NFL Chicago

In the middle of Peter King's informative look at what's going to happen with the Packers and Brett Favre, he dropped in this nugget which should frighten Packers fans and give Vikings fans plenty of reasons to hope for a Favre return.

Overwhelmingly the team that makes the most sense to sign Favre for a couple of years is Minnesota. The Vikings are training Tarvaris Jackson to be their quarterback of the future, but he's an unproven commodity with promise at best. Their offensive coordinator is Darrell Bevell, who was Favre's quarterback coach for three years, from 2003-05. They have a close relationship. Not Steve Mariucci-Favre close, but Favre has a lot of respect for him. Imagine Favre in purple. It's an absolutely vomitous scenario for the Packers, imagining Favre playing for their arch-rivals -- and imagining Favre charging out of the tunnel at Lambeau Field for the opening game of the 2008 season. Lambeau Field, Monday Night Football, the night Favre was supposed to have his number retired for the Packers.

Obviously, if the Packers decide to release Favre to get out from under his $12 million cap hit, the Vikings should be calling him immediately. Offensively, the only real questions with this team are whether Tarvaris Jackson is ready to lead them to the playoffs. Give Adrian Peterson, Chester Taylor and Bernard Berrian Brett Favre and watch the points pile up. Minnesota is a team that was on the cusp of the playoffs last year with horrendous quarterback play and a mediocre pass rush, adding Favre and Jared Allen would make the Vikes a legitimate Super Bowl contender.

I noted this morning that the Chicago Sun-Times had a report on its front page about Husain Mahmoud, who was recently fired from his job as the baseball coach at Chicago State University.

The front-page story says "a Sun-Times examination" uncovered that Mahmoud had lied on his resume, but in reality, that "examination" consisted of reading a couple of blogs that uncovered the story weeks ago.

The blogs Babes Love Baseball and The College Baseball Blog reported in mid-June that Mahmoud had fabricated details like having been drafted by the Cincinnati Reds and having led a defunct football league in passing. The Sun-Times story basically rehashes those blog posts, without noting that the blogs reported the news first.

Obviously, the Sun-Times should have credited the blogs in question. When the two blog posts were called to my attention, I e-mailed Sun-Times reporter Dave Newbart to ask for an explanation; if he replies I'll post his explanation here. UPDATE: His reply is below.

UPDATE: Sun-Times 'Scoop' Broken Weeks Ago at Babes Love Baseball, College Baseball Blog

This is the front page of today's Chicago Sun-Times, where the top story is the firing of Chicago State University baseball coach Husain Mahmoud. It's an embarrassing story, both to Mahmoud and the school.

Mahmoud was fired, the Sun-Times reports, after an examination of his resume found a multitude of false claims. Perhaps the most outrageous was that he played with the Indianapolis Capitals of the Continental Football League for five years, leading the league in passing in 1977 and 1978.

Slight problem: The league didn't exist in 1977 and 1978. It took me about two seconds to type "Continental Football League" into Google and find the league's Wikipedia entry, which reveals that it folded in 1969. Apparently that kind of background check would have been too much work for the folks at Chicago State.

Barack Obama made a campaign stop in Fargo on Thursday, and the focus of his speech was military veterans benefits. But on Sundays in the fall, Fargo becomes Minnesota Vikings country, so Obama also took a brief moment to talk a little smack to the many Vikings fans in attendance.

"You guys need to be re-educated," the Minneapolis Star Tribune quotes the Illinois senator and presumptive Democratic presidential nominee saying. "Go Bears!"

Obama did find one Chicago fan in the audience, an 11-year-old boy wearing a Bears hat. Obama asked him what he'll be doing this summer, and the boy said he'll play golf and football. Obama responded, "I wish I was doing that for the summer."

That's what Hillary Clinton wishes Obama was doing this summer, too.

Via Sports by Brooks.

Chicago Bears center Olin Kreutz seems like one of the NFL's hardest players to figure out.

On the one hand, he's obviously smart, a hard-working team player, and a charitable man who has contributed money to retired players who have had health and financial problems. On the other hand, he has broken teammates' jaws in fights on two different occasions.

Chicago Sun-Times columnist Rick Telander has a wide-ranging interview with The Big Lead today in which he addresses his own history with Kreutz, and how he thinks a columnist gains credibility in criticizing an athlete if he'll meet that athlete face to face.

A judge changed the conditions of Cedric Benson's bail today when the former Bears running back appeared in court, forcing him to take alcohol counseling courses and install an ignition interlock breathalyzer in his car.

The breathalyzer, which the judge told Benson he has 72 hours to install, will make it impossible to start his car if his blood alcohol level registers above the legal limit. The judge told Benson the intent of the new bail conditions was "what's best for you."

Benson was arrested twice in five weeks on alcohol-related charges, once for boating while intoxicated and resisting arrest, and once for driving while intoxicated. In both cases, he has pleaded not guilty and publicly said that he wasn't drunk. The Bears waived him after the second arrest, and no team picked him up.

There was a pretty stark contrast between the way Tommie Harris negotiated his deal with the Bears and the way that his defensive brethren Brian Urlacher and Lance Briggs have dealt with the team. There were no threats, Harris even said if he were franchised it wouldn't be a big deal, and a lack of ill will which undoubtedly led to the quick resolution of his contract.

I'm not the only one who's noticed that. Harris himself pointed out the different way he handled things.

"We didn't try to go out there and talk about one another or dispute different things, and I feel like we did it all in-house. I would never go out and talk about the Bears in front of the media or disrespect my team."

The Bears don't have the best reputation when it comes to dealing with players but I must say they were pretty true to their words here. They've said, in relation to Urlacher, if you want a new deal then you should come to practice and negotiate one in good faith. That's what Harris did. He turned down an initial offer but didn't draw some arbitrary line in the sand and wound up with an offer more to his liking.

Urlacher, on the other hand, scoffed at an offer and has done very little to create common ground with the team. Harris's deal has provided the path, it's up to Urlacher to walk down it.

Bears defensive tackle Tommie Harris signed his four-year, $40 million contract today, and afterward he met with reporters to give an admirably humble view of an eight-figure payday:

"It was the principle of the whole deal. I wanted this deal done because the NFL gave me a price tag. I don't believe any NFL player deserves the amount of money that we do get. But in the business that we're in, they give us tags and say, 'This guy's worth this, this guy's worth that.' We play a game-a kids' game-and get paid a king's ransom.

Fans and the media often complain that pro athletes are overpaid, and I've never agreed with that: After all, if you can fill a 60,000-seat stadium and get millions to watch you on TV, don't you deserve to be well-compensated? And yet I respect Harris for saying what he said.

Still, somehow I'm guessing Harris's agent, Drew Rosenhaus, wishes Harris would knock it off with the stuff about no NFL player deserving what they get.

The Chicago Bears and defensive tackle Tommie Harris have agreed to a four-year, $40 million contract extension that will keep Harris in Chicago through the 2012 season, when he will be 30 years old.

Harris had been skipping voluntary practices because he was upset with his contract, but he has now ensured that he'll spend the prime of his career with the Bears. The extension was first reported by the Chicago Sun-Times and the value of the extension was first reported by Pro Football Talk.

Harris is the perfect defensive tackle for the Lovie Smith defense. He has been chosen for the Pro Bowl in three of his four years in the NFL, and he's coming off an eight-sack season.

The next priority for the Bears will be determining how to handle a couple of other players who want contract extensions, Devin Hester and Brian Urlacher.

It's been more than 20 years since Chicago Bears great Walter Payton retired and almost nine years since he died. But Sweetness is most certainly not forgotten.

The NFL has implemented a new policy this year requiring every rookie to visit the Pro Football Hall of Fame, and there's great news for any old-school type who worries that the modern 20-somethings don't have respect for the history of the game. Here's what Hall of Fame vice president of communications and exhibits Joe Horrigan had to say about the rookies' visits:

"The one guy they all seem to know about is Walter Payton. It's just the mystique. I think it's the personality, the nickname 'Sweetness,' and everyone really revered him as a guy that put his heart and soul into the game."

This year's NFL rookies were infants when Payton stopped playing and pre-teens when he died. And yet they still revere him. That speaks well to them, and to Payton's enduring legacy.