The New England Patriots’ quarterback Tom Brady is working on getting his game back, and he’s been out of the game for such a long time that there are concerns as to how well he’ll be playing once the season gets rolling. He gave an interview yesterday in which he talked about his recovery. He says that he’s working hard on getting the rust off. Also, being on the sidelines for all that time gives you a new perspective on your career and the game itself. He would love to be in the action again this year and the team is banking on it. He also discussed his career, where he said that any game could be a player’s last, as that first week game last year could have been if he’d been further injured that day. So he just wants to enjoy playing and work his hardest.

The Wedge Formation has been part of football for many years and people have used it effectively to get their kick returner down to the endzone or deep into the other team’s territory. Turns out that this formation is incredibly dangerous for those who have to defend against it. In case you aren’t sure, this is that formation where 3 or 4 guys hold arms and charge forward in order to block defenders as the kick returner comes forward behind them. The defenders often lower their heads and charge forward. And this is where a lot of problems come from, because both sides have so much speed behind them. So you have one guy hitting 900 pound of blockers, head first. And this can cause great harm. So the NFL has now made that formation no longer legal in the game. This is part of the ongoing attempts to pay more attention to player safety.

One of the benefits of winning the Super Bowl is that you’ll be able to “go to Disney World” but also go to the White House and meet the President. I suppose that the different players probably don’t get the chance to sit down individually with the President and discuss the political issue of their choosing. But they get to meet him and get a little photo op. Yesterday’s meeting of the Steelers and the President was a nice meeting, where the President joked that he was, nevertheless, a Bears fan, but that he had rooted for them in the Super Bowl. The Steelers also met wounded soldiers and helped assemble care packages for those who are still on the battlefield.

When Tony Kornheiser took the mic in the broadcast booth last December, we didn’t think that it would be his last broadcast for Monday Night Football. No, he didn’t pass away, he just decided to go and try something else for awhile. He was a good commentator, but it turns out that he didn’t enjoy the job as much as we’d thought. Instead, we’ll get to see Jon Gruden, former coach of the Tampa Bay Bucs, in his place. Gruden worked in Tampa for seven years, if I recall correctly, and won a Super Bowl with them. He was let go in January after another underplayed year. But he knows the game and that’s the kind of person that Monday Night Football uses well!

When the Dallas Cowboys practice facility collapsed during a windstorm or tornado on May 2, there were some significant injuries, including one man who was paralyzed. There is now a small investigation as to whether the facility was too weak or anything else like that. They are looking forward to finding out whether the building was somehow poorly built. After all, it was only a few years ago when it was first built and they have very high standards for weather resistance, especially in North Texas where there are storms every year. There are also some government papers missing from the files on this building and this might become a problem for the team administration. Hopefully they can inspect it and make sure that any replacement facility for the Cowboys is safe, even in the case of large storms coming through.

One of Oakland’s best prospects for this next year was able to show some good speed and work in his first scrimmaging with the Raiders this week. In one of his first plays, Darrius Heyward-Bey dashed downfield and got a catch nice and fast. He’s looking like one of the best prospects this team has for the new season, and he knows it. And he also knows that he’s in a bigger world now, because he was quoted as saying “I know I’m not in college anymore” as he jogged back from the end of that place. It’s going to be an interesting year for Oakland in their current protracted rebuilding phase. They have many good new players this year from the draft and free agency so they might at least have something great to work with again!

The Vikings issues with Brett Favre is probably not over. Since almost none of the actual players are putting out statements or information regarding this issue, we have to consider the case not closed. But there is a kind of a unified understanding on the net today that he spoke with Childress, the coach of the Vikings, and said that he’s going to remain retired. But again, he hasn’t said anything, the Vikes haven’t said anything, nor has his agent said anything. And these reports could be based on a rumor that go echo-chambered around for a few days. While I like that this QB has given me something to write about in a long and sometimes dull offseason, we need to have something else soon!

Kurt Warner, who led the Cardinals to the NFC Championship and almost won the championship this last season, has been in the process rehabbing his knee. It was hard to tell that he might have had an injury at the time and he did a very good job of preventing it from bothering him all that time. But according to him and his doctors, he’s ahead of schedule on the rehab and will be doing a lot better once training camp and the season start. He will be hoping to bring his team all the way to the championship this year, and he’ll have to be right at the top of his game in order to do so. The Cardinals look good and the odds are probably up, mainly because of the season they just completed. So the expectations are high this time.

The soap opera might be in the spring offseason, with no new episodes being made at the moment. But there are rumors that new episodes of “Brett Farve: Quarterback” might be in the works. The New York Jets cut him this week after his fairly clear retirement a couple months back and they wont have to deal with his contract, and neither will he. But there were rumblings from our jilted star that he might have yet another comeback in him. There are some teams that are being discussed in this situation, most especially the Minnesota Vikings. When they started to suggest that they might be interested, he said “At this time, I’m retired.” Hardly a clarifying statement. This is where it stands now. If the Vikings got him, they would be a very improved team. It would also give him a chance to sock it to those Packers that he’s so bitter about. Perhaps a new chapter will come out this coming summer.