Detroit Free Press

Ihand the map of Sweden to Nick Lidstrom. I ask him to circle his home town. It's in the southern half of the country. "Vasteras," he says. "Very nice place.""And where is your teammate Tomas Holmstrom from?" I ask."Tomas?" he says, snickering. "He's from ...up north."I go to Holmstrom. I hand him the map of Sweden. He circles his hometown. It is indeed in the north. "Pieta," he says. "Very nice place.""And where is Lidstrom from?""Nick?" he says, rolling his eyes. "He's from ...down south."

* Detroit 28, Tampa Bay 10: The Bucs, having missed the playoffs, can't wait to end the season and get out in the sun. Wait a minute. They live in the sun. Pick vs. spread: Detroit.* San Diego 30, NY Giants 20: The Giants can't wait to finish this year and get the heck out of New York. But then, that goes for anyone who lives there. Pick vs. spread: San Diego.

There were four people interested in buying Mike Vernon's house. He had their names and numbers. One day, not too long ago, he told his wife, "Maybe we better call them." This is how you think when you're not playing. Brace for the worst."I figured they had no reason to keep me if I wasn't playing, so I'd be traded somewhere else," he says. "When that happens during the season, you get on a plane and your wife gets stuck with the movers. I was trying to help her out."

We laughed at him, poked fun at him, maybe whispered behind his back about those silly ties and those corny cheers he led. But deep down, we all felt we should have been a little more like him -- this strange, thin man with the thick glasses who wandered through the aisles of our lives, yelling happily at the top of his lungs.The Brow is gone. And the stadium just got very quiet.

LONDON -- Now that we're into the second week of Wimbledon, the question begs to be asked: Will we actually talk tennis instead of underwear?Not that underwear doesn't have its place. But usually that place is, well, under something. Based on the media here, you'd have thought it was worn on the outside -- particularly if it belongs to Anna Kournikova.

The last time the Red Wings went this far, his hair was dyed, it was red, white and brown. Looked like a half-gallon of supermarket ice cream. I felt like pouring hot fudge on his head."We only did that because someone said, 'Let's grow playoff beards,' " Shawn Burr now admits, "and I didn't have enough facial hair to grow one."Today, seven years later, Burr has facial hair. Not a lot. Enough for a blond mustache, which, thickness-wise, is somewhere between Larry Bird and Rik Smits. In other words, not completely finished. But then, neither is Burr.

Marcus Ray knows better. He's a senior, he's a captain, he had all last year to hang with his buddy Charles Woodson and witness, up close, the vultures that come swirling when you have NFL potential. He's seen fast talkers. He's seen the jewelry and the nice suits and the fast cars.