But Tom G., if someone stuck a "35 mph" sign on the interstate, where the speed limit should be 70 and people are driving 70, 35 wouldn't magically become unsafe.

And Susan, would it be possible to express your opinions here without resorting to schoolyard name-calling? Your vehement disagreement with me or anyone else is welcome. Calling people dickhead and whatnot, I mean, come on please.

Billy Pilgrim, thanks for the catch. Fixed that Bills-Jets mixup.

sweet 16: Hey, could you do me a favor and respond to this post and work in something about the Falcons missing another field goal? My husband would love it.

The Falcons just read your post and responded by missing a field goal.

Anything for your husband, Sweet 16. I suspect the man is a saint.

Oh, I get it--you're King and you created this identity, "imac," to insult me (I tagged your post and got your IP address, it's K. Kaufman alright). Well, Mr. Kaufman, or should I say "imac?"

Do you really believe you did that? I mean, in your world, did that happen? Why would I need to create an identity to insult you? I'm happy to stand right here as me and insult you.

Stop the subterfuge and respond like someone who is not a second rate hack.

I can't respond like anything else, but there's no subterfuge. Have you tried decaf? 12-step?

Look King, we can all see through your dodge--posting under some bizarre handle in attempt to evade your detractors.

Boo! It used to be possible to see through my Dodge, when I washed the windows. But I sold it and bought a Nissan. Actually, that's not true. I gave it to Goodwill. No kidding.

Actually, "Sweet 16," I'm just playing along. I tagged your post and got your IP address. You should be ashamed of yourself, Joan Walsh. Or should I say, "Sweet 16"?

Saints Fan: and the saints are better than you think. look into it.

Actually, I'm not sure the Saints are better than I think. I think you don't know that I think the Saints are better than you think I think they are.

Whoa, headache.

No, I don't think the Saints are that bad. They got a lot better the day they fired Jim Haslett, and they also got better when they gave Aaron Brooks to the Goodwill and bought a Drew Brees. I don't think they'll win the division or anything but 8-8 isn't out of the question. If I had to guess I'd say 6-10 though.

Sweet 16, still there? Hey, last year at this time I was leading the pool. Was I really smart then? Say hi to the hubby. And anyone else you run into when you're tagging posts and getting IP addresses. The Tooth Fairy, Napoleon, whoever.

JustAGuy, there are certain trade secrets that must be protected.

Trying to research this, and I have to interrupt myself for a while, but I'm reasonably sure that's not true. I think it was a regular field-goal attempt.

Here's a picture of it and a story about Dempsey in the San Diego Union-Tribune in 2004

http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20041105/news_1s5dempsey.html.

There's no mention of it being a fair-catch kick, and the photo seems to show both the blocker and the defender in what appears to be standard field-goal-play action. If it were a fair-catch kick, it would look like a kickoff, only with a holder. The blocker would be even with Dempsey and the defender 10 yards away when he made contact.

And also, though it's been some double-digit number of years since I've seen the clip, I'm pretty sure I remember it as a regular field-goal attempt.

Why not just hike the ball, wait a few seconds, and then have the QB slide? Game over.

Because five seconds is an ETERNITY!

You're going to trust that your QB can run around for five seconds -- really, during tonight's game, count 5 seconds from the snap on a running play -- without getting tackled, and that when he does get tackled, and up until then, he doesn't fumble? This is a play that's never practiced. As opposed to a routine play on which there's maybe one or two mishaps in a season, a punt. If there were one or two second left, sure, hike the ball, run a few steps backward and flop to the ground, but five seconds, boy, that's really a long time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rdv2TJyGzKE

This one's a little longer and I think slightly clearer.

Folks, Steve Schaak is right. I undercounted Rodman's total rebounds.

Fixing now, and there will be a formal correction notice.

What happened was I read from the wrong column and used defensive rebound figures for total rebounds in one place, early on the second page. So those totals were too low for Rodman.

The fixed section starts with the third paragraph on Page 2 (""First of all, some of Rodman's rebounds were going to happen anyway ...") and continues through the line

"Or, as we'll see, about one point less than he cost his team with his lack of scoring."

There's some re-written stuff and some new information about Rodman's teammates in that section. I don't think the mistake I made changes the basic argument.

A formal notice on the Corrections page is in the works.

I apologize for the error.