Normally, you don’t see a broadcast booth spend a plurality of a football game raving about the “time of possession” statistic. Then again, normally, you don’t see a team win said battle by a full 30 minutes of game time, which is precisely what Miami did to Indianapolis last night. And then again, you don’t normally see a team control the ball for fewer than 15 minutes of the game… and win anyway.

(”Okay, so you just scored the go-ahead touchdown. Allow me to retort: BOOOO THUMBS DOWN TO YOU BOOOOOOO!”)

But lo and behold, thanks to the quickest of quick-strike offenses, the Colts did exactly that; thanks to touchdown drives of 1, 6, and 4 plays, Indianapolis prevailed in Miami, 27-23. Indeed, the Colts’ longest drive of the night was a 9-play drive that led to a 2nd quarter field goal; on the other side of the field, the Fins had exactly one shorter drive: an 8-play, 25-yard drive that ended in a punt. After that, literally every drive of theirs was 9 plays or longer. That’s the longest shortest drive since [ERROR WE ARE NOT ELIAS SPORTS BUREAU CLIENTS ABORT, RETRY, FAIL?].

Ah, but without turnovers, time of possession is effectively meaningless. Read more…

It’s been almost 9 months since the 2008 Heisman was awarded, which should tell you what a nightmare the college football offseason is. That one went to Sam Bradford, who’s on the Oklahoma sidelines and ruefully eying Matt Stafford’s mammoth rookie contract as we speak. And hey, Bradford set a record for passing efficiency, and anyone who watched the season knows the performance wasn’t exactly a fluke; kid can ball.

(Enjoying the pregame ritual by getting CBS’s feed: “You’re great, Tim… you’re the best, Tim… If I had a daughter, I’d personally hand her to you, Tim…”)

But that, of course, means the Heisman didn’t go to eventual champion Tim Tebow, and after the shameless, near-fellatial fawning that Tebow enjoyed, some broadcasters obviously thought Tebow deserved the trophy in what was a remarkably close ballot race. One broadcaster for CBS - who held the rights to most of the Gators’ games last year - still hasn’t forgiven the voters for, in his mind, robbing Tebow of the Heisman.

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The Dallas Cowboys are a perfect sports analogy to Microsoft. They’re both led by supremely arrogant billionaires who have cornered the market on casual users of their respective products. To wit: nothing says “I know nothing about computers” quite like a guy running Windows Vista Home Edition, and nothing says “I know nothing about football” quite like a guy in, say, North Dakota sporting a Cowboys jersey.

FAILlionaires* Bill Gates and Jerry Jones inadvertently teamed up Saturday to cause havoc at Cowboys Stadium, and it had nothing to do with Sam Bradford’s shoulder sending Oklahoma’s national championship hopes down in flames. Get your nerd flag out and ready to fly.

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Bad things, man; bad things.

Dennis Hopper’s warnings from those admittedly awesome Nike commercials were an apt metaphor for the perils of Week 1 in college football. In this case, while Georgia and Virginia Tech couldn’t overcome tough opponents in hostile territory, Oklahoma was the real loser of the weekend.

(”Coach said to rub some dirt on it. Wait… we don’t have dirt; this is field turf! MEDIIIIIIC!”)

But first, about the Georgia loss: With the score 17-10 OSU in the third quarter, Zac Robinson led Justin Blackmon on a crossing route over the middle. The pass sailed and bounced off the receiver’s hands, at which point Blackmon was immediately met with a violent hit from safety Reshad Jones. Flags fly, unnecessary roughness call, 1st down for the Cowboys.

Except… that was, by all accounts, a legal hit. Jones had begun his move before the ball bounced off the receiver’s hands. His technique was legal: he didn’t lead with the helmet, just a high shoulder. But since he hit Blackman so hard and there’s the emphasis on caling unnecessary roughness, three flags fell at his feet. Even Matt Millen was apoplectic. After all… what the hell was Jones supposed to do? Not play defense? If Blackmon makes that catch and Jones lets up, Jones probably loses his starting role for bitching out and being afraid of contact. It was an idiotic call and a bad precedent for the rest of college football. Video is after the break.

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The Oakland Raiders: they put the “Holy crap, Coach just slugged an assistant!” in “dysfunction.” At least, we’ll have to assume that’s what happened, as Raiders head coach Tom Cable (who is not, by the way, in way over his head) didn’t do much to clarify reports that he broke the jaw of defensive assistant coach Randy Hanson with a sucker punch, with his only response being that “it’s an internal issue and we’re dealing with it, and that’s all I’m going to say.”

That sure didn’t sound like a denial, and “dealing with it” sure seems like code for “I’m going to use a tire iron to cave in the head of the next pipsqueak who asks me about this.” The Raiders are becoming more like a sitcom every day. Sort of like “Coach“, but with less physical comedy and more physical assault.

 (Remember when Hayden Fox crushed Luther’s jaw with a punch? Me either.)

(Although I do love the episode where Coach smashed in Dauber’s face with a beer bottle after he lost the playbook right before the big game in a wacky mix-up.)

If Cable (who is totally qualified to be an NFL head coach and has the winning demeanor of a John Madden or Curly Lambeau) wasn’t admitting to anything on Monday, then at least his players were rolling over on him, starting a “Cable, Bumaye” chant during practice to mimic the cheers Muhammad Ali got from the African people before the “Rumble in the Jungle.”

And about Hanson: Raiders fans might remember, he’s the same coach that irritated Lane Kiffin so much that he “suspended him for one game, said he had medical issues and then tried to fire him” before Al Davis stepped in and backed Hanson, who apparently is one of his favorites. So Cable (who is not treading so much water that the band from “Titanic” is standing by) probably picked the worst person in the organization to slug except for Davis himself.

(Also, you have to wonder if one of those “medical conditions” that Kiffin tried to use to fire Hanson was a “permanent glass jaw”…)

Meanwhile, Beano Cook thinks that Syracuse should get a spot ready for another Heisman Trophy to go along with those representing Jim Brown and Ernie Davis. After all, if they found a way to get Ron Powlus back at QB, anything is possible. Of course, Beano Cook is a rambling old man, the kind who holds up the line at the supermarket so he can check every item on the receipt for errors.

So no, Syracuse didn’t get “Heisman” Powlus into their football program, but it’s close: they announced yesterday that former Duke point guard Greg Paulus will be the starting QB for their opening game against Minnesota. It’s either a testament to the athletic ability of Paulus - who hasn’t played football since high school but was once the Gatorade National Player of the Year - or the sorry state of Syracuse football that someone who has been out of the game for years is their best bet. I won’t say which one, but merely point out that Syracuse was 3-25 in the Big East the last four years.

Finally, let’s see…former WWE champion decides to become an MMA fighter. Stop me if you’ve heard this one before. But this time we aren’t talking about a UFC heavyweight champion/Coors aficionado, but a new possible women’s MMA star. The DAYTON DAILY NEWS says that Lisa Marie Varon, who wrestled until recently in the WWE as Victoria, has been training for nearly a year and is ready to make her MMA debut soon.

On the positive side, Varon is a former bodybuilding and fitness model who was one of the most physical women’s wrestlers, and she is working with former UFC champ Rich Franklin’s trainer. The downsides are that she is 38, and has almost no fighting experience.

Still, she apparently is quite serious about this, and wants to become a part of the Strikeforce women’s division. While she might not talented enough to rival Christiane “Cyborg” Santos, I think we can agree that seeing Varon take on Gina Carano would be a much more attractive match-up.

In other sports news that you might have missed while celebrating the fact that The Kids In The Hall are getting back together for a TV project:

• No matter what, Scott Boras always wins. This time it was getting a last-minute deal done between the Washington Nationals and his client, No. 1 draft pick Stephen Strasburg. The price tag? Just a cool four years and $15 million - almost double what the Cubs signed Mark Prior for in 2001 in what had been the previous largest contract for a draft pick.



• The NEW YORK TIMES wonders if Y.E. Yang’s shocking victory over Tiger Woods in the PGA Championship will start a golfing boom in Asia that could help the PGA Tour. Because that’s worked so well for the LPGA…
• Speaking of which, CNBC’s Darren Rovell says that other than Yang, the biggest winner on Sunday might have been Le Coq Sportif, the clothing line whose red rooster logo got almost $2 million of free air time during final round coverage.
• The Lingerie Football League has released its preseason “All Fantasy Team“, but BUSTED COVERAGE wants to know if you should be more insulted to be a third-team offensive lineman or first-team offensive lineman.
• Stephen Good might be the starting right guard for the Oklahoma Sooners, but EVERY DAY SHOULD BE SATURDAY says there’s one thing that terrifies him more than losing to Texas: Clowns, especially Pennywise from “It”. No word on if he wet the bed when Bozo the Clown came on as a kid.
• Sad news from the CHARLOTTE OBSERVER: former North Carolina State LB Edrick Smith was killed early Sunday morning when a hit-and-run drunk driver smashed into the Honda Accord he was in, splitting it in two.
• NEWSOK.COM says that Oklahoma All-American TE Jermaine Gresham broke his vow of media silence last Friday … to give a “shout out” to Michael Vick for being signed by the Eagles. Also, he gave “mad props” to attempted Presidential assassin/Manson Family member Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme for being released from prison.
• Great, another “Polish canoeist goes nuts on the way to World Championships and forces plane into emergency landing” story.
• Two men from Honolulu were arrested in Las Vegas for having pot in their car after leading police on a short chase. Not much of a story, until you realize that the men were Honolulu cops in Nevada to play on a softball team in the Nevada Police & Fire Games. Needless to say, Dano has already booked them, and then beat them for being so stupid.
• This might be a bit more than gamesmanship: a top British rugby team was having players use fake blood so they could substitute in better kickers during key stages of games.

College football fans will likely recall Matt Vasgersian’s epic call of Owen Schmitt’s touchdown in West Virginia’s upset win over Oklahoma in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl. As the burly Schmitt barreled down the sideline en route to a long touchdown, Vasgersian yelled, “Like a runaway beer truck!”

(This isn’t a mugshot, but whatever his mugshot looked like is undoubtedly inferior to this.)

It was an iconic nickname in an era where so few are spontaneous and evocative, and one that stuck with him as he joined the NFL. Spontaneous and evocative, yes, but now, extremely unfortunate.

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Normally, when we write about an athlete being arrested, our tone is some combination of mocking him for his stupidity, and taking him to task for his incredibly poor judgment. Sometimes it can even be a bit rote, a sports police blotter version of a Mad Lib. But don’t expect that in this story about Oklahoma All-American TE Jermaine Gresham’s arrest on Monday night.

Why? Because as the TULSA WORLD reports, Gresham wasn’t hauled in on a DUI charge. No guns were involved, and there are no girlfriends sporting black eyes or bar patrons missing teeth. That’s because Gresham’s crime was failing to appear in court over a ticket for not wearing a seat belt. And that’s it.

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Last time we checked on Brian Bosworth, the former Sooners & Seahawks LB was caught driving drunk on his Harley in the heart of Hollywood. Although he managed to avoid any jail time, it was just another black eye for the Boz’s reputation, an embarrassment he hadn’t felt since starring in “Stone Cold“.

But every cloud has a silver lining, and the administrators at Putnam City West High School in Oklahoma saw Boz’s lousy night in L.A. as a chance to educate their own students about the dangers of drunk driving. (And Brian had some community service time to work off.) So last Friday, Bosworth came to town and talked to the teens about the terrors of driving drunk - and hopefully save a few lives.

It turns out the Boz did save a life, after all - by giving someone CPR.

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It was just a few days ago that Texas unveiled that silly asterisk on their wall of fame, giving themselves credit for a conference championship that they didn’t even play for (yes, we know, 45-35), much less win. Well, Mack Brown said he’d had no idea what any of that was about and had it all taken down. Big win for sanity, yes? Please?

(Y’know, for being such tough football players, the ‘Horns are handling this with all the maturity and level-headedness of your average 13-year-old girl. Juuuust sayin’.)

Actually, no, Texas; there is no sanity clause in Brown’s contract, because instead of merely putting up a wall decoration that awards the ‘Horns the conference title with an asterisk, according to the AUSTIN AMERICAN-STATESMAN, they’re actually going to pay the assistants’ bonuses for winning the thing. Once again, Texas didn’t even play in the game, much less win it. But if the UT athletic department really wants to give away a total of $44,000 to people with ample six figure salaries, who are we to complain, right? Read more…

Leave it to Major League Baseball’s old and tired leadership to open half of the league’s games in cold climates, many of which will force postponements during the very first week of the season. While the proud and downtrodden denizens of Philadelphia should be have been celebrating the first professional sports crown in the city of brotherly love for decades, they instead found some of their press stolen because of a cancellation of the season opener between the White Sox and Royals a day before the game was scheduled to be played!

That’s right folks,  it’s baseball season, and it’s snowing in Chicago.

It’s ludicrous that a professional sports league that employs as many marketing consultants as locker room attendees could sign off on a plan designed to wreak havoc on the schedule year after year.

There’s a simple solution to avoid the annual cancellations, travel headaches and  furious dispossesed fan bases: Play the entire first two weeks of the season in markets that are either: A) on the West coast, B) below the Mason-Dixon line or C) have domed stadiums. Stop kowtowing to the need for a New York opener and season-starting series in places like Cleveland and Chicago, and the season might actually work the way it’s supposed to on paper.

Of course, there’s never any weather-related problems in basketball, but there are plenty of crowd issues when the basketball is being played by women. If you tuned into the NCAA Women’s Final Four last night, ESPN would like to hear from you (they don’t believe the Nielsen ratings could possibly be that low) and Courtney Paris would like to apologize for crying so much the tears started flowing out of your screen.

Put those two stories together — the blown, $64,000 guarantee by a Joe Namath-sounding women’s basketball player and an utter lack of attendance (at least heading into the Final Four; no overnight attendance numbers were available last night) — and add in undefeated UConn’s seemingly inevitable drive to a perfect season, and there are plenty of fascinating story lines in St. Louis. Yet the bottom line, as it so often is with women’s basketball, no one cares.

That’s a shame. After all, when’s the next time an NFL great will have twin daughters playing in a Final Four, one of whom has an impulsively gregarious moment that costs him $64,000? When’s the next time we’re going to get to see that face? Priceless folks, priceless.

Somehow, despite the odds and ethical questions, a 19-year-old jockey is on the verge of competing in his horse racing’s signature event. If that doesn’t seem stunning enough, this is: Joe Talamo has already earned some $4 million en route to spitting range of his ultimate goal: the Kentucky Derby.

What’s even more amazing about Talomo, as first exposed by LAIST, are hisTwitter updates. For instance, check out these recent inputs from the rider of derby contender “I Want Revenge”.

• “30 til derby: Am at Santa Anita. Worked out 3 horses this morning…Right Round by Flo Rida is my song of the day. Big month ahead,”
• “30 til derby: just got home from dinner at the ivy and tim’s show. great night! going to bed. gotta wake up early”
• “29 til derby: Working a couple more horses after the break. Then filming a scene at Clocker’s Corner for Jockeys. LA Times interview at 10.”

Hmmm, tough life you got there kid. Now, about that L.A. TIMES interview. Would you prefer a Bill Plaschke kiss up, or a clueless T.J. Simers job? Your choice.

• About that Philadelphia World Series celebration; ummm, someone forgot to tell the Braves to roll over, even with a prior winless-in-openers Derek Lowe on the mound.
• Sidney Crosby is still getting upstaged by Alex Ovechkin in the box scores, but he’s starting to make up ground on him in on-ice fights.

• If anyone needed another reason to believe that Oakland’s entry into the National Football League is an ongoing script for a future WB sitcom, there’s this entry calling for the team to consider acquiring Michael Vick.
• Forget NASCAR, the real auto racing news is in the IRL, where Danica Patrick crashed … and then went off on a rookie driver.

• Roy Williams is already setting the groundwork for an excuse if someone gets hurt and it costs his team the national title. Has he already forgotten that his Tar Heels housed this Michigan State team on the same floor a few months ago?
• Dustin Pedroia: Alex Rodriguez is a dork.
• This has to qualify as one of the stranger endings to a UFC fight in memory.

• Could unfrozen zamboni ice be the strangest free hand out in minor league hockey history? We’re going to say yes, yes it can.
• Her name is Destinee Hooker. His name is Clifton Gay. Of course they had to get married.

• Only in Italy: World famous soccer manager Jose Mourinho gets a lap dance on national TV …
  … and finds a way to appear completely uninterested. As if.