*****************************('3','Greetings from Detroit','By John Dudley

Welcome to my blog, even though I\'m not sure what a blog is. What I hope to do is share some thoughts and observations that won\'t make it into my stories. We\'ll start with the Super Bowl, which I\'m covering for the first time this week.

People who have been to Super Bowls have told me that you can\'t really appreciate what it\'s all about until you go to one, and it only took me a few minutes to realize that\'s true.

My plane had just landed in Detroit when I spotted a limo driver holding a sign that read, \"L. Taylor.\" Yes, that L. Taylor. Next to the driver was a semi-circle of large men who looked like bodyguards surrounding Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis, who was pulling large bags off of the luggage claim belt.

On the shuttle to the media center, which is located in downtown Detroit at the Renaissance Center, a volunteer told me she had been working security the night before when a black stretch lino pulled up and unloaded P. Diddy and Paris Hilton. Another limo slid in behind them and out hopped the rapper Jay-Z. Apparently they were heading to an invitation-only Super Bowl party on the second floor of the Renaissance Center. I looked through my bag of media materials from the NFL and, darned if I could find my invitation.

The Renaissance Center itself is a massive building the NFL has taken over as the hub of all things Super Bowl this week. It houses the media headquarters, all kinds of fan events and a sprawling ESPN set that on Thursday afternoon was ringed by thousands of fans, many of them sipping from bottles of beer or mixed drinks, watching a live production of SportsCenter. Just down the hall were dozens of miniature studios on Radio Row, where sports talk hosts from around the world were simultaneously conducting interviews with celebrities and current and former coaches and players.

Even after covering the NFL for seven years, I found myself walking through the place with my head on a swivel. The best way to describe it was the marriage of the world\'s largest interview room and the world\'s cocktail party under the same roof.

I\'ve spent the rest of the night filing my first two stories from Detroit for Friday\'s paper, and I\'ll be up early Friday for press conferences with Steelers coach Bill Cowher, Seahawks coach Mike Holmgren and NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue.

As for this space, I think in time it will evolve and take on a personality of its own. In the meantime, feel free to post responses to what I write, ask questions, make comments and observations, or generally post your thoughts about the Super Bowl and Detroit. I hope to hear from many of you.

Cheers,

John','','1','','1138938051','','','','text','1','4','1','72.255.47.89','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('4','It\'s Detroit, so crummy weather comes with the package','By John Dudley

My worst fears about covering a Super Bowl in Detroit were that it would be cold and snowy. Turns out I was wrong. It\'s cold and rainy, that\'s worse.

Fortunately, most of my work is done inside, and today began with a series of press conferences at the Renaissance Center downtown. After Steelers coach Bill Cowher opened the day by deflecting questions about his coaching legacy, the NFL honored Peyton Manning as its Man of the Year.

And whether you are a Colts fan or not, whether you like Manning the quarterback or not, this is a guy to admire. No player is more involved in charity work, and no player goes to greater lengths to reach out to kids. Manning even has a section of his Web site in which he personally responds to questions from kids. His work last year, along with his brother Eli, in helping victims of Hurricane Katrina in and around his native New Orleans, obviously weighed heavily on his selection for this year\'s award. But commissioner Paul Tagliabue said Manning is always among the first players to call the league office and offer to hely any time there is a disaster anywhere in the world.

I know people and work with people who became Colts fans solely because of their admiration for Manning, who despite his talent and his wealth still comes across as one of the most approachable, sincere players in pro sports. The fact that he is coached by another one of sports\' true gentlemen -- Tony Dungy -- is remarkable, and probably no small coincidence.

As a reporter, one thing I always worry about is what the working conditions will be wherever I happen to be covering a game. I have covered high school football games in press boxes so cold I couldn\'t feel my fingertips when I typed, and I once stood in a downpour to cover a soccer match.

I had some fears that, with 3,000 credentialed media at this year\'s Super Bowl, we would be crawling all over each other for access to work areas, power outlets and internet access. But the NFL did a great job of providing enough space to work, including installing wireless internet service in all media areas.

For Sunday\'s game, my seat will be in the auxiliary seating area in the Ford Field stands, but the NFL is providing tables for our laptop computers, power and wireless access. Should be quite loud, but I\'m sure it won\'t be any louder than three weeks ago at the RCA Dome, where I shouted at a colleague sitting right next to me just before kickoff and he couldn\'t hear a thing. Someone with a decibel meter that day said the noise levels reached 118 decibels, almost as loud as a rock concert.

I saw Aerosmith with my wife in old Memorial Coliseum in Buffalo once, and it wasn\'t as loud as the RCA Dome.

Any questions or comments, feel free to pass them along. Talk to you tomorrow.','','1','','1139009066','','','','text','1','4','1','72.255.44.211','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('5','The snow -- and the virus -- arrive','By John Dudley

It\'s the day before the Super Bowl, and the coaches and players are in seclusion in their hotels and practice facilities. It should be a calm day, a day to finish up my advance stories for Sunday\'s paper and collect my thoughts about how to approach our coverage of the game.

But outside, a winter storm is starting to belt Detroit, and I\'m a little concerned about waking up Sunday morning to find myself snowed in at a hotel 16 miles and an hourlong shuttle ride from Ford Field. I have faith in the Detroit streets department, which has promised to have the major arteries clear by the time some 70,000 fans and media descend on the downtown area Sunday afternoon.

Inside my room, where I spent most of the day writing stories, I was dealing with a serious illness, specifically a virus that struck my laptop computer in the form of an e-mail attachment last night and had me up until 3 a.m. trying to figure out how to get the gremlins out of the machine.

After a few hours of sleep and about six hours of lost writing time, I woke up this morning and flipped on the laptop to find that I was no longer in control. Every time I opened up an Internet Explorer page, a pop-up ad would take its place. I tried to open a Microsoft Word file and the computer just stared back at me for 10 minutes without changing the screen. At 10 a.m., I gave up and hailed a cab for Best Buy, where I bought the cheapest laptop in the place to get through the next two days. Hopefully I can return it and get my computer fixed. It\'s days like these when I wish I had majored in computer science, because while I detest these creeps who develop viruses, I admire their incredible knowledge of how computers work.

If you happen to have been checking out the audio commentaries I was uploading to the Super Bowl site the first two days, you\'ll notice there isn\'t one there for today. That\'s because the software to upload the files from the digital recorder I use is installed on my stricken laptop, and I don\'t have an installation disk with me.

As for what\'s happening here today, most of the attention has been on the weather, which is cooling down, and the celebrity scene, which is heating up. While I am only a little more than two days into covering my first Super Bowl, it\'s become obvious to me that for the stars, this is really little more than a weeklong bar- and club-hop with a four-hour football game at the end.

The Detroit TV stations have been sending reporters to cover the private parties at the exclusive clubs downtown. Pretty hard-hitting stuff, as you might imagine. Tonight one of the stations had a sports reporter at the SI Swimsuit party, and he spent the night asking the models if they were married. It actually made me look forward to covering my next soccer game.

Today was the day I needed to keep up with what was going on back at home, since my two sons were wrestling in a tournament in Harbor Creek. The nine-year-old went 1-2, losing to one of his McDowell teammates in his final match. My wife said the two of them spent several minutes before the match assuring one another that they would still be friends afterward. Both of my boys are Eagles fans, but the youngest has a real weakness for the Colts since they went with my to Terre Haute, Ind., last summer when I reported a story on Bob Sanders. Neither one of them wants the Steelers to win, but my five-year-old daughter, who has watched about 2 1/2 minutes of football in her life, has a pink Steelers jersey and has been flaunting it in front of her brothers all week.

I got my work done early tonight and had a few hours to relax, so I caught \"Capote,\" which is a fantastic film. Philip Seymour Hoffman did what I would consider to be his best work, and I learned some things, and unlearned some things, about Capote, through Hoffman\'s portrayal.

Sorry for the aside, but with the all the non-sports angles making their way out of Detroit in the guise of Super Bowl stories this week, I\'m not too worried about charging into pop culture for a paragraph or two.

I\'ll try to post another update tomorrow before the game, and maybe another one late tomorrow night after I file my final deadline stories for Monday\'s paper, assuming the deadline adrenaline will still be pumping.

As usual, any questions or comments are appreciated and even encouraged.

John','','1','','1139114292','','','','text','1','1','1','72.255.20.53','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('6','A few hours before the Super Bowl','By John Dudley

Had breakfast with an old acquaintance -- John Perrotto of the Beaver County Times -- and his friend Peter Schmuck of the Baltimore Sun. One of the great things about traveling is that I didn\'t have to feel guilty ordering a piece of chocolate cake for dessert after my eggs benedict. (Unless she reads this, which is unlikely, my wife will never find out.)

From there we boarded a shuttle to Ford Field, where we arrived at around 2 p.m. I\'ve been in about a half dozen NFL stadiums -- Pittsburgh, Cleveland, Buffalo, Cincinnati, Denver and Indianapolis -- and this is by far the most unique and impressive building I\'ve seen. It\'s much larger inside than the RCA Dome, and on one end is a five-tiered bank of suites that make it look like the inside of a high-rise luxury hotel.

Unlike other indoor arenas, which can make you feel claustrophobic, the designers of this place added huge glass windows that are visible from the concourses and seating areas. The natural light adds a lot and gives you the sense you\'re in a place that\'s even bigger than it is.

Not surprsingly, I received several e-mails this morning from readers who are sick and tired of reading about the Steelers and sick and tired of seeing me pick them to win, as I did 27-17 in today\'s paper. I\'ve never quite understood why it bothers some people so much to see a team other than their own favorite team have success. And I think a lot of people fail to understand that if it were the Browns or the Bills who were playing today, our coverage would have been just as exhaustive. And had either one of those teams been on the roll the Steelers are, I undoubtedly would have picked them to win, too.

With some of the e-mails, it\'s tough to tell if the people are actually Seahawks fans (I\'ve never actually met one in Erie) or just the folks whose favorite team is anyone who\'s playing the Steelers. I suspect the latter, although I don\'t want to overlook the fact that there are Seahawks fans living in our coverage area.

I felt a sense of relief when I got to Ford Field today, as I usually do after a long buildup to a big game. As a writer, the waiting and all of the preview stories start to become tedious, and you begin to feel that you\'re writing the same stuff over and over, even though you\'re trying desperately to avoid doing just that. With the Steelers, a team I\'ve covered extensively for two years, it\'s difficult to find a fresh angle or an untld story, so I\'m relieved that I\'ll have something new to write about for Monday\'s paper.

Right now, about four hours before kickoff, there are several hundred fans already in their seats, and the overwhelming majority of them are Steelers fans. The vendors in the concourses are peddling stacks and stacks of Terrible Towels. There are so many Steelers fans here this week that I remarked to another writer on the shuttle ride over that they might not have to worry about a massive celebration in Pittsburgh tonight since the whole city seems to be here.

The first real black mark on the week for Detroit officials came early Saturday morning, when a 24-year-old woman was gunned down outside a nightclub. Her male companion was seriously injured. Police had no suspects and released few details, except to say that the murder appeared to have stemmed from a \"bumping incident\" while several patrons were waiting to go inside. Detroit officials said they hoped that what they called an \"isolated incident\" wouldn\'t taint the city\'s image this week in the national media. It strikes me as just the sort of story they had nightmares about.

That\'s it for now. I\'ll file another update after the game, probably very early Monday morning when I finish my deadline stories.

Enjoy the game,

John','','1','','1139168984','','','','text','1','4','1','208.39.171.2','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('7','The conspiracy that won\'t go away','By John Dudley

Maybe I\'m naive, but my last thought before falling asleep Sunday night in my hotel room in Detroit was that I wouldn\'t awake to vast numbers of angry, taunting, told-you-so e-mails and phone messages from Browns fans as I did after last year\'s AFC championship game.

Those folks delighted in the Steelers\' loss last season, I guess out of simple jealousy and the aggravation of opening up the paper every morning to read story after story about another Pittsburgh win, and they directed their wrath at me because they incorrectly assume I care whether the Steelers win or lose.

Clueless lad that I am, I figured the Steelers win on Sunday would quiet the masses, for a while.

Wrong.

Seahawks fans and Steelers haters alike have latched onto a bad call and a couple of close, debatable ones to decide that Super Bowl XL was clearly, undeniably fixed. That the NFL wanted Jerome Bettis to go out with a win in front of his hometown fans. That Paul Tagliabue wanted desperately to see Bill Cowher and Dan Rooney accept the franchise\'s fifth Lombardi Trophy. And they will stop at nothing to try to prove they\'re right.

The saddest of all of this is that Seattle coach Mike Holmgren lacked the class to remain above the fray, telling Seahawks fans, “We knew it was going to be tough going against the Pittsburgh Steelers. I didn’t know we were going to have to play the guys in the striped shirts as well.”

In one misguided, emotional statement, Holmgren, a good coach and by all accounts a decent man, tainted his career, the NFL\'s biggest game and the reputations of referee Bill Leavy and his crew. Holmgren should receive a six-figure fine for his statement and should be forced to apologize to the Steelers and to the league.

Holmgren would have us believe that Leavy is sitting on some tropical island right now counting wads of cash that he received for helping to fix Sunday\'s game. He\'d have us believe that Tagliague, Rooney, Cowher and the rest of the Steelers were in on it, too. That everyone knew, in fact, that it was a guaranteed Steelers win except Holmgren, who apparently missed the memo.

And so, egged on by Holmgren and, apparently, some grainy video showing Oliver Stone lurking in the shadows of Ford Field on Sunday collecting footage for his soon-to-be-released Super Bowl conspiracy docu-drama, the e-mailers and callers came back in waves this week.

And the most stunning part of it is that almost to a person, they refuse to give the Steelers credit for anything they did well on Sunday, and they refuse to assign any blame to the Seahawks for a series of horrible mistakes and blown defensive assigments that sealed the game.

I was expecting more from them. I should have known better.','','1','','1139588992','','','','text','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('8','Wrestling with a gender issue','By John Dudley

The first time I watched a girl wrestle against a boy it was mostly a curiosity to me. The girl, Erin Tomeo of Grove City, was a pretty good wrestler from a very good wrestling family, and I saw her beat a couple of boys at the District 10 Class AAA wrestling tournament.

As a former wrestler, I remember asking myself how I would have reacted to wrestling a girl, whether it would have felt strange to be in such close physical contact with a member of the opposite sex in a setting where the sole purpose of every move you make is to cause at the very least discomfort and preferably at least some pain on your opponents\' part. I don\'t think I would have handled it too well. I think I would have had some real problems resolving the issue of trying to pound on a girl after growing up in a fairly conservative household in which we were taught never to hit a girl (my sister might say my brother and I didn\'t stick to that rule very closely when we were younger).

But beyond those initial uncomfortable feelings after watching Tomeo wrestle, I really didn\'t give it much thought. There have been a handful of other girls who have wrestled in the area at the varsity level, but none were nearly as accomplished as Tomeo, and I never actually saw them compete, so the whole issue kind of faded to the recesses of my mind.

Until a few months ago, that is, when my 9-year-old son was matched up against an 11-year-old girl at a novice wrestling tournament at Iroquois High School.

It happened like many matchups do at the novice level, which is for first- and second-year wrestlers who are just learning the sport. We took the kids of similar age and weight into the hallway and started to pair them up. But there were an odd number of wrestlers at my son\'s weight, so he wound up being paired with a girl who was about the same weight but two years older just so the two of them could get a third match in that day.

My initial thought was that this wouldn\'t be a problem, since my mind said my son is a decent wrestler, and my ego said no self-respecting Dudley boy is going to go out and lose to a girl. In a moment I\'m sure to regret forever, I leaned in to my son and said, \"You\'re wrestling a girl -- go out and make her want to become a cheerleader.\"

I\'m not sure what took over at that moment and caused me to say those words, but I quickly regretted them on several levels. Obviously, deep down inside, I was coming to terms with a supressed or unrealized bias against having girls compete against boys in sports in general, and particularly in wrestling, where the contact is so physical and so sustained.

Nonetheless, he smiled back at me and gave me a thumbs up, then proceeded to go out and lose to the girl, who was clearly stronger and more physically mature.

I wasn\'t happy -- either with the outcome or with the fact that he had to wrestle a girl. He was devastated, embarrassed and on the verge of giving up the sport for good.

My wife, who usually gets about as passionate about sports as I do about the Japanese mercantile exchange, was irate. The point she kept making was that we have taught both of our boys not to impart their physical strength on girls, never to hit them, never to hurt them. She was also upset that his first physical contact with a girl came on a wrestling mat at age 9, and she worried about what effect that might have on his attitude toward girls down the road.

I was just angry that he lost, because I knew that despite her size and strength advantages, he knew more wrestling than she did and could have beaten her if he had stuck to his game plan instead of becoming infatuated with the fact that he was rolling around with a member of the opposite sex, only two thin layers of spandex separating him from her. Talk about stuff that just doesn\'t happen at recess...

Well, on Saturday, at a tournament in Franklin, he ran into another girl -- there are a lot of girls out there on youth wrestling teams these days, and it will be interesting to see how many stay with the sport as they rise to the varsity level.

This time, he stuck to his plan, beat her pretty soundly and advanced to the finals at his weight class. I was more nervous watching that match than I have been for any single athletic event I have ever competed in or watched in my life. Afterward, I felt a sense of relief, and he did, too.

I\'m not necessarily proud of my attitude toward having boys and girls meet on the wrestling mat, but it\'s an issue that\'s obviously going to continue to gnaw at me as long as my kids are involved in the sport.

My feeling is that the best thing that could happen is for enough girls to become interested in wrestling that girls-only programs can be started at at least some schools, with co-operative agreements available for girls from other schools who want to compete.

It\'s a little selfish, yes, and I\'m just old-fashioned enough to admit it.<<>><> VALUES ('9','District 10 Class AAA wrestling leftovers','By John Dudley

Some leftover notes, thoughts and observations from the District 10 Class AAA wrestling championships at McDowell.

-- McDowell\'s Kenny Hammer became a first-time regional qualifier after transferring from Cathedral Prep at midseason. Hammer reversed a pair of earlier losses -- including one in Friday\'s quarterfinals -- to Conneaut Lake freshman Matt Laird -- and beat Laird 10-6 in the consolation final at 112 pounds.

\"I was nervous going into the match,\" said Hammer, a sophomore. \"I had lost twice to him and and knew I had to do something this time. The big thing was not getting in tight with him where he could use his length and reach in. I had to stop that, and I did.\"

Hammer, who sat behind two-time district champion Joe McCullough at Prep, transferred in January and took a 6-5 record into the district tournament. He said advancing to regionals only recently became a goal, and he\'s not thinking too deeply about his chances next week in Altoona.

\"Right now I\'m still very excited,\" he said. \"I\'m pretty caught up in the moment, and not really too worried about what\'s next.\"

-- Another first-time regional qualifier, General McLane senior Kyle Goss, emerged from one of the tournament\'s toughest weight classes with a 3-1 overtime decision over Conneaut Lake\'s Kory Hubbard to take third place at 189.

Goss, a loser to two-time D-10 champ Jon Wentz of Cathedral Prep in Saturday morning\'s semifinals, bounced back with two wins, scoring the winning points against Hubbard on a takedown out of a scramble, to join a contingent of eight Lancers heading to Altoona.

\"As a team we\'ve really come together at the end of the year and we\'re having a lot of fun right now,\" Goss said. \"I\'ve known most of my teammates since I was knee high, and I\'m really looking forward to spending a little more time with them.\"

-- McCullough became a two-time champ with a dominating performance at 112, winning by pin in the quarters and technical fall in the semis and finals with an unstoppable tilt series. He pounded Titusville\'s David Pondel 15-0 to win his second title in three years.

The win put McCullough in a good spot in next week\'s regional bracket and also provided some atonement for McCullough, who was injured early in last year\'s final against Franklin\'s Bobby Steetle and lost by injury default.

McCullough said Steetle\'s foot came down on his left elbow early in that match and McCullough\'s arm went numb. Steetle went on to build a big lead before McCullough ended the match.

\"I lost feeling in my arm for a few minutes and I kind of freaked out,\" McCullough said. \"It was tough, not something I really want to remember. Coming out and winning again feels really good right now.\"

-- McDowell\'s Steve Mancuso also repeated at 103, edging Cathedral Prep freshman Rocco Wellek 12-7 with a late flurry to break open a tight match.

\"It feels just as good as the first time,\" said Mancuso, a senior who improved his record to 33-5.

Wellek (30-10) solidified his status as one of the most impressive in Class AAA this season, and with Mancuso graduating, he could become a multiple district champion.

-- At 130, General McLane\'s Brandon Saraceno reversed an earlier loss to Oil City\'s Greg Tenney with a 3-2 win to earn his first district title.

Saraceno gave up an ealy takedown but evened the match with a reversal and took the lead with a second-period escape.

Tenney chose down to start the third and Saraceno rode him out with a tough leg ride.

\"I thought I might have a chance to ride him out if I could get the boots in,\" Saraceno said. \"I was a little afraid of getting called for stalling, but I figured if it happened I felt confident that I could get a takedown if we went to our feet.\"

-- At 135, McLane\'s Donald Osinski won the rubber match against Warren\'s Alex Lauffenburger. All three have been battles.

Lauffenburger beat Osinski in their dual meet early in the season, but Osinki evened it with a win at Tool City.

The third meeting came in Saturday\'s finals, where Osinski (39-3) made a second-period reversal stand up in a 2-1 win for his second district title.

\"I had to stay focused against him,\" Osinski said. \"I knew he was going for his 100th win (in the final) and he would have some extra motivation for that reason, but I think I wrestled a pretty solid match.\"

-- Jason Ardillo won Prep\'s second title at 152 with a 4-3 decision over Strong Vincent\'s Jake Jurkiewicz.

Jurkiewicz for the first takedown, but Ardillo reversed him to tie it, then took down in the second period and used another reversal for a 4-2 lead. Jurkiewicz took down in the third and escaped, and the two finished on their feet.

Ardillo won last year at 145, and said this title was a bit tougher because he went into the tournament a marked man.

\"I\'ve felt more like people are gunning for me this season, which can be tough,\" Ardillo said. \"But it can also be good because it makes you prepare and stay sharp for every match.\"

-- Nick Roussin gave Corry its only champ at 215 with a pin against top-seeded Jordan Heberle of Conneaut Lake in the finals.

The Beavers advanced only two to the finals but used a strong showing in the consolations to send five to Altoona.

J.C. Hammond (119), Brandon Eck (145) and Dana Goodwill (160) all wrestled back for third, and Ryan Smith also advanced with a second-place finish at 171.

-- Prep\'s Jon Wentz made it two straight titles after moving up to 189 from 160 and pinning McDowell\'s Jeremy Little.

Wentz took Little down with a freight-train double near the edge of the mat, and Little reacted as if he thought he were out of bounds. But Wentz dragged him back in and held him for the pin at the 1:09 mark.

Wentz, a two-time state qualifier who was on the fence about coming out for the team when football season ended, said he\'s glad he did.

\"It was the right thing to do,\" Wentz said. \"I had a lot of things going on in my life, but this was the right decision for myself and my family, and hopefully I can finish it off right with a medal in Hershey.\"

-- Charles Wilson gave McDowell six qualifiers with a second-place finish at 275. After losing to Conneaut Lake\'s Kris Turksy earlier this season, Wilson built a lead and pinned Tursky at the 4:44 mark in Saturday morning\'s semifinals to earn his first regional berth.

Wilson, a sophomore with a 26-13 record, lost 11-2 in the final to Warren senior Kyfer Rumburd.

-- Tournament officials recognized five distinguished guests prior to Saturday\'s finals -- former state champion Bon Brabender and his late brother Bill, retired Meadville coach Dick Lumley, retired McDowell coach Ralph Clark and former PIAA champion and current state senator Bob Robbins.

The four honorees presented awards after each weight class.

Tournament director Mike Caro intends to make the presentations an annual occurence to help promote the sport and maintain a connection with its past.
','','1','','1140939312','','','','text','1','3','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('10','A site for sore eyes','By John Dudley

Almost exactly a year ago, I wrote a column satirizing the District 10 wrestling site message board. First, for the uninformed, it should be noted that the District 10 wrestling site is in no way affiliated or officially endorsed by PIAA District 10. It is in fact run by a very honest, dedicated and, thanks to my column, for a brief time last March, embattled wrestling fan and parent from the Edinboro area.

My point in writing the column -- which was brutally critical of the site\'s message board -- was my small attempt to create a shred accountability and class in a place where precious little exists, namely the internet.

At the time, the D-10 board was far from unique as a haven for anonymous insults, criticisms and accusations, some of which rose to the level of slander, many of which crossed even the most liberal boundaries of common decency and respect. The most memorable thread, which actualy appeared on the site some time before I wrote the column, involved what was presumably an unnamed teenager from one school accusing a named wrestler from another school of being gay.

To the unitiated, this might have sounded like your garden-variety lunchroom banter, and that might be the case if it weren\'t typed into a computer keyboard and beamed over the internet for anyone to read and repeat. But it wasn\'t one person delivering a zinger to another within earshot of a half dozen bystanders. It was, potentially, fodder for someone to spread a rumor to the far corners of the state. (And don\'t think for a minute that in this wrestling crazy state rumors don\'t travel at the speed of a Cael Sanderson ankle pick. They do.)

Anyhow, I became the scourge of the underground wrestling community, a big bad bully who was trying to ruin everyone\'s fun, and I was fine with that and still am. I fully expected it.

What I didn\'t expect was what I found when I visited the site again the other day. What had been a place of lively chatter rampant with a heavy dose of silliness and downright meanness has become, by and large, a forum for thoughful discussion and healthy debate. In scanning the topics, I saw little evidence of the a dregs who populated the site in its previous incarnation. I saw numerous moderators and a clear-cut system for dealing with posters who crossed the line. After a couple of warnings, they were banished for good (or at least until they could figure out how to circumvent the new secure registration system.)

Heck, I even saw a four-page thread debating a blog entry I wrote last week about my son\'s experiences wrestling girls. Good stuff, and very thought-provoking.

On the whole, the District 10 message board is now a worthy companion to what has always been an outstanding site from a conceptual standpoint, and the only reliable source of well-organized, archived dual meet and tournament results dating back several seasons.

While I never would have thought it possible a year ago, it\'s become a model for what sports message boards should be.

Congratulations on a cleanup effort that was long overdue.','','1','','1141144823','','','','text','1','3','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('11','A generally stunning start to the state tournament','By John Dudley

HERSHEY -- Usually the big surprises don\'t happen until the wrestling begins.

Not this year.

Regardless of what happens over the next three days, the most stunning news at this year\'s PIAA wrestling tournament came nearly 24 hours before the first whistle blew.

Three-time state champion Garrett Scott of Juniata Valley, who was trying to become the 10th four-timer in state history and the first in 10 years, was pulled out of the tournament on Tuesday afternoon for violating his rural central Pennsylvania charter school\'s internet conduct policy.

Cryptic as that sounds, it\'s as much of an official explanation as anyone has given for the abrupt end to Scott\'s high school career, the news of which spread quickly on Tuesday afternoon.

Mike Copper and I learned of it almost as soon as we stepped foot in the Giant Center to pick up our credentials Wednesday evening. It was the buzz of the evening, and we even wound up talking about it with a stranger at Fuddruckers later that night as we waited in line to order hamburgers.

Having a kid put himself in position to win four state titles doesn\'t happen very often. Having him thrown out of the tournament before it begins for an inexplicable disciplinary problem is unheard of.

The bigger question hanging over Scott at this point is whether Penn State, which signed him to a full scholarship during the early recruiting period, will now pull his ride, effectively making him a free agent, an a tarnished one at that.

Scott\'s absence made a footnote of the week\'s other disciplinary development, the forced withdrawal of Grove City 119-pounder Robbie Miller on Tuesday afternoon for an undisclosed incident at last weekend\'s regional tournament.

Miller was replaced by Greenville senior Paul Hallowell, who earned a new lease on his final season after losing in the regional consolation finals in overtime for the second straight year. Hallowell went 1-1 Thursday and needs one more win for a medal.

The site of the day, as far as I\'m concerned, was Brookville junior 275-pounder Eli Morres, whom I hadn\'t seen until Thursday, stretching out his first round opponent and pinning him with one arm.

Morres is the sort of manchild I haven\'t seen at the PIAA tournament since Jon Trenge and John Sauve were banging foreheads in Hershey every March.

','','1','','1141940034','','','','text','1','3','1','64.9.50.197','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('12','Breaking in a newbie, and other observations','By John Dudley

HERSHEY -- Disjointed thoughts from the state wrestling tournament...

It\'s been interesting watching my colleague Mike Copper experience his first state wrestling tournament. In some ways it takes me back to my own first experiences in Hershey.

I was never good enough to get there as a wrestler. I never made it out of the District 10 tournament in high school. But at the end of my senior year I went down to watch with assistant coach Tim Krysiak and one of my teammates, Billy Boylan.

I felt a connection to the tournament that year, since I had contributed three wins to the record of a certain sophomore 185-pounder, Rod Martin of Lakeview. Martin would later become Rodney Martin-Wright and finally Rodney Wright, with the commom denominator that he won a state title by each of those names, or three in all. Somehow, having wrestled him and lost three times that season, I felt I had a small stake in his championship.

The first two times we met I hung with him for a while and lost major decisons each time. The third time he cradled me up and pinned me, and there\'s a story behind that.

It involves a certain chemistriy teacher of mine at Cambridge Springs High School, Donald \"Lindy\" Lindenmoyer, who knew little or nothing about wrestling but was Dan Gable when it came to torching the egos of high school athletes.

Lindy, who was always 10 years ahead of his time when it came to computer technology, crated \"Wanted\" posters -- and computer-generated homemade signs were still something of a novelty in the mid 1980s -- and hung them in the girls locker room, where Martin and his Lakeview teammates would be dressing for that night\'s match against us.

The signs read, \"John Dudley wants YOU Rod Martin,\" and while I never found out for sure if he read them, Martin certainly came out with more than the usual energy that night. Twenty years later, I still haven\'t settled the score with Lindy, but I haven\'t forgotten.

-- That year\'s tournament was at the old Hersheypark Arena, and to get a real feel for Pennsylvania high school wrestling you really had to watch the state finals in that barn. The lighting was yellow, the seats appeared to be designed to fit people with butts shaped like wooden crates, and the balconies were so steep that, years later, when I took my wife there for the first time, she was afraid we might fall forward from the upper deck and land on the arena floor.

I still remember covering state tournaments there and going in search of a phone line to send in my story from my laptop, only to find most of the phone jacks dangling from the walls, the wires twisted and usually broken or disconnected, like Christmas ornaments hanging from the tree.

-- The Giant Center is to the the old arena as the new shopping center is to the old corner store. It is bright, clean and generally lacking in any of the charm that made Hersheypark so unique.

But the tournament itself retains the same ability to at once overwhelm and fascinate those who witness it for the first time, and, as I mentioned, it\'s been fun to watch Copper experience it this week.

I think the first thing that strikes you is the way the tournament moves along, on six mats, with the wins and losses coming fast and furious, with one wrestler you\'re watching scoring a victory that secures a state medal and coming off the mat in a delirious state, while next to him another wrestler you\'re watching has just absorbed a heartbreaking loss that ends his season and maybe his career.

I can think of no other place where such joy and heartache is played out side-by-side, over and over, dozens of times in one day -- as it is on the Friday of the state wrestling tournament, when the place winners in both Class AA and AAA are separated from those who will go home from the place they\'ve dreamed about since childhood emptyhanded. I suppose the Olympics produce a similar sort of drama, but I\'ve never attended a Games or covered one.','','1','','1142007725','','','','text','1','3','1','64.9.50.197','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('13','A real renaissance man in Chocolatetown','By John Dudley

HERSHEY -- Multitasking has never really been my strength, which is why my wife always stands in amazement whenever I am capable of something as simple as folding laundry and watching television at the same time. (Actually, she stands in amazement whenever I just fold laundry.)

But today has tested my limited powers of concentration beyond the norm.

I am working in Hershey, tracking the progress of local high school wrestlers in search of state medals, while five hours away in North East my sons are competing in their own little wrestling postseason.

Austin, 9, and Logan, 7, wrestle for McDowell\'s kids program, and this weekend is their sub-area tournament, the qualifier for next week\'s area tournament, which leads to the state tournament later this month. I worked it out in advance with my wife to record every match on the camcorder and call me after every match with an update. Naturally, the first call came after Logan had already wrestled three times.

A little while later, Austin called to tell me he had won and would wrestle in the finals, meaning he would advance to next week\'s area tournament. Then, apparently, my wife\'s cell phone went dead, leaving me result-less in Hershey.

It\'s probably for the better, since the only thing more stressful than watching my sons wrestle is not being able to watch them and having to rely on someone else to relay the results. This has now happened two or three times since they started wrestling, and each time it\'s taken its toll.

My wife never was much of a sports fan, and even back in high school when she would travel to watch me wrestle she never developed anything more than a very crude working knowledge of rules and scoring.

Thus, when I get an update from her on how my kids are doing, it usually goes something like this: \"Logan won. I think the score was 15-1, or something. He\'s bugging me for popcorn. Megan is sleeping in my lap. I\'m not doing this alone next year.\"

Great, that\'s exactly the sort of detail I was looking for.

-- Yesterday\'s weather in the midstate made me wonder, yet again, why my ancestors settled in Erie. It was 68 degrees and sunny with light winds yesterday afternoon. When I called home to check in, my wife said it was 45 and rainy with nasty gales. Yes, that\'s the Erie I love.','','1','','1142101758','','','','text','1','3','1','64.9.50.197','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('14','Moulds would be a good fit in Pittsburgh','By John Dudley

I\'ve been thinking ever since it became clear that Eric Moulds wouldn\'t return to the Bills that this guy could be a great fit in Pittsburgh. A veteran receiver who can still get open and, despite what happened in the disfunctional atmosphere that pervaded Buffalo the past two years, a great guy in the locker room.

The Steelers clearly need a solid wideout now that Antwaan Randle El is gone, and I\'m convinced they would be better off signing a veteran like Moulds to be the No. 2, allowing Cedrick Wilson to move into the No. 3 spot, where he could line up in the slot or move around to expose deep coverage gaps.

I\'m willing to bet that Moulds would be willing to play for a cut rate for the chance to join a Super Bowl contender with a history of treating its veteran players well. But the Steelers might want to close this deal soon, because my hunch is that the Philadelphia Eagles envision Moulds in the same sort of role and have even more cap room than the Steelers.','','1','','1142480723','','','','text','1','4','1','68.109.243.189','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('15','Big free-agent rush for the Browns','By John Dudley

I\'ll be among the first to credit the Browns for massively upgrading their roster over the first four days of free agency, which, by the way, will go down as one of the most amazing stretches of roster-jockeying in NFL history.

Fifty players have changed teams since Saturday compared with 25 last year, prompting agent Leigh Steinberg to make the following breathless statement in USA Today:

\"It\'s like the Oklahoma land rush. At the beginning, there were teams that had cap room and defined game plans who moved with lightning speed to get their priority targets, and thus we\'ve seen this spate of signings in the first few days.\"

No team did more than the Browns, who signed six players, including four -- center LeCharles Bentley, wide receiver Joe Jurevicius, nose tackle Ted Washington and linebacker Willie McGinest -- who are significantly better than the players they will replace. They\'re also guys who fit the Romeo Crennel-Bill Belechick mold and will give the new leadership team of Crennel and general manager Phil Savage the chance to really put their stamp on the team.

When you think about the free agent additions and the return of tight end Kellen Winslow and wide receiver Braylon Edwards, it\'s not that much of a stretch to envision a Browns team that can contend for a wild card spot this year, assuming Reuben Droughns and the offensive line can pick up where they left off and quarterback Charlie Frye makes a leap in his second year.

Regardless, this is already the Browns\' most productive offseason since returning to the league, and the draft is still a month away.

Or, as Steinberg put it:

\"With blitzkrieg speed, Washington and Cleveland have dramatically advanced their roster while other wagons never got off the line.\"

Yeah, what he said.','','1','','1142515419','','','','text','1','4','1','68.109.243.189','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('16','Oklahoma throws down the gauntlet','

By John Dudley

Here in Oklahoma, site of this week\'s Division I wrestling tournament, a Daily Oklahoman columnist wrote about the debate over wrestling superiority between this state and Iowa. She points out that while Iowa has Dan Gable, Oklahoma has John Smith and his three straight national titles, looking for a fourth.

I say let them fight it out, because, as I wrote a couple of weeks ago, we Pennsylvanians know which state produces the most college prospects who go on to feed the top college programs in the country. My feeling going into this year\'s national tournament is that we\'ll see one of the more wide open team races in recent years, with no chance of an Oklahoma State runaway as we\'ve seen recently. Minnesota is back among the elite, Michigan is game, Iowa State has at least two national title contenders, and teams like Cornell have enough firepower to affect the team race, even if they can\'t win it.

I also think we\'ll see a lot of No. 1 seeds go down, mainly because I think there\'s more parity right now among the top wrestlers in the country than there has been in recent years. There\'s certainly no Cael Sanderson in the field, and a glance at the top seeds reveals little invulnerability.

By John Dudley

I\'m not sure how to react to Team USA\'s elimination from the World Baseball Classic at the hands of Mexico.

On the one hand, I think the Mexican team deserves a great deal of credit for beating a team of outrageously paid American superstars. It\'s been obvious from the start of the WBC, and it\'s obvious at every Olympics, that amateur, and even pro athletes from other countries have a far greater sense of patriotism than our pros when it comes to competing for their countries. American players are rich, happy and accustomed to playing for the well-being of themselves and their families, and it\'s refreshing to see players from other countries compete for reasons that go beyond that.

On the other hand, I think it\'s sort of a hollow victory for Mexico, for many of the same reasons. I honestly believe that if the U.S. filled its roster with college players, the team would compete harder and be a better representation of our national lineup than the pros who were on this team\'s roster. Not to mention the fact that a team of young, unproven college players would have much better chemistry than the team that was cobbled together after all the defections and questionable injuries were sorted out.

By John Dudley

Can you think of a more fitting threesome than Terrell Owens, Bill Parcells and Jerry Jones? Do these guys all deserve each other or what?

With the news that Owens has signed with the Cowboys, we now know that ESPN will hold two T.O. weeks before each Cowboys-Eagles game, in which we\'ll hear T.O. rant about how shabbily he was treated in Philly and how wonderful things are in Dallas.

The love-fest between Owens and rickety Cowboys quarterback Drew Bledsoe will be played out in a dramatic, breathless segment narrated by Suzie Kolber and played in an endless loop on ESPN\'s 13 networks. We\'ll hear Jones gush about what a good soldier Owens has been and how he only needed to find the right situation.

And then, when the Cowboys miss the playoffs and Bledsoe can\'t avoid the rush long enough to get T.O. the ball, and T.O. throws one of his epic tantrums at Valley Ranch, Parcells will wish he would have walked away from the money and bought another bass boat so he could spend his Sundays with someone rational, like Bobby Knight.

This will go down as one of the great two-sport runs in Erie County history, even though General McLane came up just short of Hershey for the second time in four months on Tuesday in the PIAA Class AAA basketball semifinals.

Tuesday\'s loss to Franklin showed just how hard it is to beat a great team three times in one season.

The best news for General McLane is that many of the principle parts of this year\'s football and basketball teams -- both of which reached the state semifinals -- will return.

Let\'s also not forget that this was one of those unusual years in which simply making out of an absolutely loaded District 10 AAA tournament that included four of the best teams in the state was a major accomplishment.

-- This is a belated take on the PIAA\'s re-examination of the athletic transfer rule, but once again I think the state\'s governing body for high schools is missing the point.

If no one steps in to stop a promising band member or mathematics whiz from transferring to a school that better suits his or her needs or offers a better opportunity at earning a college scholarship, then why should the PIAA step in and stop an athlete from trying to do the same?

I\'ve often said that someday someone is going to file a lawsuit on the grounds that the PIAA is interfering with an athletes\' right to seek the best path to a scholarship and seek to recover damages on those grounds.

While I applaud the PIAA for its efforts to prevent rampant transfers for purely athletic intent, I would remind everyone that such transfers are seldom overturned.

-- I always enjoy dispelling readers\' preconceived notions about my pro sports loyalties, and today was another one of those opportunities.

My wife and I went to the airport to pick up my parents only to find out that their flight from Philadelphia was delayed. We ducked into the airport restaurant for a bowl of soup, where I was recognized by a waiter who told me he had left me a voice message awhile back ripping me for being another overbearing, obnoxious Steelers fan.

I remembered it and reminded him that his message wasn\'t very nice. He laughed and said it was all harmless fun, and he blanched when I told him I grew up rooting for the Eagles.

We had a good laugh about Butch Davis -- naturally he\'s a long suffering Browns fan -- and promised to keep in touch.

Another convert won over. I\'m starting to feel like I\'m on a Mormon mission.','','1','','1143079084','','','','text','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('20','Youth wrestling feedback, and more','By John Dudley

I got lots of feedback for the Friday column I wrote about angry confrontations at youth sporting events, especially in youth wrestling. One caller became defensive and tried to argue that it wasn\'t just Team Erie parents who were at fault. What\'s interesting is that I never mentioned a particular school or team in my column. I\'ve seen enough displays of poor adult behavior to know that it\'s not all coming from one group or even a handful of groups. There are really bad examples of sportsmanship among adults nearly everywhere you turn. So rest easy, Team Erie, it wasn\'t directed at you.

-- Another e-mailer last week called me out for going too easy on Otters coach Dave MacQueen in Wednesday\'s column, instead blaming MacQueen for refusing to take responsibility for the Otters\' poor play. Fair enough, but I would counter that MacQueen didn\'t have the right mix of players to win this year or last year, and some of the blame has to fall on management\'s shoulders for failing to recognize and bring in the types of players who can flourish under a tough, no-nonsense coach.

-- So much for the relatively widespread fear -- made popular a couple of years ago -- that big high schools in the west would never win another boys basketball title with the integration of the Philadelphia Public League into the PIAA. Franklin whipped the PPL\'s first state finalist, Communications Technology, to win the Class AAA title on Friday night, reminding all of us, once again, that high school kids are high school kids, whether they come from the big city or from sleepy towns on the edge of national forests.','','1','','1143345600','','','','text','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('21','A bear of a wrestling opponent','

By John Dudley

Lance Palmer, a four-time Ohio state wrestling champion from St. Edward in Cleveland, has been making national headlines over the past few days after revealing that he trains by wrestling with a 650-pound black bear named Ceaser.

Palmer, whose career record is 150-6, won the 140-pound title on Sunday at the 17th Annual High School Senior Nationals Wrestling Tournament at the University of Pittsburgh\'s Petersen Events Center. He beat Byron Kuylen (156-17), a three-time Montana champion from Sidney High School, 9-6.

Palmer\'s father is an animal trainer, and he has augmented his usual wrestling training by grappling with Ceasar, creating an outcry among animal-rights groups. He plans to wrestle at Ohio State.

If his name sounds familiar, it might be because Palmer\'s first loss this season came against Reynolds\' Matt Dunn in the finals of the Ironman Tournament.

As for the bear wrestling, Palmer insists that he never hurts Ceasar, but that hasn\'t stopped Norfolk, Va.-based People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals from lobbying hard to stop it. Ohio is one of 30 states where bear wrestling isn\'t banned.

By John Dudley

Just as Terrell Owens, Chad Johnson and Steve Smith are elevating post-touchdown celebrations to off-Broadway levels, the NFL has once again cracked down on the type and duration of theatrics players may engage in after crossing the goal line. This is an ongoing issue for the league, but it\'s back on the agenda at this week\'s annual meeting in Orlando because competition committee chairmen Jeff Fisher, coach of the Tennessee Titans, and Rich McKay, general manger of the Atlanta Falcons, believe enforcement hasn\'t been strict enough recently.

If you long for the days when Barry Sanders set the standard for the understated celebration by simply flipping the ball to the referee after he scored -- he had, after all, been in the end zone a few times before -- then you\'ll appreciate the fact that the league wants to penalize offenders\' teams 15 yards on the ensuing kickoff.

Such penalties always seem to get the attention of coaches, who you can bet will be particularly vigilant about enforcing the celebration ban if they face unsportsmanlike calls. Naturally, the league will provide for some, uh, wiggle room, allowing that dances are permitted as long as they aren\'t too lengthy or involving too many teammates. (And that\'s just what we need -- NFL officials with more latitude on judgment calls.)

One curious portion of the proposal calls for players to come to their feet before beginning a celebration. Those who begin gyrating or dancing while still on the ground will be penalized.

So much, then, for the celebration I\'d truly like to see -- T.O. writhing on the turf beneath a stampede of greased-up agents.

Remember three years ago when we sat around wondering whether Mark Shapiro was really building a contender or simply paring the Indians\' payroll to make the team profitable again?

Turns out Shapiro was smarter than a lot of us tought, and he proved it again today when he locked up centerfielder Grady Sizemore with a $23.45 million, six-year contract.

At this point, Sizemore is as can\'t miss as young players come. He went .289-22-81 with 22 steals in his first year as a starter at the top of a lineup that spent a good chunk of the season finding its way. He is being projected as a potential 30-30 guy this season and already is the best all-around centerfielder in the American League, and perhaps in the majors.

Even better, Sizemore is what scouts call a makeup guy. I recall talking to a scout at Jerry Uht Park several years ago, when Sizemore was in the Eastern League, who said he believed Sizemore had more upside than anyone he had seen in at least five years.

That encompassed some pretty heady prospects, including Philadelphia\'s Chase Utley, Florida\'s Adrian Gonzalez, Pittsburgh\'s J.R. House, Toronto\'s Alexis Rios and the Indians\' own Victor Martinez.

It\'s now obvious that he was right. And that Shapiro was, too.

-- So, baseball will finally investigate Barry Bonds and other suspected steroids users.

And former Senate majority leader George Mitchell will head up the probe.

Two observations:

1. This is long overdue and should have happened in 1998 when it was first revealed that Mark McGwire was taking andro.

2. If Mitchell uncovers evidence of steroids use by Bonds or any other player whose performance affects baseball\'s record book, their names and statistics should be removed for good.

Enough dancing around the issue of whether or not performance-enhancing drugs were banned by baseball when many of the current records were set. If baseball is truly serious about cleaning up its image, it will come down as hard as it can on players like Bonds who have flouted the rules and dared anyone and everyone to call them on it for years.

-- John Dudley','','1','','1143679638','','','','html','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('24','Sabathia might need to tweak his routine','I\'m no athletic trainer, but there\'s something amiss when your 290-pound ace suffers an abdominal strain two years in a row at the beginning of the season.

That\'s the case -- again -- with Indians starter C.C. Sabathia, who couldn\'t make it out of the third inning of Sunday\'s season-opening 10-4 loss to the Chicago White Sox after feeling a twinge in his side while delivering a pitch.

Last season Sabathia missed all of spring training and didn\'t make his first start until April 22. While his absence obviously wasn\'t solely responsible for the Indians\' 9-14 record last April, it certainly didn\'t help.

If I\'m the Indians, I\'m taking a hard look at Sabathia\'s offseason workout program and at his conditioning level when he arrives at spring training. I\'m not going to knock the guy for being heavy. There are plenty of big pitchers and big hitters who don\'t have chronic abdominal strains.

Instead, maybe there\'s something Sabathia\'s not doing to improve his core body strength, which should help reduce the strain on his abdominal muscles.

The Indians aren\'t the surprising underdogs anymore. They\'re on the short list of teams expected to be in the mix not only for a Wild Card berth but to challenge the White Sox for the AL Central title.

Their time is now, but they\'re not going to be a pennant contender or a playoff team with their ace icing down his belly.

-- John Dudley','','1','','1144121771','','','','text','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('25','We need more like the Round Mound','Charles Barkley is going into the Pro Basketball Hall of Fame as part of a great induction class that also includes Geno Auriemma, Joe Dumars and Dominique Wilkins.

Auriemma is a splendid coach, Dumars was the consummate pro and Wilkins was one of the greatest, most athletic players of any generation.

But it\'s Barkley that stands out in this group for me.

He\'s everything that\'s missing in today\'s NBA, the underdog who silenced everyone who doubted his ability by averaging 22 points and 12 rebounds over a 16-year career and, just as notably, injected unmistakable personality into a league that was once a riot to watch.

For all his faults and a paunch that earned him the nickname \"Round Mound of Rebound,\" Barkley will always stand out.

He always competed, which is a major reason he played on the best U.S. Olympic basketball team ever and won the gold medal in Barcelona in 1992.

And he never pulled punches. There are players in the NBA today who are as brutally honest as Barkley, but none who combine candor with Barkley\'s charm and wit.

There will never be another Barkley, and the NBA has never been quite the same since he left.

-- John Dudley

','','1','','1144122397','','','','text','1','1','1','69.163.30.153','1','1','0','1','1');
*****************************('26','Bush story represents big news break for Yahoo','

The story about the house Reggie Bush\'s family has been leasing is unusual in that it was broken by a reporter from Yahoo.com. Charles Robinson, a former NFL reporter for newspapers in Michigan and Florida, is no stranger to pro football circles, so it\'s not surprising he had the sources and reporting skills to nail down one of the biggest pre-draft stories in recent memory. But such stories typically have been broken by large newspapers or, more recently, web sites like ESPN.com.

Since Yahoo got into the online sports information business in a serious way with a series of high-profile hires, including former MLB all-star Tony Gwynn as baseball analyst and former Los Angeles Times deputy sports editor Dave Morgan as executive sports editor, this is by far its most high profile news break.

Why should readers care?

Because it\'s further evidence that breaking sports news, once solely the domain of television and newspapers, is moving steadily to the internet, something that was the topic of much discussion at a newspaper sports seminar I attended two weeks ago at the Poynter Institute, a think tank for journalists in St. Petersburg, Fla.

-- By John Dudley

Vick did sign as a rookie free agent with the Miami Dolphins, but there are two main reasons he was skipped over in the draft.

First, he\'s had a series of run-ins with law enforcement and with school officials, the last of which got him kicked out of Virginia Tech.

Second, he\'s not nearly the talent his brother Michael is. While Michael has carved out a nice living as the Falcons\' scramble-first starting quarterback -- they say they might feature more of a passing game next season -- Marcus is viewed as an \"athlete\" who could wind up playing receiver, returner or special teams in the NFL.

Another reader, Gary Rogers, wrote about the Mount Rushmore of U.S. athletes, which ESPN\'s Mike and Mike in the Morning chose last week and which I wrote about Monday to point out the absence of a football player.

Rogers correctly pointed out that Vince Lombardi was the sort of iconic figure that the Mount Rushmore faces -- Babe Ruth, Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan and Wayne Greztky -- represented. I thought of Lombardi, too. But the premise was athletes, not coaches, which is why Lombardi doesn\'t count, at least according to Mike and Mike\'s rules