Should Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford sit out the rest of this season, undergo surgical repairs, then play one final year of college football to reestablish his NFL value?

Should Bradford try to come back from his shoulder injury by the end of this season, to showcase his skills in a bowl game?

Or should he bid farewell to college football altogether to focus on getting healthy and prepare for pro football?

Rams fans are following this story with great interest. Quarterback is just another area where this downtrodden NFL team needs to improve.

A healthy Bradford would have been a very high pick in the 2010 NFL Draft. A surgically repaired Bradford could fall out of the first round, depending on his recover (or lack thereof) from his unfortunate shoulder injury.

According to ESPN.com, he is leaning towards season-ending surgery. But he remains uncertain about 2010.

“Sam’s whole situation, he’ll have something to say when he knows what his path will be, and that isn’t right now,” Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops said. “I’m not the one to answer it. He will. And I will once he feels he’s ready to and knows for sure what he wants to do.”

It’s a shame this year went they way it did. We were all looking forward to Bradford and Colt McCoy sharing one more showdown season in the Big 12.

MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE

Questions to ponder while wondering if Manny Ramirez has played his last game as a Los Angeles Dodger:

• If LA ditches ManRam, eating the second year of his contract, would the Dodgers get first in line for Matt Holliday?
• If the Dodgers were willing to pay ManRam $25 million per year, what would that team pay Holliday?
• Would Albert Pujols’ nagging elbow injuries – and his potential need for reconstructive surgery — make him more likely to consider a contract extension from the Cards?
• Does former NBA star Reggie Miller need to simplify his personal life?
• Is it so terribly wrong for Jeff Fisher to pull an funny and don a Peyton Manning jersey so he could “feel like winner”?
• Is this how the NHL could make shootouts more interesting?
• And speaking of personal lives, should every man be forced to see “Fatal Attraction” for his own good?

CUBAN IS FOR STEROIDS

Fearless as ever, Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban gave an honest answer when asked about steroids at University of Pittsburgh forum.

“I’ll get killed for saying this . . . but I’m not so against steroids if they’re administered under proper supervision and there is no long-term damage,” Cuban said.

“We do performance-enhancing things all the time, just not steroids. If you administer them properly and fairly and set the rules strictly, as long as in doing so we recognize there are no negative long-term health-impact issues.”

Athletes would go for that, of course, but the folks running most organized sports would consider this stance outrageous.

“If somebody thinks it’s controversial, fine,” Cuban said. “To me, it’s just common sense. I’m sure I’ll hear about it [today] that ‘Cuban is for steroids.’”

Consider it done.

QUIPS ‘R US

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

Jayson Stark, ESPN.com: “Before last October, this team had won only four postseason series in the history of the franchise. And now it’s won five series in a row. It wasn’t so long ago that this franchise had played in two World Series in its first 100 seasons of existence. And now it’s about to play in its second World Series in 12 months. No National League team had ever won 16 times in any stretch of 20 postseason games — and only the Yankees have ever done that in the American League. But now this Phillies team has done exactly that over the last two Octobers.”

Jeff Passan, Yahoo! Sports: “Should the test come against New York, which can lock up the American League pennant against the Los Angeles Angels tonight, it would make for the most compelling World Series since … when? Boston-St. Louis in 2004? Bigger. The Subway Series in 2000? Wider appeal. Not since 1996, when the Yankees made their first World Series in 15 years and beat an Atlanta Braves team with four future Hall of Famers, has baseball been gifted such a plot-thick, compelling face-off for the right to wear diamond-covered rings.”

Jay Mariotti, FanHouse: “We’ll have several days to explain why Phillies vs. Yankees might be the hottest (and coldest) Series in years, a matchup between the bloated Bronx behemoths and the defending Series champions from the Pennsylvania shadows. What needs to be performed today is the burial of Ramirez, the steroids fraud who has shrunk into an ordinary hitter since his 50-game suspension and officially needs to remove himself from our baseball lives. The only reason we tolerated his petulant, goofy, self-absorbed act — all that Manny Being Manny garbage — is because he was one of the greatest hitters of our lives, the all-time leader in postseason home runs, a clutch slugging machine. But his legend has turned to mush this autumn, just as it had started to over the summer, and he departed the stage he once owned with some very puny numbers in these playoffs: in 32 at-bats, he had one homer, four RBI and six strikeouts.”

T.J. Simers, Los Angeles Times: “The Dodgers had the best start, the best record for a long time, and finished with the top mark in the National League — squandering it all, the home-field advantage and all that success, to finish exactly as they did a year ago. A World Series invite up for grabs, the Dodgers hit .232, have a team earned-run average of 7.39 and former Dodgers outfielder Jayson Werth proves he was worth more than the Dodgers thought. Thanks for the nightmares.”

Gregg Doyel, CBSSports.com: “Playing like this, the Yankees won’t win the World Series. They can’t. Not with their players getting picked off and their starting rotation at 60 percent and their meddling manager making moves just to show everybody how smart he is. Playing like this, the Yankees can reach the World Series — but that’s not their goal. Getting there? The Yankees didn’t spend $200 million to get there. They spent it to win it, and they were way too good for Minnesota in the Division Series and they’re proving to be too good for the Angels in the American League Championship Series. But the Yankees can’t screw around and win the World Series like they’re screwing around winning the pennant.”

MEGAPHONE

“It might be so crazy it’d fall into the ocean. It would be wild. Absolutely wild.”

Phillies third baseman Greg Dobbs, on a potential Eastern Seaboard World Series against the Yankees.

INBOX

Some Cards fans are miffed at how their season ended, as you can tell from what turned up in our electronic mail bin:

“If you’ve got half a pair, you’ll ask LaRussa why his teams consistently underperform in the post-season, and print his response. Don’t worry, I already know you don’t have the guts to ask him a straight forward question.”

Rick

Remember that 2006 World Championship run with a widely ridiculed team? That erased that postseason underachiever tag from Tony La Russa’s resume. The ‘09 team went flat at the end of the year, for sure, and changes will come as a result.

“Game 2 you blame Holliday.  I take issue with you. (Ryan) Franklin costs us that ballgame. He was ineffective as a closer the month of September and it continued into the post season. Tony is too stubborn to take him out when he is struggling because of his blind loyalty to certain players.  He had (John) Smoltz available with a ton of postseason success.  Put the blame where it belongs on Franklin’s inability to save a lead and TLR’s bone headed stubbornness about his closer.  Thank God we had Holliday or we would not have made the playoffs or would not have been in the game in which he made the error.  Do you remember who homered to give us our first run?”

Dave Backer, Sedalia.

Yes, Holliday did hit a homer in that game. But his deer-in-the-headlights at bat in Game 1 with the bases loaded on that disastrous defensive gaffe in Game 2 will forever mark Holliday’s career as a Cardinal. As for Franklin, TLR was stuck there — Smoltz wasn’t throwing all that great at the end and Kyle McClellan wasn’t up to the task.

Elsewhere in STLToday.com

Moving Will Witherspoon made all the sense in the world for the rebuilding Rams.