The NFL will not – repeat, will NOT – tolerate players flashing gang signs this season. The league has hired experts to scrutinize video replays of on-field hand gestures.

This ought to be fun, as the Los Angeles Times noted.

“Guys come from all over the country, and who knows what they’re really doing?” Jacksonville Jaguars receiver Dennis Northcutt said, according to the Times. “People have got signs for their kids, signs for their fraternities. How do you differentiate who’s really throwing up gang signs?

“This is a gang sign,” he added, touching his index finger to his thumb to form a squished version of the hand sign for OK. “But at the same time, it’s a sign for a personnel group.”

So Peyton Manning better be careful when he is frantically waving at the line of scrimmage, calling or not calling audibles on the fly. The league will be watching.

MAKING BILL PARCELLS WINCE

The Dolphins appear to be one of the teams Brett Favre could help next season. And Miami’s need for a veteran quarterback nearly became more acute two weeks ago.

Dolphins quarterback-for-now Josh McCown injured his throwing hand in a chainsaw mishap. He and his brother, Tampa Bay quarterback Luke McCown, were cutting a tree stump in Jacksonville, Texas, when the accident occurred.

Fortunately, the damage was limited to a six-stitch gash on his index finger. His agent, Mike McCartney, insists his client will be ready for training camp.

“He has been throwing the football, and he’s even playing golf,” McCartney said. “He’s fine.”

MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE

Questions to ponder while waiting for Adam Wainwright’s hand to heal:

• Do the Tigers regret never taking a look at Ryan Ludwick after sticking him in Toledo?
• Rather than pursue tampering charges against the Vikings, why doesn’t Packers management trade Favre’s rights to a team outside the division and end this charade?
• What good could come from letting this matter hang over Aaron Rodgers’ head all summer?

PILING ON CANSECO

It wasn’t enough for former Gridbird Vai Sikahema to pummel Jose Canseco during their celebrity boxing exhibition. Sikahema had to rip him verbally was well.

“He’s a very impressive-looking guy,” Sikahema told the New York Daily News. “But the guy is a walking corpse, because he’s rotted inside out. He’s a pathetic figure.”

QUIPS ‘R US

Here is what some of America’s leading sports pundits have been writing:

Mark Kriegel, FoxSports.com: “A bimbo in Boston (limerick, anyone?) tells the New York Post that she reversed the Curse by sleeping with Alex Rodriguez in 2004. Sorry, but the only thing this proves is that, when it comes to women, Charlie Sheen has better judgment.”

Steve Rosenbloom, ChicagoSports.com: “The NBA keeps screaming that Tim Donaghy acted as a lone fixer among referees, but get a load of this: One of the guys in Donaghy’s fave five, Scott Foster, officiated seven games in 2006-07 that moved the point spread by at least two points, and Vegas lost all seven games. The odds are less than 1 percent that such a thing occurred randomly, meaning without, say, a referee fixing it. The more the NBA keeps screaming that Donaghy acted as a lone fixer among referees, the more it seems like the NBA’s nose is growing.”

Rick Reilly, ESPN.com, on playing in the American Century Championship golf tourney: “Random celebrity observations from the week: Michael Jordan’s girlfriend is scorching. Aaron Rodgers nearly gets a facial tic when asked about Brett Favre. Ray Allen can actually rap. After a bad shot, Ray Romano will yell, ‘I could rip off my own ear!’ Jessica Simpson, in town with boyfriend Tony Romo, is not a stickler for detail. When I asked her, ‘Jessica, is today your birthday?’ she replied: ‘Yes! No! Wait! Yesterday! No, wait, is today the 12th? Then, day before yesterday? I don’t know!’”

Diane Pucin, Los Angeles Times: “Billy Packer had become old-school, and not in the good way of paying attention to detail or studying hard before he would go on the air, but in the way of a crotchety old guy who chases neighborhood kids out of the yard. ‘Get off my grass, young’uns’ became ‘How dare the NCAA tournament committee let in all those Bradleys and Wichita States and George Masons instead of . . . (insert any bottom feeder from the Atlantic Coast Conference).’”

MEGAPHONE

“Everybody has distractions. Mine are just on the front page of the papers. And I’m fine with that. You look at it as a gift and a curse. There’s so much good that comes with playing here. You have to be able to take the good with the bad and not take yourself too seriously.”

A-Rod, on his well-publicized marital discord.