Detroit Free Press

I remember the good old days, when Denver was a place your plane stopped on the way to the West Coast?"Hey, nice mountains you got here," you'd say to some cowboy-hatted local who was hanging around the airport.And he'd pause for a minute, spit some tobacco and say, "Yep."Then you'd get back on the plane and go someplace else.Back then, the city had only one big sports franchise, a football team, the Broncos. They wore orange uniforms and were lucky if they won four games a season. Five victories, they held a parade.

The Lions play their last game of the season tonight, and then we find out just how much Christmas spirit Wayne Fontes can count on.Fontes and owner William Clay Ford have always had a good relationship, but a season like 1996 could make Romeo and Juliet sleep in separate bedrooms.So perhaps Wayne is looking to tweak Mr. Ford's holiday cheer. Why, I can just envision their meeting Christmas Eve, when Wayne will suggest -- before they do anything rash -- that they share a few Christmas carols.Christmas carols?

I went away for a while, and now I'm back. I always know when it's time to come back because I'm usually traveling far from home and I see something on the news that makes me yell, "You've got to be kidding!"So there I was, down in Mexico, the surf rolling in, the margaritas flowing like a Las Vegas lobby fountain. And I picked up a day-old copy of the Los Angeles Times and I saw a report that said Red Wing goalie Mike Vernon, the hero of the Stanley Cup, the Conn Smythe Trophy winner, was about to be traded to the San Jose Sharks for a couple of draft picks.

All lies and jest, still a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the restPaul Simon She came in with pomp, she left with circumstance.At her wedding, cameras rolled, and thousands cheered outside Westminster Abbey. At her funeral, cameras rolled, and millions mourned outside Westminster Abbey.There were tears from strangers at both events, just as there was sympathy from strangers at her crumbling love life and outrage from strangers at her death last week in a car wreck in Paris.

WIMBLEDON, England -- Don't bury the male species yet.Oh, I know, these days men's tennis is as exciting as a traffic cone. They serve, they mumble, they cash the check.But out of the rain, the clouds and the lengthy delays of this long and winding Wimbledon, we have emerged with a terrific semifinal cast of men, all of whom are scheduled to play today. (True, "scheduled to play" at Wimbledon means, "Bring a raincoat and a deck of cards." But what can you do?)

LOOK, THERE'S your father, sitting in the rightfield seats, handing you a hot dog and telling you be careful, don't get mustard all over your shirt. And over there, near the third-base line, that was your grandma, holding her little pencil and writing names delicately in her scorecard, "Kaline, RF, Horton, LF, Freehan, C . . ."And out there, in the bleachers, wasn't that your first girlfriend, looking the way she did back then, her hair in a ponytail, her eyes feigning interest as you pointed out the players and proudly quoted their statistics?

The game was in the final minute, the Colorado goalie was pulled, and finally, finally, there really was nothing standing between the team and the dream. Brendan Shanahan raced to the loose puck, took good healthy aim and put that baby in the open basket, unleashing a flood of noise that could be heard all the way to the Rocky Mountains.

This weekend marks the NFL draft, and across the country, phone lines are buzzing. Of course, not every conversation is as fruitful as the next ..."OK, Rocky, gimme the news. What have you found?""Well, boss, scouting ain't as easy as it used to be.""You're already making excuses?""I'm just saying there's good news and bad news with these 'sleeper' picks. Take this quarterback prospect I got out of South Carolina.""What's the good news?""He's a combination of Peyton Manning and Ryan Leaf.""What's the bad news?"