10. Christmas came early for Mavs fans, as Dallas ended the Heat's 12-game winning streak with an entertaining 98-96 victory last night in Miami. My wrap-up is forthcoming, but until then, Wilonsky over at Unfair Park showed us the team's official Christmas gift -- Dirk Nowitzki and others wearing reindeer antlers and lights while struggling to sing along with "Grandma got run over by a reindeer," or as Nowitzki says, "Grandma got run over by a truck."
9. The School Sisters of Notre Dame inherited an old Honus Wagner baseball card from the brother of a deceased nun after he died earlier this year, and it sold for $220,000 in an auction hosted by Dallas-based Heritage Auction Galleries. But when the winning bidder never ponied up the dough, someone at Heritage reached out to Philadelphia cardiologist Dr. Nicholas DePace early this month to see if he'd be interested, and he agreed to add it to his impressive sports memorabilia collection that includes game-worn uniforms of Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Jackie Robinson and Wilt Chamberlain and a game ball from the Giants-Colts 1958 NFL championship game. Even though I used to be a big card collector, it's crazy enough that one guy would agree to pay a couple hundred grand for a damaged piece of cardboard, but two people? These guys have way too much money, although apparently the first bidder didn't have the spare change lying around to close the deal.
8. The Biz of Baseball evaluated the high-dollar contracts inked by Cliff Lee and Jayson Werth this offseason and made the case that former Rangers outfielder Rusty Greer would have signed a larger contract than Werth's $126 million deal if he had been a free agent this year at 27 years old. Just another way of saying Werth's deal was one of the biggest shockers in recent memory.
7. Times must be tough for former Super Bowl MVP and Cowboys cornerback Larry Brown. After selling his Super Bowl ring, Brown sold his copy of Super Bowl XL Opus, which happened to be the MVP Edition -- one of only 400 made with signatures of all the living Super Bowl MVPs through Super Bowl XL. The asking price from the new owner? How about $24,999 or your best offer? Again, anyone willing to pay that much cash for an effin' book has too much of it.
6. Terrell Owens' season is over after he had surgery to repair the torn meniscus cartilage in his left knee suffered in the Bengals' 19-7 win on Sunday, which ended the team's 10-game losing streak. Like most of the NFL, I thought the 37-year-old Owens had very little if anything left in his tank, but he actually had a very productive season in Cincinnati. Surprisingly, Owens wraps up the year with 72 catches for 983 yards and nine touchdowns. I'm glad he wasn't brought back to Dallas, but, seriously, how much could you have made betting that Owens would outperform Miles Austin through 15 weeks?
5. About that massive hole in the roof at the Metrodome? Well, it turns out that part of the fix included engineers using a shotgun to rupture a roof panel under stress from accumulated ice. Why a shotgun? "By using a precision shot, the engineers caused the panel to fail in an area away from the clamps that hold the tarp to the roof's frame, said Pat Milan, a spokesman for the Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission. That makes repairs easier."
4. It's been a tough year for Mike Modano in his first season away from the Stars' organization. After scoring just two goals and posting eight points for the Red Wings in 20 games before suffering a wrist injury against Columbus on November 26, now we know his timetable for return isn't until March. Let's hope Modano's able to come back healthy and is able to contribute -- just as long as it's not against the Stars.
3. Speaking of the Stars, ESPN's E.J. Hradek expects Dallas to keep Brad Richards, a free agent at the end of the year, throughout the season instead of dealing him before the trade deadline. Hradek also speculates that "he may opt to re-sign once the current ownership mess is settled." One thing I heard several times during my coverage of the Rangers' auction from insiders was that the Stars are likely headed down a similar path -- bankruptcy and then an auction. If that's the case, Richards is likely a goner.
2. The Cowboys are thinking about putting Tony Romo on injured reserve. The question is: Why didn't they do this a long time ago? I know they were hoping to get him back for the final two games, but I have no idea what that would accomplish other than the opportunity for Romo to re-injure himself in meaningless games. Using his roster spot to audition players for next year always seemed like the more prudent move.
1. Brett Favre left last night's 40-14 drubbing against the Bears with a concussion. After the game, Favre talked as though he had played his last game and joked that he should have left the game following the Vikings' opening scoring drive. "I probably should've went straight up the tunnel after that," he said.
He actually should have never even come out of the tunnel this year, passing for a career-low 2,509 yards with just 11 touchdowns and 19 interceptions and letting an injury stop his Cal Ripken-like consecutive games played streak. Favre could have ridden off into the sunset after perhaps his best season last year and ended the streak on his terms, but, like several times before, he delayed retirement and came back. My questions to you, dear readers, are: 1. Did Favre tarnish his legacy by staying too long? and 2. Sure, Favre has his name on nearly every record in the book for quarterbacks, but where does he rank among the all-time greats?
