Will any other dunk during the 2012-13 college basketball season eclipse this insane moment of instinct, confidence, and sheer ballsiness? The correct response, almost assuredly, is "no." And by the eighth or ninth time you watch this, check out the Fresno State players' heads turn in every conceivable direction as Franklin throws the ball up. That's what splits the defense and allows him to fly through the lane and cap off the play. As skillful as this slam was, it was also tactically brilliant.

MLB and T-Mobile just announced a new deal here at CES that'll (maybe? hopefully?) cut down on embarrassing miscommunications between the bench and the pen. Starting next season, clubs will have the option of using dedicated, in-dugout cell phones to help get their relievers up and warming. Although, the best news for fans is that MLB will work with the carrier to improve (often unreliable or borderline non-existent) wireless internet coverage in stadiums. The dugout system will also operate on its own cell tower, so as not to be affected by fan usage during games.

MLB has also provided a sample screenshot of what the actual system will look like, once it's introduced during the World Baseball Classic in March. (The giant button-as-baseball? Subtle.) As for the old hardwired phones, those won't really be going away:

The phone system will use T-Mobile's 4G network and a Samsung Galaxy 3, a standard phone that is available to consumers. However, the dugout phones will remain in place in case teams prefer to use them.

Top photo via Eric Fisher of SportsBusinessJournal

The Consumer Electronics Show, held in Vegas every year during the second-ish week in January, is an odd duck. Everyone is desperate to talk to you and show you things and shake your hand and trample you on the show floor and so forth. But (and this is my third time being here) there's often little that truly grabs your attention. So, naturally, when I noticed a eight-drone swarm flying in synchronized formation to the tunes of Frank Sinatra, dialogue from Back to the Future, and other disparate sources, I couldn't help but notice.

If you want one of your own, these AR.Drone 2.0s from Parrot cost a hair under $300 each and each has an onboard HD camera that will, while airborne, record two hours of video, which also gets simultaneously streamed to your phone. But be warned, it looks like they go down hard with a little tap, like the unfortunate pair at the end. (Let's remember this obvious weakness when Skynet finally makes its move.)

After yet another season of missing the playoffs, it's been no secret that Jerry Jones was probably going to make some big changes to the coaching staff, but the first axe has apparently fallen on the neck of defensive coordinator Rob Ryan, who seems to be taking it all in stride.

Now, would/could/should the the Jets dare hire another Ryan brother? Dennis Thurman is expected to replace outgoing DC Mike Pettine, but dare to dream, I say.

News surfaced last week that Lance Armstrong was sorta kinda getting itchy to come clean on certain PED-related matters, and now it seems that Oprah Winfrey will get the next crack at letting the ex-seven-time Tour de France winner admit, well, anything he might feel compelled to admit. And on the off-chance you don't get OWN, or have no earthly clue where it may be in your cable lineup, the show airing will be live-streamed at Oprah.com.

Here's the press release from the network:

Los Angeles, CA – Oprah Winfrey will speak exclusively with Lance Armstrong in his first no-holds-barred interview. Armstrong will address the alleged doping scandal, years of accusations of cheating, and charges of lying about the use of performance-enhancing drugs throughout his storied cycling career.

The special 90-minute Thursday night episode of Oprah's Next Chapter will air Thursday, January 17(9:00 – 10:30 p.m. ET/PT) on OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network. In addition-the interview will be simultaneously streamed LIVE worldwide on Oprah.com.

In the interview, Winfrey speaks with Armstrong at his home in Austin, Texas in the only interview since the seven-time Tour de France winner was stripped of his titles and dropped from millions of dollars in endorsement deals after the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency released an extensive report accusing the renown cyclist of doping throughout his career. Armstrong was given a lifetime ban on competing professionally. Late last year, Armstrong resigned as chairman of the foundation he created, Livestrong, which has raised hundreds of millions of dollars in the fight against cancer.

Any chance we'll get some all-out admission of bad deeds done? Yeah, not really counting on it.

Looks like Bill O'Brien isn't going anywhere after all. Mere minutes after Sports Illustrated's Pete Thamel dropped a nice little scoop that school officials would be putting forth an extra push to keep O'Brien at the school (and that he was strongly considering doing so), CBS Sports' Jason La Canfora (who kind of started this whole ruckus anyway) dropped this bombshell just a few minutes ago:

To be sure, O'Brien is undoubtedly leaving millions on the table by spurning the NFL's overtures, but he is obviously beloved by the Penn State community for how he's helped keep the program moving through tough times. Regardless, the rebuilding and healing continues in Happy Valley, and the fans and players now know who'll be at the helm for another such season.

UPDATE: In an interview with PennLive's David Jones, O'Brien has confirmed that he's staying.

In an exclusive conversation with me, the second-year head coach confirmed that he was contacted and entertained overtures from multiple NFL clubs through his agent Joe Linta. But he has decided to remain at PSU for at least the 2013 season.

"I'm not a one-and-done guy," said O'Brien. "I made a commitment to these players at Penn State and that's what I am going to do. I'm not gonna cut and run after one year, that's for sure."

Even with Oregon's offense out on the field tonight in Glendale, it sounds like there's been nonstop excitement in the stands as well. Arizona NewsNet has just passed along word that the women's restroom in one part of the stadium had to be evacuated for a medical emergency:

Fiesta Bowl: Section 404 women's restroom evacuated due to intoxicated male passed out on the floor. Police officers might have saved his life. Male was aspirating on vomit, was rolled on his side to open airway.

And it also appears that the fans are being ejected in droves, driving some to assault and 911 calls of desperation.

If Oregon fans stay true to form, we pretty much know how this is going to play out.

First of all, it makes no sense because Bowser doesn't come anywhere near World 1-1, and Mario could never carry any cool stuff on his back, like, say, an NBA championship trophy. But that's fine, Dallas Mavericks CGI worker bees. You have fun with your green screen and rampant video game-revisionist tendencies. (Mostly, though, we're bitter that the obvious Stern-as-Bowser mashup didn't truly come to pass. Wasted opportunity there, no doubt.)

If you're looking for a legendary coach amid today's high school football landscape, it's hard to top Bob Ladouceur's credentials. But after 399 wins over 34 seasons at De La Salle High School in the Bay Area and throughout a tenure that has produced more than a few NFL players (read: Amani Toomer and Maurice Jones-Drew) as well as an all-time, 151-game winning streak, it looks like Ladouceur is ready to call it quits at a press conference scheduled for tomorrow.

Here's Stephanie Hammon of The Contra Costa Times with more:

The school offered no details about the 3 p.m. news conference except to say it would "provide information about the future direction of its football program."

Ladouceur said he wasn't able to comment on what the press conference will address. "I have people I still need to talk to," he said.

[...]

During De La Salle's run to a fourth consecutive Open Division state championship last month, Ladouceur publicly acknowledged that he was considering stepping down after the 2012 or 2013 seasons. When De La Salle beat Centennial-Corona 48-28 on Dec. 15 to cap a 15-0 season, he told reporters he would decide after the holidays whether to return for another year.

He also hinted that even if he retires as head coach, he'd likely be staying with the program in some coaching capacity.

For years, it's been widely speculated that offensive line coach Justin Alumbaugh will be Ladouceur's successor. Alumbaugh, a 1998 graduate of De La Salle, was a senior linebacker and tight end when the Spartans broke the previous national record of 72 straight wins.

He began coaching at De La Salle while still a college student at UCLA and has run the Spartans' off-season conditioning program for several years.

Even if Ladouceur's future involvement with the program is minimal, it's clear we still haven't heard the last of his name, by any stretch:

A movie on Ladouceur and the De La Salle football program starring Jim Caviezel is currently in the works. The film is based on a book by former Contra Costa Times columnist Neil Hayes — "When the Game Stands Tall" — that chronicled the 2002 season.

[...]

The Spartans have won 26 straight games and a number of impact players will return from a squad that finished the year ranked No. 1 in the nation by ESPN and No. 4 by USA Today.

De La Salle, Bob Ladouceur to address "future direction" of football program Friday [Contra Costa Times]

Holy freakin' diamonds, Batman. Phil Jackson, who obviously knows a thing or 11 about acquiring rings, should never, ever be questioned in this department. Still, when it comes to the Lakers and larger-than-your-head rings, it's awful tough to beat the champ.

[@JeanieBuss]

The Andrew Luck-led Indianapolis Colts, by some unexplainable circumstance, pulled off an 11-5 record this season and secured a wild-card playoff game against the Baltimore Ravens this Sunday. Colts owner Jim Irsay? Oh, he's ready to party, as you can see for yourself. (Of course, Irsay's self-portrait was so nice, he tweeted it twice.)

Before fantasy football, before Madden NFL, before even Tecmo Bowl, there was Electric Football, the wonderfully aggravating tabletop game that sent players scurrying aimlessly (so it seemed) about a miniature metal field. Powered by a small motor—and subject only to the whims of metallic vibration—this pastime was an idea hatched by one Norman Sas, whose family had acquired a company that used the technology to make small-scale horse racing and car games. Even if you've never played the game itself, if you know that buzzzzz, you know Electric Football.

Sas died in June, his game having become something of a cult object to children of the '80s. He was 87. In a 1980 issue of Sports Illustrated, Jack McCallum described the basics (and, by extension, the allure) of Electric Football:

You lined up your men so that your back had plenty of "blocking," slipped the ball (a tiny piece of felt) under the runner's arm and turned the game on. At this point one of several things happened:

(1) There was a massive pileup at the line of scrimmage—something like the old flying wedge play that led Teddy Roosevelt to threaten to ban football—from which your back simply couldn't extricate himself.

(2) Your back took off like a bat out of hell...toward the wrong goal line, something like Roy Riegels in the 1929 Rose Bowl.

(3) A strange tropical disease suddenly beset your back and he began moving in a circle, around and around, joined, perhaps, by two or three linemen eager for any break from the tedious routine of blocking.

(4) Nothing.

OK, so pretend that you had never heard of Electric Football before and you read this description. Doesn't that sound awesome? Don't you picture you this and immediately smile? This was the very essence of unpredictability. You had essentially no control over anything, other than the on/off switch. You were playing the role of a laissez-faire God. It was pure randomness, and it was beautiful.

Stupid? Sure. Modern game-makers would never bring something like this to market. They'd cast it off as juvenile, nihilistic, not interactive, a general waste of one's time. They'd be wrong, of course, but maybe it was a game for its era. Indeed, in its obituary for Sas, The New York Times moves swiftly through the rise of Electric Football to get to the moment the game was rendered obsolete:

Early versions of the game included figures that bore little resemblance to real players. But in the 1960s, Mr. Sas began working with an industrial designer, Lee Payne, who had played a year of college football at the University of Georgia. Mr. Payne helped him improve the aesthetics of the game, making the figures more lifelike, with specific team colors; giving the players some degree of directional control and adding a cardboard representation of a stadium, which was mounted to the side of the frame.

The National Football League began licensing the product in 1967, and it became a fixture in the toy section in the Sears catalog.

The company, which Mr. Sas renamed Tudor Games, thrived into the 1980s, until new hand-held games, and later video and computer games, made it seem quaint to a new generation of children.

And though it's estimated that some 40 million sets have been sold over the years, Electric Football's age had clearly started to show by the time SI's Jeff Pearlman revisited the game some 21 years after his colleague did:

In the 1960s four companies made Electric Football games. By 1991, after the bankruptcy of Superior Toys, there were none. Since Miggle began producing the game board and pieces in '93, there has been something of a revival. The Electric Football elite, like that of Dungeons & Dragons or Magic: The Gathering, is a tight community of mostly single men (note: Electric Football tournaments are not good spots to meet the honeys) who communicate through Internet chat rooms. Secrets—how to make the players move faster, ways to illegally widen the base of each player—are the hot topics. Fashion is not.

Watching Electric Football is, 99% of the time, Meet Joe Black dull. The switch is flicked, the little men vibrate. If a receiver happens to get open, the switch is flicked off, everything stops, and a tiny quarterback figurine chucks an even tinier foam football. If the football hits the receiver, the pass is complete. The switch is flicked on again and—yawn—everything moves.

Still, Sas's creation had a memorable run, and it should come as no surprise that he was nothing short of a prodigy, even before Electric Football entered his thought process. He was a graduate of the Bronx High School of Science and earned two bachelor's degrees from MIT, in between which he was a commissioned officer in the Navy. And yet, even as his success and personal wealth exploded in the '60 and '70s, he was also keen enough to know the end was nearer than anyone else expected.

As his widow told The New York Times, "He said: ‘Listen, this is it now. We're making a killing on it, and it's going to end as soon as the electronic versions come out.'"

Sas understood buzz in every sense of the word. For a while, in shag-carpeted rec rooms across America, the little men vibrated. Then the switch was flicked off.

As Manish Mehta of the Daily News is reporting, Mark Sanchez's days with the Jets may be coming to their inevitable end. As Mehta's sources indicate, the Jets will be looking to trade Sanchez after this season, the clear indication being that there would be some other team in the NFL that would be willing to take him on to play quarterback, a task he has not particularly excelled at over the past few weeks.

But if the Jets can unload Sanchez to some suitor out there that's so desperate for a warm body that can throw a football, it could set in motion a series of events that land another star quarterback in north Jersey. Per Mehta:

In order for the Jets to pull off a deal, they would almost certainly have to absorb the bulk of Sanchez's guaranteed $8.25 million base salary for 2013. The likely out-of-pocket ceiling for potential suitors would be $3 million.

The Jets' need to replace Sanchez with a veteran signal caller could lead them to another player who has fallen on hard times recently.

The News has learned that Michael Vick, who is expected to be released by the Eagles shortly after the season, would be amenable to coming to the Jets if Sanchez is out of the equation.

"Bring it on," one Jets source said about signing Vick if he becomes available. "He was hit too many times (behind a subpar offensive line) the last two years."

Rex Ryan may be the X-Factor to land Vick, according to sources. Ryan has always had an affinity for Vick, who could potentially help save the coach from getting his walking papers after the 2013 season.

"(Ryan) loves him," a team official said.

But waaaaait a second, what about all that ridiculous Tebow-to-the-CFL chatter? Are we really going to be denied such crazy Montreal-focused rumors surrounding the continuing Tebow debacle? The chances look better by the day, despite the dawning of the Age of Greg McElroy, but an even better set of questions might be, who would take Sanchez and what could the Jets possibly get for him? The Jets are probably open to any and all suggestions, so let's help 'em out on this one.

NY Jets ready to get rid of Mark Sanchez, will explore trade market for former first round pick [NY Daily News]

As one savvy observer pointed out, you actually have to be in the frame in order to be posterized, but Dwight Howard is so disinterested in being a part of the play that Gerald Henderson has a relatively easy time throwing down one of the dunks of the year, one that has clear shades of Griffin-on-Perkins. (Dunk truthers: Kindly shut up.) Sure, the Lakers held on for the win (BARELY), but for the rest of the year Dwight Howard will think about this dunk and get a thousand-yard stare.

The best part? The Laker on the end of the bench who couldn't help but jump in excitement, only to be pulled back to his seat.

via Hardwood Paroxysm

With Rex Ryan engaged in a hilarious, semi-silent standoff with management over Tim Tebow's playing time, or severe lack thereof, there's been some speculation, idle thus far but growing in volume, that Tim Tebow's last best option for playing professional football, once his underwhelming tenure with the Jets completes its logical (and spectacular) flameout, will come with our neighbors to the north. As Mike Florio just casually mentions, you know, just saying, Tebow's player rights are already held by a team so possibly/maybe he'll head there after this dismal 2012 seasons reaches its merciful end?

Here's Florio casting his line in the shallow end:

If the Jets decide to cut quarterback Tim Tebow, the next question becomes whether any other team will sign him. Though some think he'd be a viable fullback at the NFL level, Tebow may insist on playing quarterback.

And if the Jaguars or the Cardinals or any other quarterback-needy team isn't interested in letting Tebow play quarterback, he could always go north of the border.

As recently pointed out by Sportsnet, the Montreal Alouettes hold Tebow's negotiating rights in the CFL. Previously, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats had dibs on Tebow.

Montreal's incumbent starter, Anthony Calvillo, is reportedly contemplating retirement.

Though it seems like a joke to think that a guy who helped take the Broncos from 1-5 to the final eight last season could be out of NFL options, there's a chance he soon will be forced to move on from the NFL - unless he wants to move out to a new position.

Well, to the uninitiated or even casual football fan, this sounds like a most unlikely scenario. (Does ESPN even have a Montreal bureau?) But for a more educated, nuanced rebuttal, we can turn to Andrew Bucholtz of Yahoo's 55-Yard Line CFL blog:

... Dual-threat quarterbacks like Russell Wilson, Robert Griffin III and Colin Kaepernick ... can both run and pass effectively; Tebow can only do one of these things, and that's what makes it difficult to see him as a good NFL fit going forward.

If that's true in the NFL, though, it's even more true in the CFL. With three downs, a bigger field and expanded motion, the Canadian game is even more passing-focused. Yes, some dual-threat quarterbacks have had success up north, most notably Damon Allen (Warren Moon, sometimes cited as an example there, didn't actually run very much in the CFL), but Allen was always quite capable in the passing game too. He was the CFL's leader in career passing yards until Anthony Calvillo broke his record in 2011, and his 56.4 percent career completion mark (much of which was recorded in an era that emphasized deep, lower-percentage throws more than today's game) makes Tebow's look like chopped liver by comparison.

Knowledgable as he is about what makes a quality CFL player, Bucholtz can't really envision any likely scenario where Tebow excels up north, not even remotely in the vague-ish way Florio hints:

The comedy of Tebow, a former Florida Gators star, being behind [Adrian] McPherson, who left rival Florida State following an infamous arrest, would be substantial, though. What would be even better would be if Tebow came to the CFL and had less success than another former Florida quarterback, the less-hyped Chris Leak, who infamously washed out in Montreal and then Saskatchewan. Beyond merely giving CFL fans a chance to laugh, though, there's no reason for the Alouettes to even consider Tebow. Simply put, Tim Tebow has done nothing that would suggest he'd be an effective CFL passer.

Tebow supporters will vouch for his love of football and willingness to prove himself against lesser competition, but remember that Tebow had the chance to make that kind of move that would've benefitted his career more than lofty personal aspirations. He had the choice of deciding where to be traded, once Broncos management became eager to get his constant sheen away from prized acquisition Peyton Manning. It was either Jacksonville, a struggling team that would've no doubt elevated him to starter in little time and with a state's fan base that would (you might say) worship him, or the Jets, a team with an entrenched starter, a bull-headed head coach, and the most rabid sports media landscape in the world.

He chose New York, with the slim hope that he would get a legitimate chance to play meaningful games, either with Sanchez hurt or a team that bowed to suffocating external pressure. Neither of those things happened, and now Tebow faces few options, but the bottom line is this: Once Tim Tebow fails in the CFL, he will never, ever have another chance in the NFL. He is not Doug Flutie 2.0. He full well knows this, which is why he'll (for now) take his chances as a middling second-stringer who can't play his own position and hope the right situation emerges somewhere. At least in the short term, that depends on whether he can escape from New York for what would likely be one last, good chance. Still, don't bet on it.

Why the CFL shouldn't bother with Tim Tebow [55-Yard Line]
Montreal could be Tebow's eventual destination [Pro Football Talk]

Has anyone tried to warn us of the impending giant fucking eagle menace? Is this merely the first warning shot? We must be vigilant, or else the giant fucking eagles of the world will make off with all of our children. BUT ONLY IF WE LET THEM.

UPDATE: Fake? Oh, say it ain't so.

UPDATE #2: Definitely totally fake, though not any less awesome.

Via Reddit

When you win a $200 million-plus lottery, you can pretty much screw with people however you want, especially if you're willing to pony up for something they really want or need. Take Brian and Mary Lohse, who won a Powerball jackpot some three months ago and finally decided they would make a hefty $3 million donation to their son's school so that administrators could construct a swanky new football stadium. I mean, this is Iowa, and people love their high school football, right?

Yeah, well, funny thing about large donations and little conditions and fine print and such. The AP has more on the bargain the Lohses are willing to strike with the school:

The stadium visitor's locker room must be painted pink.

The Bondurant-Farrar school district accepted the $3 million donation from Brian and Mary Lohse on Monday, The Des Moines Register reported. The couple from the Des Moines suburb of Bondurant requested only that the new stadium be completed before the fall 2014 football season - their oldest son's senior year - and that the visiting team's locker room be painted pink.

"I was sort of half joking and half not, I suppose, but they said they'd do it," Mary Lohse said of her scheme, inspired by the University of Iowa visitor's locker room at Kinnick Stadium, which is also painted pink.

"It's supposed to put them in a certain soft frame of mind," Mary Lohse said. "It will certainly give all the players something to talk about."

Now, other than cornfield baseball, is there anything more Iowa than pink locker rooms? Tough call.

Iowa lottery winners fund new football stadium [AP]

Bengals 34, Eagles 13: Well, that was something. For those that actually watched every second of this abomination of a football game—and from that club I exclude myself—I challenge anyone to explain where the redeeming value was in staging such a contest between two clubs that clearly seemed so unready/unwilling to play competitive football. That the Bengals emerged with a victory is beyond the point, though obviously beneficial to Cincinnati's hopes for ultimately heading to the AFC playoffs. The Eagles, meanwhile, moved one more incalculable step toward helping their draft standing, which is the very least they can ask for at this point.

The Marvin McNutt butt-punt block on his own teammate—OK, it's more of a block courtesy of the right, upper hip-ish area, but it's completely ridiculous all the same—was merely a spectacular representation of this Eagles team's badness, the complete ineptitude that seeped from most every offensive series. With Philly's fourth turnover coming in the waning moments of the third quarter, the final period was left solely for fantasy playoff observers whose early-week leads hinged on a play here and there. Aside from that angle, there was no compelling reason for even casual fans to stay tuned. It was mid-December football at its worst, a reminder that scheduling a competitive game every Thursday night will be a harder task for NFL Network than originally conceived. That will require more foresight on the NFL's part next season, but few, in fairness, could've seen how dreadful this Philadelphia squad would be at this point. Even the Bengals' Emmanuel Lamur (or some pissed-off Philly fan within distance of an NFL Network mic) summed up the night ever-so-succinctly for Philly.

The Bengals now move to 8-6, a half-game ahead of the division-rival Steelers (whom they play next on Dec. 23) and 1.5 games ahead of the Jets, who are still hoping to run the table and position themselves for a playoff berth, crazy as that may seem.

The Eagles are now 4-10 and dreaming for a quick and merciful end to this most miserable of seasons. So it goes, Philadelphia.

When paraded one after the other, it's really easy to see which Houston Rockets were ready to bring the Hanukkah spirit and which ones were sorely lacking. (Good job, good effort there, Jeremy Lin.)

h/t Jonah

There's probably no other sports reporter/columnist out there who can ingratiate himself so well to a coach as T.J. Simers of the Los Angeles Times, if by "ingratiate" we mean "antagonize coaches coming off a bad loss by uttering outrageous allegations that make them to want to strangle you in front of your peers." This technique is fast becoming old hat for Simers, who recently pulled these kinds of trolltastic shenanigans with UCLA head coach Jim Mora Jr. Now, Mike D'Antoni, fresh off a demoralizing road loss to the Cavaliers, is his latest target.

Hell yeah, we worked for a half hour on it. So get your—you're starting to—you're starting to piss me off. You're starting to piss me off because you're saying something that's not factually correct.

Can't imagine what Simers' column tomorrow will focus on. After all, this is pretty much all he knows.

h/t USA Today Sports, photo via @The_Only_Derm

Broncos, 26, Raiders 13: Raiders fans really do deserve better than this team, and I say that not as someone who lives among many of them but solely as an interested football observer. The Broncos didn't clearly put this game away early on, but whatever hope Oakland may have had of making this a competitive contest in the early going was strictly of the false variety. This wasn't five quick touchdowns and a halftime crowd exodus. This was death by a thousand consistent plays, with a few Raider-ly penalties thrown in for good measure. In the end, the Broncos won by 13 points and it wasn't nearly that close. The Raiders, it can be said, are a dreadful football team, now 3-10 and with many needs and little prospects for the immediate future.

The Broncos, meanwhile, boast a damn scary squad. They thoroughly controlled the play all game long, save for one 13-play, 80-yard drive from the Raiders that ate up six minutes and 33 seconds near the end of the second quarter. It was the longest TD drive (time-wise) for Oakland this entire season, and aside from this lone bright spot, the Denver defense maintained gamelong dominance over Carson Palmer and his receiving corps, disorienting them so much that they could be forgiven for forgetting the direction of their end zone, as Denarius Moore can attest. Peyton Manning, on the other hand, hit tight end Joel Dreessen for a six-yard TD on the game's opening drive, later threw the 5,000th completion of his career (second only to You Know Who), and continued to lead five more scoring drives before the start of the fourth quarter that provided all the points he'd need.

The Raiders scraped out a touchdown with 5:47 to play when Palmer and Darrius Heyward-Bey connected for a 56-yard score, but it was much too little, much too late. Denver recovered the ensuing onside kick and eventually locked up its 10th win of the season. As for the Raiders? Well, they made this guy stand again, so they've got that going for them.

photo via delta__bravo

At around 2 a.m. this morning, Ed Coleman of WFAN in New York reported that the Mets and superstar third baseman David Wright had agreed to a contract extension that will likely keep him in Queens for the remainder of his career. The deal is presumed to be for seven years and around $140 million, which would be north of the largest in team history, Johan Santana's $137.5 million deal that was signed in February 2008.

Obviously, the extension hasn't been officially announced by the club yet, but if you're a Mets fan, today should be a good day. Yes, the team has lots of needs and will likely be LOL-sy for the next season or two, but even an ownership group as lousy as Fred Wilpon's has to give fans a reason to keep coming to the ballpark. Knowing that Wright is now firmly entrenched in that lineup for the foreseeable future helps assuage those concerns. And, most incredibly, the Mets may have finally done something right.

via NorthJersey.com, MetsBlog

Falcons 23, Saints 13: I'll admit, I wasn't too high on the Falcons coming into tonight's contest, which seemed not like the typical "trap game"—the Saints are way too talented to catch anyone off guard in such a respect—but it just felt like perhaps the Falcons were ripe for a reality check, having won seven games this season by seven points or less. And even though the Saints defense, which had been giving up over 500 yards a game, allowed only 283 to Matt Ryan & Co., Michael Turner finally remembered he was Michael Turner (83 yards rushing and a TD) and the Falcons defense picked off five passes to outlast New Orleans under the lights of the Georgia Dome and run their record to an impressive 11-1.

Even more notably, however, future Cash Cab host Drew Brees failed to throw a touchdown pass for the first time in 54 regular-season games. Not since a 24-10 win over the Jets on October 4, 2009 has Brees failed to toss one into the end zone. If you include the four playoff games he's played over the period of time (which adds in another eight TDs to the overall total), Brees threw 145 touchdown passes (an average of 2.5 per game) over 17,922 yards heading into tonight. It's not that the Saints didn't have opportunities—Brees threw five picks, including one in the end zone, and then there was the botched clock management at the end of the first half that took at least three and possibly seven points off the scoreboard when they were down—but rather that the execution was so utterly un-Saints-like. In fact, the only other Saints quarterback with five picks in a game is Archie Manning, who did it twice. Whatever the reason for such lackadaisical offensive play, it doomed New Orleans on this night. This ugly, inexplicable pick with three to play pretty much sealed the deal.

The Saints, now 5-7, have 10 days to figure out what went wrong before they venture to MetLife Stadium to take on the Giants. The Falcons, meanwhile, have basically clinched the NFC South and next face the Carolina Panthers on the road.

Missy "The Missile" Franklin dominated women's swimming for the US this past summer in London, winning five medals—four of them gold—and just recently announced her intent to attend Cal-Berkeley and swim there competitively for two years before preparing for Rio in 2016.

So how is Franklin planning on spending the remainder of her senior year of high school eligibility? Demolishing pretty much every high school girl in the greater Denver metro area that has the unfortunate honor of swimming against her between now and graduation.

More from the Denver Post:

It's confirmed: Missy Franklin, four-time Olympic gold medalist, will swim for her Regis Jesuit High School team this winter.

According to Raiders athletic director John Koslosky, Franklin, who also won a bronze medal this past summer in London, won't be there Wednesday, when Colorado's second scholastic season opens, but she will participate in an abbreviated schedule.

"She's doing this because of her team, her school and the other girls who swim in high school," Koslosky said. "And she wants to. They all want her there."

Olympian Missy Franklin decides to swim for Regis Jesuit High School [Denver Post]