Nolan should have been axed last season. The team underperformed and his way of dealing with the poor performance was to blame the players. Granted the team didn't have a lot of standout players, but he used the same excuse the year before AND the year before that. Nolan was the one drafting and signing these guys. At what point does it become his responsibility?

I liked Nolan when he first came to the team. My impression was that he would bring discipline and install a strong defense built around a strong corps of line-backers. But that never happened. Instead the defense kept falling behind. The line had trouble putting pressure on the QB without the blitz. The defensive backs provided little to no coverage on WR's, constantly giving up big plays on third and long. So much for his defensive expertise.

Nolan also had a hard time managing the clock in close games. How many times did the half end with the Niners moving the ball and one or more timeouts on the board? How many bad replay challenges did he make that cost the team precious time-outs? Who could he blame for those lapses?

So now the Niners have to start over. I don't know if Mike Singletary will be kept on after this season, and I don't envy him having to take over under such circumstances. Who knows? Maybe the team will play hard for him. Maybe not. At least they didn't put Mike Martz in charge. The guy may know offense, but he's really no better than Nolan in managing a team.

Graham was an athlete. His clients were world-class athletes. The competition in track and field, especially among runners, is fierce. Once his clients got caught using banned substances, he was probably resentful that BALCO clients were getting away with it. I think he decided to level the playing field by ratting the BALCO athletes out.

But no good deed goes unpunished. Already under suspicion due to the inordinate number of clients who were caught and suspended, Graham made a poor choice and lied to federal agents about providing his clients (and Marion Jones in particular) with steroids. The feds caught on and pursued a case against him.

His lawyer is portraying him as a saint who did the right thing only to be set up. Sorry, I'm not buying it. Too many of his clients have been caught using. Enough of them have come forward to implicate Graham as the connection to Heredia. Have fun coaching the prison track team, Trevor!

Michael Vick is a despicable person. What he did to those dogs is unforgivable. Just because some numbnuts believe that dog fighting is a sport doesn't change that fact that it's illegal in this country. Vick broke the law, and he's paying the price. Paying tribute to him just shows that you have the same ignorant mindset that Vick has.

It wouldn't surprise me one bit if we found that these jack-asses were frequent guests to Vick's "arena". If this proves to be true, they should get the same treatment their teammate is enjoying now; suspension, loss of salary and endorsements, and incarceration.

Now that they've finally caught someone big, maybe the French press will give up their witch hunt for Lance Armstrong. They've dogged him since he first won the race with rumors and innuendo about doping to no avail. But that doesn't matter since the damage has been done. Armstrong will always have the cloud of suspicion over him just like Barry Bonds.

I don't deny that Hardaway is entitled to his opinion, but the rancor of his words point to why so many gay athletes stay in the closet while they're actively competing. Why does hate have to enter into the discussion? Why is there so much intolerance in male dominated sports?

Ignorance is probably the main reason. Most heterosexual males have the impression that if a gay man is attracted to them, they might be gay themselves. This is ridiculous to say the least. You can be attracted to another woman without being a bigamist. It's only if you marry a second woman that you become a bigamist. You are either gay or bi, or you're not. It's that simple.

Hardaway is already paying the price for what he said. I doubt that he regrets what he said more than the consequences he faces as a result of his statement. He'll lose endorsement money and his ties to the NBA have been severed for the time being. His apology won't erase what he said or the consequences that have resulted.

The fans in Dallas don't seem to mind too much though. One guy even read three chapters while waiting in line two hours to get an autograph. I don't know what's more remarkable. That he waited in line for two hours or that it took him that long to read three chapters. I mean c'mon. We're not talking about Tolstoy here. How long could each chapter be?

The last bit in the story really cracked me up. Hey kid, if you want to read about "football leadership" you've got the wrong book. T.O. couldn't even lead a conga line.

I did watch the year the Cup was held in the U.S. and was disenchanted by a final that was scoreless after overtime and had to be settled with a shootout. How is that good? You watch a bunch of guys kick a ball around for over two hours, and they end up deciding things with free kicks. No wonder the sport can't catch on in the U.S. If you can't decide something during the course of the game, then you might as well skip to the shootout and just get it over with. It would save us all a lot of time.