocking from the Jaguar OL as he went 60 yards to the house with a screen pass to give the team a winning margin against San Diego. It's always nice to run when everyone in your path has already been knocked on the ground.

Sour Sequence of the Week: Trailing Dallas 20-7 in the middle of the third quarter, the Arizona (caution: may contain football-like substance) Cardinals faced third-and-14 from their own 1-yard line. Nothing gets defensive linemen excited more than the chance for a safety. Cards QB Jeff Blake dropped 10 yards back, almost to the end-zone line, before being taken down for the safety by Cowboy lineman La'Roi Glover. On their next possession, the Cardinals faced third-and-10 from their own 1-yard line. Did Arizona learn a lesson? No. Blake dropped all the way to the end-zone line, where he was pushed out for another safety by Cowboy lineman Kenyon Coleman.

Safety Sidelight No. 1. How did Arizona get stuck on its own 1 twice in a row? The fiasco sequence began when rookie Anquan Boldin signaled a fair catch on his 5-yard line. Punt returners are taught never to touch the ball inside their own 10. By calling fair catch at the 5, Boldin only insured that the ball did not roll into the end zone for a touchback.

Safety Sidelight No. 2. Minnesota also recorded two safeties Sunday, both when Atlanta committed penalties (grounding and holding) from its own end zone.

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! Game tied at 21, Oakland had Chicago facing second-and-20 on its own 40-yard line with 15 seconds left in regulation. Since the typical NFL pass attempt yields about six yards, and the Bears held only one time-out, all the Raiders had to do is play straight defense and the odds strongly favored overtime. Instead, it's a blitz! Six gentlemen cross the line, including a cornerback. Twenty-nine yard completion to Dez White, who went through the area vacated by the blitzing corner. Bears field goal to win on the final play.

Sidelight: Two plays before, Chicago faced fourth-and-one at midfield with 45 seconds left. Rather than play it safe and punt -- playing it safe doesn't make much sense for an 0-3 team, but six-nines of NFL coaches (that's 99.9999 percent) would punt in this situation -- the Bears went for it, setting up the fantastic finish. The football gods may smile on this display of manly manhood.

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! No. 2: San Francisco leading Detroit 17-3, the Niners had the Peugeots facing third-and-five at the San Francisco 6-yard line. Since the closer you get to the end zone, the less territory the defense must defend, odds favored San Francisco if they played straight defense. Instead, it's a blitz! Six gentlemen cross the line, touchdown pass to Mikhael Ricks.

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! No. 3: New England 7, Tennessee 6 late in the second quarter, the Flaming Thumbtacks faced third-and-10 at the Patriots' 44. Since the average pass attempt yields about six yards, all the Patriots needed to do was play straight defense, and the odds favored a stop. Instead, it's a blitz! Seven gentlemen cross the line, including a safety; Steve McNair completes a 43-yard pass to the New England 1; Tennessee scores for the lead at the half.

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! No. 4: Leading 16-13 with 3:31 left in regulation, the Cincinnati Fudgsicles had Buffalo facing third-and-11 on its own 40. Since the average pass attempt yields about six yards, all the Fudgsicles needed was to play straight defense, and the odds favored a stop. Instead, it's a blitz! Six gentlemen cross the line; 14-yard completion for the first; the Bills tie the game with 28 seconds left, and win in overtime.

Ahh, nothing like seeing federal power employed to preserve an offensive racial stereotype.

On the Plus Side, This Insures TMQ Can Keep Calling Them the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons: Things went well for Lord Voldemort (Dan Synder) last week. While the football world focused on Rush Limbaugh -- maybe, possibly, you heard something about that -- attention was distracted from what otherwise would have been a big story: a federal judge's inexplicable ruling that the name "R*dsk*ns" has not been shown to be disparaging to native groups.

U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly tossed out a Patent and Trademark Office finding that the name is offensive, sending the case back down for yet more consideration. Kollar-Kotelly inexplicably said it was unclear whether linguists considered "R*dsk*ns" disparaging. ("Offensive slang:" American Heritage Dictionary.) Kollar-Kotelly also declared that the Patent and Trademark Office should not have relied on a random poll of 300 American Indians, most of whom objected to the term; Kollar-Kotelly said survey results cannot be extrapolated to the population as a whole. Reader Jason Grady notes, "Apparently, the judge has never taken a statistics course. The fundamental rule is that if a population sample is random, it is indicative of the population as a whole." Judge, what was the Patent and Trademark Office supposed to do -- call up every American Indian in the United States? Anyway, some wouldn't come to the phone because they're busy watching a "R*dsk*ns" game.

Had it not been for the Rush razzle, editorialists might have focused on this decision, in which federal power is employed to preserve an offensive racial stereotype. Say what you will about Rush, he was speaking off the cuff; Kollar-Kotelly had weeks to ponder her decision.

Stop Me Before I Blitz Again! (College Edition): Many readers, including Chris Lordan, pointed out that West Virginia had No. 2 Miami facing fourth-and-13 deep in its own territory, trailing, with a minute left. Since the average pass attempt yields about six yards, all the Mountaineers needed was to play straight defense -- what they'd done well most of the night -- and the odds favored victory. Instead, it's a blitz! Six collegiate gentlemen cross the line, completion for the first down, Miami goes on to kick a game-winning field goal with 10 seconds left. Ay caramba.

Wacky Food of the Week: According to this scary article, the latest "in" dish at Manhattan's most expensive super-restaurants is -- fat. The hip, $100-a-head restaurant WD-50, is serving "the best high-end pork belly in town, with turnips and spicy-sweet gingerbread-inspired garnish." The best pork belly in town! And not just any old pork belly but "high-end" pork belly. According to the scary article, the dish consists of a large slab of fat. "Celebrity chef Wylie Dufresne" becomes upset if diners do not finish the slab of fat.

No matter how you dress the pork belly up, it's still just a piece of fat.

Meanwhile, Manhattan's high-fashion Le Cirque 2000 now serves "lardo." Lardo is pure pork fat, though at Le Cirque 2000 it is "shaved into thin slices and draped on warm toast." The ultra-trendy Jean-George's 66 of downtown Manhattan is offering "lacquered pork, a blatantly fatty dish napped in a sickly-sweet marmalade." Yum -- fat in sickly-sweet marmalade! Jeeves, ring up Bertie Wooster and we'll head over to Jean-Georges.

All this may sound like some "Magic Christian"-class parody of the absurd things the rich can be tricked into. But men and women are entering New York City restaurants and, of their own free will, paying top dollar to swallow slabs of fat. When will sautéed coffee grounds and deep-fried post-consumer paperboard become status foods?

TMQ won't even pause to point out that pure fat is awful for your health, or that pork belly traditionally has been cheap because no one who has any choice in the matter wants to eat it. The African-American playwright August Wilson once gave a moving speech about how, through history, blacks have gotten only the fat of the pig while whites dined on the ham. Attention August Wilson! The role reversal you dreamed of has come to pass. Head on over to Le Cirque, order healthful grilled fish and have a good chortle as rich white idiots wolf down slabs of fat.

TMQ Thought for the Day: How exactly does one become a "celebrity chef" -- by joining the National Association of Celebrity Chefs?

There Was a Time When Being Propositioned Was a Good Thing: California is about to elect a new governor who will serve six months before himself being recalled; state law specifies a minimum of six months between recalls. Also on the ballot is one of the state's infamous plebiscites, Proposition 53, which concerns fiscal policy. Other propositions were proposed for the ballot, but a judge ruled that only one could appear. Here is a list of propositions that will have to appear on a future California ballot:

Proposition 20. Requires that all motion pictures produced within the borders of California must open with a "tracking shot," in which the camera moves along as if the viewer were walking or driving. Critics have protested that Proposition 20 is unnecessary because all motion pictures produced within the borders of California already open with a "tracking shot."

If you lived in California, would you vote in mud wrestling as the state's official sport?

Proposition 92. Makes mud-wrestling the official sport of the state of California; grants Rupert Murdoch's DirecTV a monopoly over mud-wrestling broadcasts.

Proposition 38. Mandates that all California state employees be paid in bags of salt, as Roman soldiers once were.

Proposition 6. Requires that all future California gubernatorial candidates speak in a foreign accent.

Proposition 109. Makes survival of the fittest the law on all California freeways.

Where Was the Defense? Trailing by eight, the Potomac Drainage Basin Indigenous Persons faced first-and-10 on the Eagles' 32 with 19 seconds to go. The Persons' sole hope was to score, and they held just one time out. So where, oh where, oh where might the pass go? Maybe toward the end zone! Yet Person WR Darnerien McCants got behind the entire Philadelphia secondary on an "up" route -- three gentlemen watched him go by -- for the touchdown that set up the last-second almost-comeback. How can any receiver ever get behind a defense in this situation?

What Did Jim Fassel Do In a Previous Life to Deserve This? Jersey/A suffered yet another kicking fiasco as its second starting placekicker this year went out injured, and punter Jeff Feagles hooted a short field-goal attempt.

The Football Gods Have Promised An Investigation: You may find this hard to believe -- TMQ certainly does -- but the Dallas Cowboys have the No. 1 offense in the NFL.

Dallas offensive coordinator Maurice Carthon has installed what looks like a college offense: lots of roll-outs and bootlegs, receivers dragging back across the action, basic one-man routes for deep routes. Carthon has designed the passing plays so that the formerly-erratic quarterback Quincy Carter has a simple three-step progression. Carter looks at his primary receiver, who usually is directly in front of him on the roll-out; if the primary receiver isn't open he looks at his secondary receiver; if the secondary receiver isn't open, Carter takes off running.

From the book of "TMQ didn't predict this in August": Quincy Carter quarterbacks the NFL's leading offense.

There's no standing there scanning the field, looking for a mistake to make: On every play, Carter knows where he is supposed to look and goes through the same three-step progression. This is the way college quarterbacks are coached, and Carter is responding well to it. Why don't other NFL teams try the approach?

Meanwhile, the Dallas offensive line, which had a terrible season run-blocking last year -- 16 percent of runs lost yardage, worst in the league -- is blocking well. TMQ would like to know what kind of vitamins they are taking.

Note to NFL coaches: Time to stop considering Dallas the automatic win on the schedule.

The Football Gods Chortled: The Steelers faced fourth-and-two on the Browns' 38, trailing 16-3. This is the part of the field where logic dictates that you go for it. Pittsburgh lined up, and Tommy Maddox used a "hard count" to try to get the Browns to jump offsides. The hard count made the Steelers jump offsides. Pushed back to fourth-and-seven, Pittsburgh punted and a scoring opportunity was lost.

Tis Better to Have Rushed and Lost Than Never to Have Rushed At All No. 2: As TMQ noted last week, Buffalo doomed itself against Philadelphia by passing too much on short yardage at home -- specifically, twice reaching third-and-short at the Eagles' 32, the part of the field where logic usually dictates going for it, and passing instead of just pounding the ball, both times coming away with no points.

Flash forward to Sunday. Buffalo, again at home, leading 3-0 in the second, reaches third-and-four at the Cincinnati 34. Do the Bills learn their lesson and pound, pound? Incompletion, incompletion, turnover on downs. Cascading boos from the home fans, who appear to have spent more time with game film than has Buffalo's pass-wacky offensive staff.

Purist Drive of the Week: Oakland held the ball for 16 plays to drive for a touchdown against Chicago -- and 12 of the snaps were runs.

Purist Drive of the Week No. 2:Trailing Denver 10-7 in the unseen battle of the undefeateds, Kansas City took over on its own 24-yard line in the second quarter. The Chiefs held the ball for 12 plays and moved 70 yards, recording the tying field goal -- and nine of snaps were runs.

Purist Series of the Week: Trailing New England 7-6 at the two-minute mark of the second quarter, the Flaming Thumbtacks reached first-and-goal on the Patriots 1. Did they go pass-wacky? Extra lineman into the game at tight end, pound, pound, touchdown.

Worst Purist Sequence of the Week: Beginning in the second quarter at Green Bay, game still close, the Blue Men Group passed on 11 of 12 plays.

But Since It's the 21st Century, the Bedroom Question Is Who Spanks Whom: Researchers Diana Baumrind and Elizabeth Owens of the University of California at Berkeley concluded after analyzing dozens of psychological studies that occasional spanking is not bad for a child. "We found no evidence for unique detrimental effects of normative physical punishment," Baumrind said. What's really needed is the carefully-researched University of California at Berkeley scientific study that shows that occasional spanking is beneficial for your date/spouse/significant other. Spanking should get out of the nursery and back into the bedroom where it belongs!

The Football Gods Winced: Travis Henry, who fumbled 16 times in 2001 and 2002 -- by far the most fumbles by a non-quarterback -- has already fumbled twice this season despite missing considerable time for injuries. In a terrifying temptation of the football gods, reaching first-and-goal at the Cincinnati 3-yard line in overtime, Buffalo handed off to Henry on consecutive plays.

TMQ predicts teenage boys will love "The Rundown."

The Sequel Will Warn of Adventure Marketing: Though pro-sex, TMQ is anti-violence, and considers the distinction between the two, in entertainment, too self-evident to require much further discussion. Last year, TMQ did a column on ridiculous movie disclaimers that warn of "action violence" or "science fiction violence," as if this were somehow different from "violence." Comes now the movie "The Rundown," whose disclaimer warns of "adventure violence." So it's okay to smash things and shoot people, so long as you're having an adventure!

In full, the disclaimer for "The Rundown" warns of "Action violence and some crude dialogue." Just once, it would be nice to encounter a movie disclaimer warning of "sophisticated dialogue."

"Kurt Warner," Regrettably, Reverts to Kurt Warner: Tuesday Morning Quarterback is now totally convinced that the August northeast power blackout was caused by the muon neutrino backscatter field of a starcruiser departing from the St. Louis Rams training camp to return "Kurt Warner" to his homeworld. The superpowered alien who had been pretending to be "Kurt Warner" is now back on his planet -- a place where the mega-babes have four tentacles and a vestigial proboscis -- while the actual human Kurt Warner is wearing the uniform of Les Mouflons.

How else to account for Warner selfishly demanding a trade during the season, with his team winning? The alien-in-human-form "Kurt Warner" who came from nowhere to win the Super Bowl MVP trophy was humble and team-spirited. The Kurt Warner of today is rapidly becoming a self-centered jerk, obsessed with his own stats and money, forgetting that the NFL is at heart a business -- and whoever is performing, plays.

The Kurt Warner saga could end in this once-lovable guy being tossed out of the league on his rump. Bear in mind that Warner is being pressured to complain by his wife, whom the sports media have begun to call Yoko, owing to her appearance. But behavior matters far more than appearance! TMQ will call her Leona, as in Leona Helmsley.

Since the Chiefs are 5-0, let's give them some more props.

Another Unseen Chiefs Cheerleader: Tara of the red-hot, unseen Kansas City Chiefs is a student at the University of Missouri, majoring in psychology. This means your lines would not work on her!

Weirdly, the Part About the New DARPA Website Is Actually a TMQ Exclusive: Remember the bizarre news of last July, that the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency would sponsor a website at which people could use credit cards to place bets on when the next terror attack would occur? The White House promptly ordered the bizarre project "cancelled." Well, it's baccckkkkkkkk. Check here; the Policy Analysis Market will now debut as a privately managed project in March 2004, and now accept wagers on the "future of the Middle East." Like, giving 10:1 on whether the entire Middle East will be an irradiated wasteland in a generation?

Supposedly, bets placed at the Policy Analysis Market will create useful information about whether people think bad things will happen. But that's like saying the movement of the line on a football game creates useful information about who will win. The line moves to reflect where bettors are willing to place money; the only thing the line tells you is which team bettors are leaning toward. Similarly, the Policy Analysis Market won't create useful information. It will just be a form of legalized gambling.

Turns out such legalized gambling is already in full swing! Check NewsFutures, a "powerful new tool to answer the forecasting and decision support needs of your business, organization, or governmental agency." It's Internet wagering dressed up as information prediction. NewsFutures employs the World News Exchange to allow customers to place bets -- excuse me, to "trade" -- on the outcomes of future events.

Yesterday, for example, there were 47,412 bets registered on whether Arnold Schwarzenegger would win. Bettors bid for contracts that pay $100 if Schwarzenegger wins and nothing if he loses; a rising price indicates bettors believe Arnold will prevail, a falling price a belief he'll lose. Schwarzenegger contracts were trading in the low $40s in early September, and yesterday traded at $83 -- meaning you risk $83 to gain $17 by winning $100 -- so bettors must feel pretty confident about whom the next California governor will be. But that's not "information" in any meaningful sense, except information about how people gamble.

Here, you can legally wager on whether the United States will catch Saddam. Here, you can wager on the Democratic presidential contenders, with Howard Dean trading highest at $45 (you are risking $45 to win $55) and John Edwards trading lowest at $2 (you are risking $2 to win $98, but almost certain to lose your $2).

Similar web sites now offer this legalized gambling on topics like athletic statistics. Brendan Koerner of the New America Foundation discusses the phenomena here. Joyce Berg and Thomas Reitz, two academics, analyze the development of such "predictions markets" here. At any rate, it's all gambling, and TMQ's compromise with his Baptist upbringing is to be pro-topless but anti-gambling.

No, this isn't TMQ's office -- it's a luxury apartment on the Queen Mary.

57 Tons -- That's Almost As Much As Schwarzenegger's Hummer Weighs! The newest U.S. supercarrier, the Ronald Reagan, displaces 78,000 tons. The new ocean liner Queen Mary 2 displaces 150,000 tons -- twice the weight of a Nimitz-class supercarrier. The Queen Mary 2, designed to revive the North Atlantic passenger trade between New York and Southampton (England, not Long Island), has berths for 2,620 people. That's 57 tons of ship per passenger! The 46,000-ton Titanic offered 3,320 berths, or 13 tons per passenger. So the latest luxo-liner packs 44 tons per passenger more ship than the Titanic.

All that added tonnage translates into cabin space, discos, restaurants, exercise rooms, motion-dampers and, of course, a much stronger hull. If you don't believe we are privileged to live in a favored age, just think about an ocean liner that offers 57 tons of ship for each passenger.

Of Course Arnold Has a Platform, and He Stands On It: On the question of whether Arnold Schwarzenegger is really 6-foot-2, as he claims, or much shorter, as those who have met him contend, comes now Frank Easterbrook, an Official Brother of TMQ and a scientifically confirmed 6-4, to report that he once shook hands with AHH-nold at a charity event. Frank's verdict? America's first cybernetic gubernatorial candidate is either 5-9 or 5-10.

Hidden Play of the Week: Hidden plays are ones that aren't flashy, but stop or sustain drives. Miami 10, Giants 7 in the late second quarter, the Marine Mammals faced second-and-10 on the Jersey/A 30. The call was screen left to fullback Rob Konrad; he rumbled 25 yards for a first-and-goal behind fabulous blocking from Jamie Nails and Tim Ruddy. Miami got a field goal just before the end of the half, and controlled the rest of the game.

Running Items Department

Obscure College Score of the Week: Walsh 44, Malone 36 in five overtimes. At the end of regulation, this game was knotted at 20, meaning there were 40 points scored during the three hours of the main game and 40 points scored during the brief flurry of overtimes. Located in Canton, Ohio, the shrine city of football, Malone was founded in 1892 as Cleveland Bible College by Walter and Emma Malone, two Friends -- preferred name of Quakers -- and moved to a larger Canton campus in 1957.

Friends are supposed to be pacifists, although this philosophy did not seem to have much impact on Richard Nixon, raised as an evangelical Quaker by his mother, Hannah, who dreamed Nixon would become a pacifist missionary. The Society of Friends asks members to promote a "Peace Testimony" and specifies, "Quaker practice does not permit the overcoming of some persons by other persons." So Malone has to lose to Walsh; otherwise, its persons would have overcome other persons! Pacifism is a challenging concept to work into a football pregame speech.

Bonus Obscure College Score: Indiana of Pennsylvania 24, Clarion 20. Checking in with TMQ's favorite obscure college team, we find the Indiana of Pennsylvania Indians undefeated at 5-0, aiming toward their annual clash with rival California of Pennsylvania, which will occur this season on Oct. 18. And, yes, IUP's teams continue to be the Indians -- many readers have suggested the school can solve its name problem while maintaining tradition by becoming the Indianans -- though using a bear logo.

While "Indians" is far from an ideal moniker, the term is not inherently derogatory, like "R*dsk*ns."

Obscure College Defeat of the Week: As pointed out by reader Ben Domenech, William & Mary managed to lose without even playing. Hurricane Isabel, which struck hard in the Tidewater region of Virginia on a Thursday, caused William & Mary to cancel its Saturday home date against the University of Maine. Whether the collision really needed to be cancelled was controversial, and Maine was steamed because it traveled to William & Mary despite the conditions, only to be told the host school was bailing. Atlantic 10 conference commissioner Linda Bruno awarded the victory to Maine, while handing William & Mary a "no contest," which counts as an L in the standings.

No contest? That's what Spiro Agnew pleaded after he resigned the vice presidency on corruption charges -- except he had the good taste to say it in Latin. Tuesday Morning Quarterback thinks Bruno should have written down nolo contendere in the official standings. This is, after all, college.

Obscure High School Feat of the Week: David Rosenbaum of Wilson High School in the District of Columbia kicked what may be the longest PAT of all time, a 62-yarder. After a touchdown against Springarn High, Wilson was assessed multiple celebration penalties; the conversion attempt ended up spotted in Wilson territory, at the team's own 48-yard-line; Rosenbaum's try was true. His previous longest kick had been a 27-yard field goal.

New York Times Final-Score Score Once again, the Paper of Guesses goes 0-14 in its quixotic attempt to predict an exact NFL final score, bringing the New York Times Final-Score Score to 1-907 since TMQ began tracking. The goal of 1,000 inaccurate predictions, once just a dream, now comes into view for the Multicolored Lady.

Reader Animadversion: Got a complaint or deeply felt grievance? Register it at TMQespn@yahoo.com.

Many, many readers, including Jarratt Clarke of Lynchburg, Virginia, wrote to note that Jerry Falwell's Liberty University is in his town, not, as TMQ said, in Lynchburg, Tennessee -- where the all-important Jack Daniels whisky distillery is located. One reader, Virginia native Rachel Borek, alluding to Pat Robertson's competing Regent University in Virginia Beach, phrased the matter in haiku:

Geographical
blunder: Liberty haunts the
Old Dominion State.

But on second thought,
Pat Robertson is enough;
Boot Falwell next door!

-- Rachel Borek, White Plains, New York

A Pittsburgh reader was one of many who noted that, while certain prima-donna NFL receivers refuse to block, this is not a problem for Hines Ward:

Wide receiver Ward
could give blocking clinic and
hand Terrell his shorts.

-- Dan Elbarto, Pittsburgh

Reader Jennifer Warzala haiku-ized that although this column is Tuesday Morning Quarterback, it usually does not appear until about 1 p.m. Eastern:

Today is Tuesday.
It's already after noon:
Where is TMQ?

-- Jennifer Warzala, Syracuse, New York

Jennifer, 1 p.m. Eastern is still morning in four of the six time zones of this great nation! The problem is that long before TMQ brought his internationally-known brand to ESPN.com, Page 2 had committed to a daily update at the highly precise "noonish Eastern" -- see the dateline at the top of Page 2. Tuesday Morning Quarterback tends to take a little longer to post, because it's time-consuming to convince all those mega-babes to unbutton their cleavage and mega-hunks to doff their shirts. (Actually, because TMQ is the longest feature on Page 2, requiring the most copy-editing attention and the most illustrations.)

Last Week's Challenge: Playing off the Chicago Bears Presented by Bank One, readers were asked to propose a corporate sponsor for an NFL team.

Bob of Wilmington, Delaware, suggests that Verizon Wireless should sponsor the Arizona Cardinals. The tester nerd could be shown at Sun Devil Stadium saying, "Can you hear me now? Of course you can because there's nobody here."

Sandra Helquist of Menlo Park, California, proposed another wireless sponsor for Arizona: "Cingular advertises its plan to rollover minutes, and the Cardinals appear to be rolling over their salary cap space into the future. Also, during games they roll over and play dead."

Kevin Gier of St. Louis proposed that the Chiefs' Dante Hall be sponsored by Kansas City's American Century Mutual Funds, whose slogan is, "We're Small But We Promise Great Returns." Check the photo of Hall running one back -- he makes the ball look big!

Andrew Sroufe suggests the Cleveland Browns (Release 2.1) be sponsored by First Energy, the Ohio utility that may have trigged the August blackout in the Northeast. In haiku,

First Energy Browns.
Another blackout would help:
We won't have to watch.

-- Andrew Sroufe, Athens, Ohio

Shane F. of Rich Hill, Missouri, suggests the New Orleans Saints be sponsored by the Kroger supermarket chain: "Would you like paper or plastic to use to hide your head?"

Martha Meldrum of Raleigh, North Carolina, suggested the New England Patriots be sponsored by the United States Department of Justice, in order to promote the USA Patriot Act. "Of course, John Ashcroft would have to monitor all conversations in the huddle," Meldrum notes. "Players would have to agree to government cameras in their bedrooms, and implantation of mind-control chips. But isn't loss of freedom a small price to pay for preserving our freedoms?"

Steven Levy suggests the Tennessee Titans be sponsored by Staples: "Your source for thumbtacks."

Rob Caldwell of St. Francisville, Illinois, suggests San Diego be sponsored by MasterCard, using this script:

Ticket to the game: $45
Hot dog and souvenirs: $35
Receiver who won't play: $47 million

Listening to management excuses for David Boston: priceless

Brian Greenwald of Dallas proposes that the Denver Broncos be sponsored by Microsoft: "Denver hit with only a $25,000 fine for uniform 'error' in San Diego; Microsoft pays only a $23 million out-of-court antitrust settlement. These two are the kings of getting off easy."

Reader Amr Hiram proposes in haiku that the aging Long Johns seek out Levitra's competitor as a sponsor:

The Oakland Raiders
need an increase in blood flow.
Sponsor? Viagra.

-- Amr Hiram, Toronto

Ted Ames wins this week's Challenge with this haiku proposal:

Searching for answers:
The Cincinnati Bengals,
sponsored by Google.

-- Ted Ames, New York

This Week's Challenge: What test should you have to pass to become a celebrity chef? Submit your clever answer at TMQespn@yahoo.com.

Posted by tien mao in TMQ at 9:52 AM

0
Comments

Run amok: Soldier Field, Terrell's ego
By Gregg Easterbrook
Page 2 columnist

Last night, Chicago unveiled the "new" Solider Field, an old field that was completely redone in order to make it more expensive. Working round the clock, sparing no expense -- $632 million, according to the Chicago Tribune -- and spending freely since most of it was taxpayers' money, anyway, the architects of the new Soldier Field managed to take a beautiful classical structure and make it an ugly modern structure. Great job!

The new public park surrounding the renovated Soldier Field is impressive, as are the walkways to the wonderful Field Museum. Seats are wide and well-spaced -- TMQ recently sat at Philadelphia's new Lincoln Field, and the seats were so narrow and squished together that they made a Southwest Airlines middle seat seem appealing.

By all accounts, what's inside the rebuilt Soldier Field is fan-friendly and very well done -- on beholding the classy interior, Bears linebacker Brian Urlacher declared, "This looks like someplace we'd travel to." Also, you have to like the fact that heated liquid glycol piped under the turf will keep the Kentucky bluegrass no cooler than 50 degrees Fahrenheit in the Chicago winters. Ethyl alcohol, some heated, will be piped into fans.

Soldier Field
$630 million? They should have used some of that money to buy a better team.

But there remains the fact that the exterior of Soldier Field was once beautiful, and is now ugly -- at fantastic expense. Presumably, if an actual flying saucer crashed on Lake Shore Drive, it would look better than this.

The original, beautiful Soldier Field was completed in 1924 at a cost of $10 million, which inflates to $101 million in current dollars. Thus, in real-dollar terms, the new, ugly Soldier Field cost six times as much as the original, beautiful one. Spending $632 million to make something look worse: how very current!

It's good to know that no matter how much is ripped out and rebuilt, Chicago tradition remains. On their first possession last night in the $632 million new venue, the Bears ran three plays and gained zero yards.

In other NFL news, Terrell Owens was a member of the San Francisco team that got punched out 35-7 by Minnesota -- but you'd never know it from listening to Terrell Owens. This gentleman threw a tirade on the sidelines; and then, after the game, denounced his teammates while mewling, "I was always open." Apparently, Owens had nothing, nothing at all, to do with his team losing. There's no "I" in team. There is also no "T.O."

What is it with wide receivers and their egos? Sunday's game was not between the Niners and the Vikings; it was between the Randy Moss ego and the Terrell Owens ego. The reason T.O. blew a gasket is that Moss' ego caught three touchdowns and his ego caught none.

Terrell Owens
TO hasn't been doing much dancing this year -- but, of course, that's the fault of his teammates.

Moss, Owens, Cris Carter -- a high percentage of football's insufferable egotists are receivers. Marvin Harrison merely sulks, which makes him seem mild-mannered by comparison. Insufferable ego even strikes receivers like David Boston and Troy Edwards, who have never done squat. And receiver ego is hardly just a recent phenomenon. On the day Andre Reed became the No. 2 receiver all-time, he denounced his teammates and threw a tirade about not being worshipped enough.

Tuesday Morning Quarterback can offer these explanations for runaway receiver ego:

First, today's WRs really do believe they are always open. Watch games in person, or watch tape, and you will see that even Jerry Rice and Moss -- the two I'd least like to face -- are covered on most plays. But receivers tell themselves they are always open; and since nobody watches pass patterns, fans don't know better. In contrast, any running back who said, "I'm always about to go the distance," would be laughed at because fans follow the ball and see that isn't true.

Second, receivers get the all-ego isolation moments. Other gentlemen on the field are engaged in complex joint efforts; fans see them performing as ensembles. When the little television tetragon shifts to the receiver, he's all alone loping through the defense. It's a perspective that places emphasis on the ego, making him appear, however fleetingly, to do something single-handedly.

Third, by the nature of the long pass, wide receivers occasionally turn in spectacular major-yardage plays. Except for the occasional runback, most long gains go to the wideout corps. This allows the egotistical receiver who catches a long pass to believe he is winning the game single-handedly.

Finally, receivers have runaway egos because they don't block.

In the contemporary NFL, wide-outs are the sole players who consistently get away with not aiding their teammates. Linemen and tight ends are expected to block on every play. The quarterback is busy on every play. Running backs who don't block the blitz soon learn the definition of "waiver wire." Over on defense, everybody pursues at full speed, even when the play is 20 yards down the field on the opposite side. But wide receivers? Go to a game and watch them during running plays. They listlessly lean on the cornerback, if they do anything at all. Some star receivers don't make any attempt to block even when the play is coming their way. (The football gods adulate Jerry Rice because he always blocks; but then, Rice is exceptional in everything.) And coaches don't compel gentlemen of the Terrell Owens ilk to block. So they think they're more important than everyone else combined, and have ego meltdowns.

Solution? Make Terrell Owens and Randy Moss cover punts.

David Carr
The football gods applaud the Texans for going for the win rather than overtime.

The Football Gods Will Reward This: Trailing 20-17 with two seconds left, the Houston Texans faced fourth-and-goal on the Jax 1-yard line. A scientifically estimated six-nines of NFL coaches (that is, 99.999999 percent) in this situation send in the field goal unit to force overtime. Taking the field goal actually is not the percentage play; NFL teams probably convert about 80 percent of fourth-and-ones, while a ticket to overtime is a 50-50 chance. But coaches kick in this situation in order to avoid blame. If the coach gambles to win and fails, then the loss is his fault. If the coach plays it safe and goes to overtime where a loss results, that's the players' fault.

Gloriously, majestically, Houston coach Dom Capers ordered the Texans to go for it. And he ordered a run -- 'tis better to have rushed and lost than never to have rushed at all! David Carr on the sneak, victory.

Actually, there is another coach who recently went for everything on the game's final play. Week 15 of the 2002 season: The 3-10 Minnesota Vikings scored with five seconds left to come within one point of New Orleans. Rather than kick the singleton PAT and go to overtime -- buying that 50-50 ticket -- Vikings coach Mike Tice went for two, got it, and departed victorious. The football gods smiled; and since then, Minnesota has won an additional six straight. Yea, verily, the football gods will now smile upon the Texans as well.

Stat of the Week: Stretching back to the moment last season when they went for two on the game's final play, the Minnesota Vikings have won seven straight.

Stat of the Week No. 2: The Kansas City Chiefs held Jamal Lewis to 115 yards.

Stat of the Week No. 3: Mike Vanderjagt of Indianapolis kicked 19 times -- 10 kickoffs, seven extra points and two field goals.

Stat of the Week No. 4: The Buffalo offense scored 62 points in the season's first eight quarters, and zero points in the next seven quarters.

Stat of the Week No. 5: The Jets had more penalties and punts (8) than points (6).

Stat of the Week No. 6: St. Louis put up 24 more first downs than Arizona.

Dante Hall
Dante Hall has three return TDs (two kickoff, one punt) this season.

Stat of the Week No. 7 Chiefs' returner Dante Hall has six touchdowns in his last nine outings.

Stat of the Week No. 8: The Tennessee defense scored nine points and returned a takeaway to the Pittsburgh 1, from where the offense recorded a touchdown. The Steelers' offense scored 13 points. Thus, the Tennessee defense effectively outscored the Pittsburgh offense.

Stat of the Week No. 9: Against Oakland in overtime, San Diego ran seven plays for a net of eight yards.

Stat of the Week No. 10: Minnesota, Tennessee and "Washington" won by a combined 48 points, despite being outgained by a combined 333 yards.

Stat of the We