I don't know LaVar Arrington all that well.  But I've been on his radio show roughly a dozen times, and he always has been courteous and engaging and knowledgeable.  So I already liked him.

But now, after listening to remarks from the Monday edition of his show on 106.7 The Fan in D.C., I freaking love the guy.

Portis recently told NFL Network that Arrington left the Redskins "because he felt like he wasn't the main money guy."  LaVar's response can be heard and read at the D.C. Sports Bog.

I strongly recommend listening to it.  It takes a few minutes to get rolling, but I promise that it will give you chills, more than once or twice.

And I've got a feeling that his on-air partner Chad Dukes peed a little during portions of Arrington's epic rant.

So well done, LaVar.  That tape should be played at the Rookie Symposium, every single year.

We've been very happy during our seven-plus-month relationship with NBC.  Traffic continues to climb, I've accumulated a room full of NBC Sports swag, and I've been to New York City like eight times.

The relationship apparently is working well for NBC, given the decision of NBCSports.com to apply our formula to the other major sports.  (And to baseball.)

John Ourand of SportsBusiness Journal recently reported that NBCSports.com will apply the PFT approach to its coverage of the NBA and MLB.  On Monday, ProBasketballTalk.com launched under the NBC Sports umbrella (I've got two of those already), and Circling the Bases was renamed HardballTalk.com.

Kurt Helin will handling the hoops blog, and Craig Calcaterra is the captain of the baseball ship.

"We need to be different from the ESPNs and Foxes of the world," our good friend Rick Cordella, General Manager of NBC Sports Digital, told Ourand.  "We want to develop the model of using a high-personality guy to create a one-stop shop for an individual sport."

Translation:  "We want an asshole with OCD and no life who'll work like a malnourished Doberman and piss everyone off in the process."

OK, maybe that's not exactly what Cordella is looking for.  But that's what he's got, at least as it relates to pro football.

And he'll be getting a little more of it.  Starting soon, yours truly will be pitching in with the online coverage of the Olympic hockey tournament.  I'm officially rooting for Italy, since I might have a relative or two on the team.

That should be good for a couple hundred extra comments per day.

Last Monday, a Special Master (not to be confused with an Ordinary Master, or a Jedi Master) ruled that the NFL cannot suspend its supplemental revenue sharing program.  The league has the right to appeal the ruling to Judge David S. Doty -- and NFL spokesman Greg Aiello previously indicated that an appeal would indeed be filed.

But now it's not so clear.

Daniel Kaplan of SportsBusiness Journal reports that Aiello has more recently said that a final decision has not been made regarding the requirement that the NFL continue to redistribute to qualifying small-market teams a portion of the money generated by large-market clubs.

"We indicated we would [appeal] but a final decision had not been made at that point and certainly no appeal had been filed at that point and still hasn't.  Bottom line:  No decision has been made yet," Aiello told Kaplan via e-mail.

Though we haven't read the full text of the ruling (my insomnia has been under control lately), a league source tells us that, while the league's intention was to ensure that supplemental revenue sharing would end with the removal of the salary cap and the salary floor, the documents led to a different outcome, due to a drafting error.

In other words, one of the lawyers screwed up.

So with the league already believing that Judge Doty favors the union, there's simply no reason to push an issue that an objective assessment of the situation suggests the league will lose.

We posted on Sunday an item regarding the joint efforts of Drew Brees and Marshall Faulk to help secure funding for the 9th Ward Field of Dreams, a project aimed at building a new football stadium and track in the poverty-stricken region of New Orleans.

With $1.1 million raised and $800,000 to go, we assumed that Sunday's win by the Saints would get more of you to donate $10 by texting "DREAM" to 50555.

But according to the project's web site, roughly $600,000 is still needed.

So make it happen, Saints fans.  Celebrate your team's win by helping New Orleans continue its road to recovery following Katrina.  The intangible benefits of the Super Bowl victory mean nothing unless they prompt tangible progress -- and there's an easy way to make tangible progress.

Text "DREAM" to 50555.  I just did.  It took like ten seconds.

If you'd like to donate more than that, click here and let the money flow.

I forgot to set the DVR to record the Super Bowl, so I've yet to see many of the ads.  But I feel compelled, as a member of American society, to find them, to watch them, and to develop an opinion about each of them. 

Which proves that the 30-second spots at $3 million each are worth every freaking penny.

One commercial has left the NFL a bit upset, according to Portfolio, via SportsBusiness Daily.  (Apparently, the actual name of the publication is "PORTFOLIO," but since using all caps is the typing equivalent of screaming into someone's eyeballs, we'll stick with "Portfolio.")

Per the report, the Kia commercial contained impermissible images of Las Vegas casinos, apparently since it would be entirely inappropriate for the coverage of the game to acknowledge in any way the very thing that is responsible for roughly a third of the sport's television ratings.

NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy told Portfolio that the league did not see the ad before it aired, that CBS sold the spot, and that "[t]he shots of the casinos did violate our policy."

But the folks in Las Vegas are pleased with the outcome.  "We ended up getting international exposure without having to make an investment," a Las Vegas Convention & Visitors representative told the Las Vegas Review-Journal, again via SBD.

Though the location malfunction won't trigger nearly the same consequences as the last high-profile gaffe arising from a CBS-produced Super Bowl, the NFL likely will push this thing until the person responsible for the error quietly leaves CBS and/or the league office to pursue other interests and/or six-figure employment.
 

We aren't the only ones that don't know if Walter Jones was joking about retirement or not Sunday.

According to the Associated Press, the Seahawks have traded messages with Jones this week, but have been unable to "reconfirm" his plans for 2010.  Publicly, Jones has said he'll try to play again. He's hinted at retirement on Twitter.

Seahawks offensive coordinator Jeremy Bates spoke with the Seattle media for the first time Tuesday and said he "won't get involved with what route we're going" at left tackle. Matt Hasselbeck is following Jones like the rest of us.

"Walt's on Twitter," Hasselbeck said on KJR 950 Tuesday.  "I'm going to stay on Twitter just so I can stay in the know and see what Walt's up to."

Hasselbeck has no idea what the left tackle is going to do.

"Knowing Walt, who knows," Hasselbeck said. "It could be true, it might not be true . . . I have no idea."

The St. Augustine High School marching band played "Stand up and get Crunk" on CNN.

That surreal moment, in a season full of them, is one reason why the NFL has to be loving this story.  The Saints and the celebration in New Orleans crosses traditional sports boundaries.  It's become a national news story, not just a sports story.

(An alternate title to Lombardi Gras: Dat Tuesday.)

MSNBC was showing the parade for a while, the NYTimes' website is leading their website with coverage, NFL Network and ESPNews are also simulcasting parade coverage in New Orleans and shows no signs of stopping.  "The Situation Room" continues to monitor the situation.

The rest of the nation is getting a sense of the flavor of the city with the marching bands, the elaborate floats, and a victory parade is just picking up steam now that the sun is down.

The New Orleans Saints weren't the only big winners on Sunday. Las Vegas casinos did very well on Super Bowl XLIV, setting an early line that led to most of the bets being placed on the favored Indianapolis Colts.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board said Tuesday that casinos in the state turned a profit of nearly $7 million on the $82.7 million bettors wagered on the Super Bowl.

Overall, bettors in Nevada placed about $1.21 million more in bets than they did on last year's Super Bowl, and the casinos' profits were about $179,000 more than last year.

The house usually wins in Las Vegas, although some years the Super Bowl is actually a money loser for casinos. In 2008, according to the state board, Nevada casinos lost almost $2.6 million when the Giants upset the Patriots.

Agent Drew Rosenhaus said Tuesday that receiver Donte' Stallworth, who was reinstated Sunday night and cut by the Browns on Monday, will be working out for an unnamed NFL team on Wednesday.

Per a league source, that team is the Lions.

Stallworth entered the league as a first-round draft pick in 2002.  The Lions used a first-round pick on wideouts in 2003, 2004, 2005, and 2007.

Stallworth was suspended for the entire 2009 season after pleading guilty to felony DUI manslaughter.  He spent 2008 with the Browns, 2007 with the Patriots, and 2006 with the Eagles.  In his first four seasons, he played with the Saints.

Earlier today, Jay Glazer of FOX reported that 16-year NFL linebacker Bill Romanowski would interview with the Redskins for the position of strength and conditioning coach.

In a Twitter post, Romanowski says this:  "Just to get the records straight I wasn't called in by the Redskins to be their Strength and Conditioning Coach."

Technically, it doesn't mean he hasn't been or won't be considered for the job.  It only means he hasn't gotten it yet and/or that he didn't go to D.C. for the purposes of seeking the job.  Indeed, he acknowledges on his Twitter page that he is in Washington and that he has seen Mike Shanahan.

Rams running back Steven Jackson recently was accused of assaulting the mother of his child in March 2009, at a time when she was nine months pregnant.

According to TMZ.com, authorities in Las Vegas will not pursue charges, based on a lack of evidence.

It doesn't mean that Jackson didn't do it -- it only means that prosecutors fear that, in the end, it will be difficult if not impossible to establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.

The alleged victim, Supriya Harris, could still file a civil lawsuit against Jackson.  In civil court, a much lower standard of proof applies, as O.J. Simpson once learned.

The Buffalo Bills have announced the hiring of a strength and conditioning coach.

Actually, they've hired two.  And neither is named Bill Romanowski.

The co-strength and conditioning coaches are Michael Scott and Jim Halpert Eric Ciano and John Gamble.

Couldn't they have just hired one guy to be the strength coach and the other one the conditioning coach?

Jaws dropped on Tuesday when word emerged that a notoriously juiced-up jaw-breaker could become the Redskins' strength and conditioning coach.

But Jason Reid of the Washington Post reports that former NFL linebacker Bill Romanowski is not a favorite to get the job for which he'll interview.

Romanowski was a controversial figure during his 16-year NFL career.  Apart from his admitted use of steroids, Romanowski once spit at an opponent -- and Romo rearranged the face of a teammate, who sued him and obtained a six-figure verdict.

In 2001, Romanowski was tried on criminal charges of illegally obtaining prescription diet pills. 

After his acquittal, Romanowski said, "I am just so thankful to the jury that they found us not guilty.  I take a lot of pride in being a good person and being a role model, and a lot of that was in question in the last two years."

For more than the past four years, the question has been resolved; Romanowski is neither a good person nor a role model and even the mere granting of an interview to this pill-popping thug is the equivalent of the Redskins shooting another middle finger to the rest of the league, and to its fans.

When Saints cornerback Tracy Porter said after the Super Bowl that his game-clinching interception, which caused a collective gasp in the press box, resulted from film study, Porter essentially was saying that the Colts have become too predictable on offense.

And so we wholeheartedly agree with something I heard Pat Kirwan of NFL.com tell Sporting News Radio's The Two Live Stews on Monday -- Colts coach Jim Caldwell needs to get more involved in tweaking an offense that apparently has become too predictable.

Much of the blame is landing on receiver Reggie Wayne for running a bad route, and it's regarded as a sacrilege to suggest that the man who threw the ball might be responsible in any way for the outcome.  But the reality is that, of anyone in the organization, quarterback Peyton Manning should know whether the Colts have developed a "tell."

And indeed they have.

So with seven months to go until the next game that counts, the Colts need to focus not only on 2009 film from the defenses of the 13 teams they'll face next season, but also on their own offensive game tapes in search of any trends or habits that need to be changed come 2010.

As the 2010 season unfolds, they also need to be careful to avoid developing similar habits.

Otherwise, there will be some key evidence floating around for the next Tracy Porter to find. 

And it can happen in a key regular season contest, in a playoff game, or in the Super Bowl.

DeDe Dorsey, the running back last seen winning the most valuable player award in the United Football League's championship game, has signed a contract with the Detroit Lions.

"I am the newest member of ... The Detroit Lions," Dorsey wrote on Twitter, via the Detroit News.

Dorsey played his college ball at Lindenwood, an NAIA school in Missouri. In 2006 he signed with the Bengals as an undrafted free agent, and after the Bengals cut him he caught on with the Colts, where he played as a rookie. He then returned to the Bengals in 2007 and 2008.

After making the Bengals' 53-man roster in 2009 (as documented on Hard Knocks), Dorsey was cut after Week One, and after that he signed on with the UFL's Las Vegas Locomotives. He scored two touchdowns in leading the Locos to victory in the UFL title game.

After the UFL season, Dorsey worked out for the Rams and Browns. But he hasn't played in a regular-season NFL game since Week Four of 2008. In Detroit Dorsey may have a decent shot of making the active roster for the 2010 regular season, as the Lions have a need at running back with Kevin Smith recovering from a major knee injury.