Rams fans will follow the career of Lions defensive tackle Ndamukong Suh with some interest, since their team could have chosen the former Nebraska star first overall in the 2010 NFL Draft.
The Rams selected Sam Bradford instead, opting for their quarterback of the future. The Lions already have their quarterback – Matthew Stafford – so they were thrilled to get Suh.
He is already making news. Suh manhandled Browns quarterback Jake Delhomme in Detroit’s most recent preseason game, prompting folks in Cleveland to demand a suspension for him.
“He already face-masked him, then he grabs him by the neck, twists it and throws him down,” Browns quarterback Seneca Wallace told the Cleveland Plain Dealer. “To me, that's something you can get suspended for, I think.”
Suh’s response?
“I was just going after the ball, and I had no clue that he had gotten rid of it,” he said. “I don't know what to expect from the league. I've gotten personal fouls before, but that was in college, and they can't fine you there.”
As for Wallace’s suspension plea, Suh said: “That's unfortunate. That's his opinion, which he's entitled to. I mean, I just want to go out there and play hard. It's not my job to really worry about whether I hit a guy too hard or not. I was just going after the ball and trying to make a play and that's what I'll continue to do.”
Say this about the kid: It didn’t take long for him to get noticed.
ONLY IN AMERICA
Perhaps you’ve seen this item from The Associated Press:
Just call Troy Polamalu the man with the million dollar hair.
The long, flowing black hair that tumbles out of Polamalu's helmet and down his back -- it's nearly three feet long -- has been insured for $1 million by Head and Shoulders, the shampoo brand that is endorsed by the Pittsburgh Steelers safety.
The insurance was obtained through Lloyd's of London, which did not reveal what must be done to Polamalu's hair for anyone to collect on the policy.
MYSTERIES OF THE UNIVERSE
Questions to ponder while wondering why the Cardinals were so mesmerized by J.A. Happ Monday night:
How long will take Manny Ramirez to run afoul of mercurial White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen?
Why is everybody so worked about what Tony La Russa does in his off hours? Isn't he allowed to have a life outside the game?
When will Gridbirds quarterback Matt Leinart lose the spoiled kid approach and realize his NFL career is in jeopardy?
Is Kurt Warner 100 percent certain he doesn't want to come back?
Wouldn't it be fun to own a major league team and use the revenue streams as a giant ATM?
Isn't it important to teach young football players when it is just time to cut your loss?
What could be weirder than running into Shaquille O'Neal at Harvard?
QUIPS ‘R US
Here is what some of America’s leading sports pundits have been writing:
Jayson Stark, ESPN.com: “So off Manny goes to Chicago, where he can DH for a month, yuk it up with Ozzie Guillen, get his 2011 contract campaign rolling and try to make his new team -- and the rest of us -- overlook the messy trip he just took down another club's exit ramp. And maybe he will. Maybe he'll get just enough big hits, and put on just enough of that phony lovable-Manny act, that he'll have plenty of employment opportunities this winter. But we'll see. Sooner or later, no matter how talented a hitter a guy might be, people begin to catch on.”
Steve Rosenbloom, ChicagoTribune.com: “Talking about a player with a history such as Manny’s, Sox GM Kenny Williams says character matters less when there are 30 games to go in a season, which means the Sox won’t supply juicers with syringes, but they certainly won’t frisk anybody.”
Terence Moore, FanHouse: “Here is Roger Clemens, the greatest pitcher of his generation, fresh from getting fingerprinted and taking a mug shot on Monday at his arraignment at a federal courthouse in Washington D.C., and there isn't a doubt that he is a Hall of Famer . . . When it comes to lying. Clearly and dramatically, the guy told a slew of whoppers two years ago when he swore before a bunch of U.S. congressmen on Capitol Hill that he never used performance-enhancing drugs. He did so with the grace of one of those old Soviet Union thugs. This was before, during and after he spent time hurling folks under Washington's Metro subway cars, and those folks ranged from his former trainer to his former best friend to his former best friend's wife to his former nanny. Well, here's the scary thing: There isn't a doubt that Clemens believes what he keeps saying. He believes he never used steroids, and he believes anybody who states otherwise is the true liar.”
Les Carpenter, Yahoo! Sports: “Clemens has always been an odd one to understand. As a star in the 1990s and early 2000s, he could alternate between cranky and charming in the same conversation. He could slip from grounded to emotional in a matter of seconds. Few players were as erratic. There was, after all, the afternoon in Oakland in the 1990 American League Championship Series when he blew up at umpire Terry Cooney in the second inning, was ejected and so unable to calm down his teammates had to drag him off the field. And his explanations for why he hit Mets catcher Mike Piazza in the head with a baseball in 2000 were never clear. Even more muddy was his vague explanation for throwing a piece of Piazza’s broken bat toward Piazza as he ran to first base in that fall’s World Series. He later said he thought the bat, which split as Piazza made contact, was actually the ball. Why he would want to heave the ball at another player was never clear.”
Gregg Doyel, CBSSports.com: “Ryder Cup captain Corey Pavin must invite Tiger Woods onto the U.S. team. We all know it. That's a given. But why does Woods have to accept? That's what I want to know. And that's what needs to be explored in the next few days -- not just by me, but by you and by other media sites. We need some noise here, whether it's online or on talk radio or anywhere else that voices are heard. As fans of the U.S. Ryder Cup team in particular, or golf in general, we need to turn up the volume to make the following request feel more like an order: Just say no, Tiger. Just. Say. No.”
MEGAPHONE
“I was as skeptical as anyone when we first started talking about Maurice. Once you do the research and you dig in and spend time with him, you realize he has his head on straight. He made his mistakes, he acknowledges that. He deserves an opportunity to show people he's changed. I'm 100-percent comfortable that Maurice is not going to do anything to hurt this football team or city.”
Omaha Nighthawks GM Rick Mueller, after signing former Ohio State running back Maurice Clarett have his 3 ½-year prison stint.
