Fast and Furious…

1. I DON’T CARE WHAT THE SCOUTS SAY ABOUT TIM TEBOW … Florida’s championship QB can quarterback my team, anytime. So spare me the talk about footwork, accuracy, mechanics. Some quarterbacks are winners. Some quarterbacks make the  big plays with the game on the line. Some quarterbacks just inspire belief and confidence. You just want the ball in their hands at the end of the game. Tebow is in this category.  He’s the anti-Bulger.

2. WELCOME TO THE ST. LOUIS RAMS COACHING SEARCH BOWL, SATURDAY ON CBS: It’s Baltimore @ Tennessee in the AFC playoffs, 3:30 p.m. kickoff STL time.  This is your chance to check out two candidates for the Rams job: Baltimore defensive coordinator Rex Ryan, and Tennessee defensive coordinator Jim Schwartz. And Rams’ coaching-search consultant Dan Dierdorf will be the color analyst on the CBS broadcast. Maybe Dierdorf can do a little advance work for Rams GM Billy Devaney. Then again, DD can just go with the flow and rubber-stamp Jim Haslett.

3. NON-SPORTS OBSERVATION OF THE DAY: OK, I keep getting these e-mails from people I don’t know, inviting me to join their LinkedIn network. Just a quick question: what the hell is this? OK, in the beginning, I’d receive an invite from some folks that I did surely know — sportswriters, editors and such — and I thought, “Why not. I’ll link up with them, even though I have absolutely no idea what it is, and what it’s supposed to do for me. Maybe this will make it easier to exchange Bruce Springsteen concert bootlegs, or something.” Now the damned thing is like a  virus. LinkedIn invitations come from all over the place. A guy who works at Walgreens invited me to join his LinkedIn network, and I’m at a loss to understand how this will help me. Do I get a discount on Zantac tablets? Does it mean that I can now open a bag of Doritos at Walgreen’s and eat them as I walk the aisles, not having to pay up until I reach the register?

Memo: I’m LinkedOUT …

4. IF CHRIS PEREZ WANTS TO BE THE CLOSER IN 2009 … he has to diversify and come up with an alternative pitch. When behind in the count, the big man threw fastballs to RH batters 93 percent of the time last season. Behind in the count to LH batters, he threw the gas 96 percent of the time. According to STATS LLC, here are some of the batting averages against Perez when he fell behind last season: 1-0, .500.  2-0, .400. 3-1, .333. (He did fine on 2-1 counts). Perez has a popping fastball, but in the bigs, the hitters can rip on it, especially if they know it’s coming.

5. KURT WARNER WEATHER UPDATE: As they head into Saturday night’s NFC playoff game in Carolina, much has been made of the Arizona Cardinals’ failures in the eastern time zone this season. But what about their QB, Warner, and cold weather? Because Warner has played so many games inside climate-controlled facilities in St. Louis and Glendale, Ariz., it’s unusual for him to have to perform in frigid conditions. Warner has made only four NFL starts when in games played at a temperature under 40 degrees, and the results weren’t handsome: 50.7 completion rate, 3 TDs, 11 INTs, and a QB rating of 41.8. Yikes. But here’s some potentially good news for Kurt and his fans: the forecast for Saturday night in Charlotte is a temperature of around 50 degrees, with a chance for rain. It may get wet. But it isn’t supposed to be cold. Still, this is a tough assignment for the Cardinals; the Panthers are 8-0 at home this season.

60-SECOND BONUS: I failed to note the Jan. 8 birthday of the late great Elvis Presley.  My three favorite Elvis songs: (1) Suspicious Minds; (2) Kentucky Rain; (3) In the Ghetto. Question: did you prefer the younger, slimmer Elvis or the older, Fat Elvis? I’m weird. I liked the paunchy, white-jumpsuit version of Elvis. Why?  No. 1, I’m a fat guy. No. 2, I have a bizarre childhood memory that I can’t shake. We were supposed to go see Elvis in concert at the Baltimore Civic Center. It was my only shot at seeing him. I must have been 11 or 12 years old.  We show up, and wait, and the concert was canceled. Why? well, as it turns out, as written in the local newspapers the next day, Elvis reportedly ate 9 banana splits backstage before the show and became violently ill.  Awesome.

-Bernie