The Seattle Seahawks are running out of warm bodies for Friday night’s preseason matchup with the Oakland Raiders. QB Charlie Frye hurt his knee in Monday’s 18-17 loss to the Chargers; the injury isn’t considered serious, but it still throws Seattle’s QB situation into chaos for the Raiders matchup.

Seattle is 2-1 SU and 3-0 ATS this preseason, riding Frye’s arm through most of it while protecting Matt Hasselbeck (back) and Seneca Wallace (groin). Rookie Dalton Bell out of West Texas A&M could end up getting his first taste of NFL action on Friday.

The Raiders (1-2 SU, 1-1 ATS) are 3-point road dogs in this matchup. They’ve had some injury problems of their own this summer, and coach Lane Kiffin is responding by keeping his starters on the bench for the entire game. We’ll be treated instead to an interesting battle for the No. 3 wide receiver spot now that Drew Carter (knee) is out of the season.

Philadelphia Eagles’ RB Brian Westbrook

Running back is second only to quarterback in the hierarchy of football importance – and popularity. But a running back is highly dependent on his teammates; without a competent system surrounding him, the RB can’t put up the big numbers people equate with success: rushing yards gained.

In other words, those numbers are a bad way to evaluate talent. So let’s use the Defense-adjusted Yards Above Replacement (DYAR) numbers at Football Outsiders to determine who the Top 10 tailbacks were in 2007. We’ll also factor in receiving, another important part of the job position that the public overlooks:

1. Brian Westbrook, Philadelphia    523 DYAR
2. LaDainian Tomlinson, San Diego    400
3. Joseph Addai, Indianapolis        372
4. Adrian Peterson, Minnesota        325
5. Ronnie Brown, Miami            316
6. Frank Gore, San Francisco        240
7. Marion Barber, Dallas        237
8. Jamal Lewis, Cleveland        224
9. Maurice Jones-Drew, Jacksonville    223
10. Kevin Faulk, New England        209

It’s difficult to get very excited about what happens on the field during the NFL preseason. Naturally, Brett Favre is the exception. When he suits up for the New York Jets on Saturday to start against the Washington Redskins, it will be one of the biggest moments ever in August football.

If only they could have mustered that kind of excitement for preseason football north of the border. Five thousand Canadians showed up at the Rogers Center dressed up as empty seats for Thursday’s Pittsburgh Steelers-Buffalo Bills matchup. Overpriced tickets kept away many fans who might otherwise attend one of the upcoming regular-season games in Toronto.

Failing to sell out may have been a mild embarrassment for the league, but at least the game included the highlight of the preseason thus far: a 95-yard kick return for a touchdown by Bills first-round pick Leodis McKelvin. That’s the kind of play the Canadian fan base can appreciate.

Seattle Seahawks running back Shaun Alexander is rumored to be looking for a new home for the upcoming NFL football season. According to a report in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, the Seahawks are set to release Alexander as soon as his injured wrist has been cleared by doctors.

While many Hawks fans will be sad to see the popular player go, others will be relieved.

During the 2005 season Alexander earned the NFL MVP award for his numerous achievements on the year: In 2005 broke the franchise record for the most rushing yards in the Seattle Seahawks’ history. On November 13, 2005, scoring 3 touchdowns, Alexander became the first running back in NFL history to record 15 or more touchdowns in five consecutive seasons. Then on November 20, 2005, in San Francisco, Alexander became the first player in NFL History to score 19 rushing or receiving TDs in only 10 games. This feat eventually led to him breaking Priest Holmes record of 27 total touchdowns set in 2002, and his 27 rushing touchdowns also tied Holmes for the most in a single season. (Wikipedia)

But then it was all downhill from there.

After signing an 8-year $62 million contract (and scoring the cover of Madden NFL 07, a hugely popular video game), Alexander sustained a fractured wrist, then twisted his knee, then his ankle and then suffered a concussion.

Super Bowl XLII was a bit anticlimactic on the Strip. Betting at the Nevada books failed to reach nine figures as projected, coming in at $92.1 million. But don’t think for a second that means the NFL is losing its touch. According to a Harris Interactive poll taken last month, pro football is still the No. 1 choice of the American sports fan.

Not only that, pro football has gained in stature over the past 20 years, becoming twice as popular as the fading sport of baseball. College football, auto racing and hockey were next on the list.

What about basketball? Bad news for fans of the hardcourt: According to the poll, the NBA has slipped dramatically from the Michael Jordan years, when the league was more popular than college football. Now it ranks equally with golf, as does college hoops. Try taking that poll in March instead of January and see what happens.

The story in the NFC is like the book of the AFC movie: same concept, but not quite as enjoyable. The Green Bay Packers are the best team in the senior circuit according to efficiency (and the most profitable at 13-3-1 ATS), but instead of playing the No. 2 Dallas Cowboys for the conference title, they get the upstart New York Giants (+7) after Big Blue bounced Dallas from the playoffs.

The Giants are on a Chargeresque 6-1 ATS run as the team gels under first-year defensive coordinator Steve Spagnuolo. Green Bay hasn’t been as stout on defense lately, but the Packers still have a strong front seven to match their imposing offensive line. It’s definitely a better line than what Tampa Bay or Dallas offered, good news for Brett Favre fans. I’m not confident Green Bay will cover; I like the under to make some cold, cold cash Sunday night at Lambeau Field.

San Diego Coach Norv Turner has to be one of the happiest and proudest dudes in the NFL right now. His Chargers (a team he just took over at the start of the season) shocked football fans everywhere. Very few people thought the Chargers could win one playoff game…let alone a game against the defending Super Bowl champions — the Indianapolis Colts. They were the underdogs going into that matchup and they were walking into enemy territory (the RCA Dome). Still, they proved the critics wrong and rallied back from being down four times throughout the game. A gutsy effort? Hell yeah!

“I think we put that thing to rest, that’s done forever,” Turner said of the Chargers’ efforts. “I’ve never been around a more gutsy performance.”

To make matters even more challenging, the Chargers were forced to finish the game without two of their key players — quarterback Philip Rivers and running back LaDainian Tomlinson — who both left with knee injuries. According to the doctors, Rivers injured his medial collateral ligament after completing a 56-yard screen pass to Darren Sproles for a touchdown on the final play of the third quarter (backup QB Billy Volek stepped in and went 3/4 for 48 yards and punched in a 1-yard touchdown to win the game). Tomlinson is nursing a bruised knee and is still listed as questionable, but he’s telling reporters that he’s going to do everything within his power to play on Sunday.

“I think I’ll be ready,” Tomlinson said.

Tomlinson is going to be spending a great deal of time with the team’s trainers this week in order to get as healthy as he can come game day. “I’m going to do whatever I can to be out there,” he said, “and hopefully, I will be. I’ll listen to what they want me to do and work hard, but I think I can do it if I just give it a little rest, too.”

Will Tom Brady and the New England Patriots be ready for the super charged-up Bolts?

The Pats could very well be on their way to their fourth Super Bowl trip in seven years. But first they’ve got to get past the Chargers. (I know…it sounds unbelievable. This one should be a walk in the park for the perfect Pats and most of the sportsbooks have the Pats favored by a couple of touchdowns.) Still…we’re talking about a Cinderella Story in the making. I mean it isn’t entirely impossible for the Chargers to beat the Patriots… no one else has been able to all season…but then we’re talking about the playoffs here. And as we’ve seen…anything can happen in the playoffs.
“It’s a one-game season,” Belichick said. “One team moves on, one team goes home, so I don’t think anything that’s happened in the past has all that much bearing on it. It’s going to be whatever team is able to perform the best next Sunday.”

Best time to get your bets in on next Sundays Patriots vs. Chargers game is right now!

The NFL’s senior circuit has repaired its sullied reputation with the revival of the Dallas Cowboys and the Green Bay Packers. Both should advance to the NFC championship, and it really shouldn’t be much of a contest. But the New York Giants and the Seattle Seahawks have defied expectations all season.

The Giants aren’t even in the same class as Dallas (-7.5) when it comes to productivity. According to the latest efficiency rankings at Football Outsiders, which discount New York’s slow start, the Giants are No. 21 in the league including the playoffs. Dallas is No. 7. New York, quite simply, has been lucky.

No. 5 Green Bay (-8) will enjoy a smaller performance gap against the No. 8 Seahawks, who crushed a weak NFC West for the fourth year in a row. But Seattle will be playing in an unfamiliar environment – say it with me – the frozen tundra of Lambeau Field. I’ll take chalk over luck any day.

Patriots’ QB Tom Brady and receiver Randy Moss are both aiming for NFL records this Saturday. But a perfect season would be the icing on the cake.

For the first time in the history of the NFL three networks will be televising the same game: NFL Network, CBS and NBC will all be showing the Pats vs. Giants game on Dec. 29th as Tom Brady hopes to lead his team to a first-ever (not since 1972, anyway) perfect season.

Not only is this three-way good news for the networks but it’s also great news for football fans across the country; without the deal much of the U.S. would not have been able to see the game because of the NFL’s limited cable reach.

The Pats are 14-point favorites in this matchup.

NOTE: Tom Brady will also be gunning for another record on Saturday: most touchdown passes in one season; while Pats’ receiver Randy Moss will be looking to break Jerry Rice’s record of most TD catches in one season. Brady’s 48 touchdown passes are one shy of the record set by Peyton Manning in 2004, while Moss’ 21 TD catches are one shy of the standard by Rice of the San Francisco 49ers in 12 games in 1987.

Come on. Who really believes in this? Yeah, OK, knowing that a pretty girl is watching you play may be a distraction. But doesn’t that kind of crap end when you get out of high school?

Jessica Simpson had about as much to do with  Dallas’ loss to Philly last week as the price of a boob job. And we don’t mean to imply that Miss Daisy Duke is anything but 100% natural. But the main reasons for Romo’s dismal performance vs. the Eagles were the Philly defense and a sore thumb on Mr. Tony’s throwing hand.

Romo bounced back with a decent performance in a win at Carolina Saturday night. But the biggest concern now for Dallas and Romo is the health of Terrell Owens, who suffered a sprained ankle vs. the Panthers. That, as much as anything else, will have an effect on the postseason fortunes of the Dallas Cowboys, not whether some hot blond is watching from a luxury box.