- YARDBARKER (via NO GUTS, NO GLORY) notes that it was a tough first night in jail for former Giants’ receiver Plaxico Burress. Apparently one of the other inmates yelled out, “The Giants suck!� Inmates, they have no regard for anyone’s feelings…

- DRAFT ZOO highlights the Week 4 games to watch in college football, while also breaking down the keys to victory for certain teams.

- UNCOACHED noticed that the University of Tennessee dance team likes to party.

- REAL CLEAR SPORTS lists the top 10 surprises of the 2009 MLB season.

- THE BLEACHER REPORT writes that in the race for quarterback supremacy, the NFC is closing in fast with signal callers like Drew Brees, Eli Manning, Jay Cutler and Matt Ryan.

Around this time last year, I compiled a top 10 list of Offensive Rookie of the Year candidates and ranked Falcons quarterback Matt Ryan No. 1. He went on to throw for 3,440 yards, 16 touchdowns and led Atlanta to a remarkable playoff appearance, all while making me look like some kind of OROY-predicting genius.

Of course, I also listed Titans running back Chris Johnson at No. 7 behind less-productive names like Darren McFadden (No. 4), Kevin Smith (No. 5) and Rashard Mendenhall (No. 6), hence making me look like some kind of OROY-predicting moron.

To see my top 10 ranking from last year, click here. And for my top 10 ranking of the offensive rookie of the year candidates for this season, see below.

1. Knowshon Moreno, RB, Broncos
While the knee injury he suffered in Denver’s preseason opener is a concern, Moreno is expected to be ready for Week 1 and will be given every opportunity to shine in ’09. Granted, he’s stuck in a crowded backfield and could be eased into the season after hurting his knee, but he has the potential to be an every-down back at some point this year. He was the most complete back in April’s draft, has outstanding vision and should get plenty of opportunities to make plays in Josh McDaniels’ shotgun-heavy offense. He’ll also benefit from running behind the Broncos’ stellar O-line. Expecting him to put up rushing numbers similar to those of Chris Johnson (1,228 rushing yards) last year might be a little ambitious. But if Moreno stays healthy, a 400-plus yard receiving season in McDaniels’ system is certainly doable.

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Players like Matt Ryan, Chris Johnson and Joe Flacco have already pulled a seat up to the proverbially NFL dinner table after turning in solid rookie seasons. But which second-year players (who didn’t have great success in their rookie campaigns) are set for breakout seasons in 2009?

Here are 10 that jump out to me:

(Note: I consider players like Ryan, Johnson, Flacco, Jonathan Stewart, Matt Forte and Steve Slaton as already having breakout seasons, so you won’t find them on this list.)

In no particular order:

1. Darren McFadden, RB, Raiders
Justin Fargas is a favorite of head coach Tom Cable’s in Oakland, but the Raiders didn’t select McFadden with the fourth overall pick in last year’s draft not to take full advantage of his talents. Thus far this summer, the Raiders have lined McFadden up not only at running back, but also at receiver and even quarterback. With Cable calling the offensive plays this season, McFadden is set to see plenty of opportunities to excel in Oakland’s offense and as long as he can stay healthy (a turf toe injury slowed him down last season) the former top 5 pick could emerge as the Raiders’ most potent offensive weapon. The one part of his game that he’ll need to improve on, however, is his ability to run between the tackles. If he can’t, the hard-running Fargas will steal plenty of McFadden’s touches this season.

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Rick Reilly puts together a top 10 list of the best sporting events to see live and I couldn’t disagree more with his top 5.

5. Tour de France — Like trying to get to 20 Super Bowls in 23 days, but worth it. Pick a climbing stage, bring friends and a bike, ride the course in the morning before the race (you’re allowed), have lunch in a hamlet atop some exquisite Alp, watch the heart-skipping finish, have a bottle of Bordeaux, spend the night, bike down in the morning. Rinse and repeat.

4. North Carolina vs. Duke at Cameron Indoor Stadium — Fans pulling the hair of Tar Heels players as they inbound the ball; students camping out for months in K-Ville for tix; the hilarious chants from the Crazies, who once yelled at Grant Hill’s parents, “One more kid!”; public school vs. private; an electricity that makes the Final Four and its corporate crowd seem like a three-day seminar on bunions.

3. Wimbledon — There’s nothing in America within a par-5 of it. It’s a Windsor Castle garden party with grunting. It’s queens and cobblers, cheek to cheek, over grounds so huge it would take you and your Toro a month to mow. It’s a phantasmagoria of color — greens and purples and yellows — and that’s just Bud Collins’ pants.

2. Kentucky Derby — My life’s aspiration was to be Damon Runyon, and the Derby is as close as I’ll get. With its wooden stands, elegant barns, men in seersucker suits and women in hats you could land an F-14 on, it’s 1927 everywhere you look. Don’t miss the fillies the day before in the Kentucky Oaks or the Barnstable Brown Gala or the awful race-day breakfast at Wagner’s Pharmacy, across from Gate 3. If you hear a tip there, book it, because everyone around you is a trainer, an owner or a groom.

1. Masters — Sneak into the clubhouse for the peach cobbler and steal into the Eisenhower Cabin, where some paintings are actually by Eisenhower. Do the par-3 tourney Wednesday and Arnie’s first tee shot Thursday; see the droop-shouldered cut players driving out Magnolia Lane Friday, Amen Corner Saturday and golf history Sunday. Because Augusta already has most of the money printed in America, it has not sold out an inch. There are no ads, just flowers. No luxury boxes, just $1.50 egg salad sandwiches. Timeless.

You know that friend that we all have? You know the one – the guy/girl that only likes things that are not in the mainstream? All of his or her favorite bands are underground and all the movies that he or she likes are ones that nobody else enjoyed because they, “just didn’t get it.â€� We’re okay with these friends, but we know damn well that the only reason they like certain things is because they’re not in the mainstream.

Yeah, that’s Reilly in this piece.

I’ve never been to the Masters, Kentucky Derby, Wimlbedon or Tour de France, so as far as I know they’re the most thrilling events of all-time to see live. But I’m more focused on Reilly here. Was he just trying to be different with this list? Is he trying to separate himself from other top 10 lists? Because I find it incredibly odd that he left out the main four (MLB, NFL, NBA, NHL) out of his top 5.

If he did so just to be different, I find him more annoying than every before.

AskMen.com put together a ranking of the top 10 sports movie pep talks of all-time.

Here are the site’s top 3:

1. Kurt Russell as Herb Brooks in “Miracle�

2. Al Pacino as Tony D’Amato in “Any Given Sunday�

3. Gene Hackman as Norman Dale in “Hoosiers�

I love Russell’s speech in “Miracle� for the obvious reasons, but something about Pacino’s monologue in “Any Given Sunday� hits me hard every time I watch it. Maybe it’s because of the movie or because Pacino is one of the greatest actors to ever grace the big screen, but that “inches speech� is the best in my opinion. No actor can say the word “f**king� better than Pacino.

Training camp is still a month away but you don’t need daily reports from the grueling two-a-day sessions to see what players are going to have the heat turned up on them this season. I’ve complied a list of 10 players (in no particular order) who, not necessarily the same reasons, face make or break seasons in ’09.

1. Tony Romo, QB, Dallas Cowboys
If Romo doesn’t get the Cowboys to the playoffs in 2009 will Jerry Jones look for other options at quarterback in 2010? No. But if you read between the lines, the Cowboys jettisoned Terrell Owens this offseason so that Romo will have every opportunity to be the team’s most influential leader and hopefully go from being a great quarterback to one of the elite. While it might not technically be a make or break season for Romo, his career is certainly at a crossroads. Romo’s numbers last year were solid – 3,448 yards, 26 TDs, 91.4 QB Rating – but his play faded over the last month of the season and the Cowboys imploded. Since then, Romo’s work ethic, offseason dedication and leadership skills have been questioned and it appears as though the QB’s career has come to a fork in the road. If he continues on the path his currently on, he might put up decent numbers and lead the Cowboys to the playoffs a couple more times before his days are done. That’s certainly not bad, but Jones and the rest of the Cowboy faithful want Romo to be extraordinary and if he completely dedicates himself to the game, maybe he can take this talented team to the next level. One thing’s for sure – with T.O. out of the way, this is now Romo’s team and it’s up to him where he and the Cowboys go from here.

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- Uncoached.com lists the 10 actresses who can probably play sports well, including Jessica Biel, Gabrielle Union and the mega hot Eliza Dushku.

- Sophia Rossi was on the Howard Stern show this morning and admitted to doing the horizontal polka with Rays’ DH Pat Burrell. And according to SPORTSbyBROOKS.com, she didn’t necessarily have great things to say about the former Phillies’ outfielder.

- The Love of Sports.com ponders the question, what if athletes weren’t athletes? What would they be doing now?

- AWFUL ANNOUNCING has the lowdown on why Cubs’ manager Lou Pinella is so angry these days.

RealClearSports.com compiles 10 reasons why baseball’s spring training beats football’s training camp.

Downtime
Normally, there is no down time during an NFL training camp, unless you count sitting in a large tub full of ice. Players are usually so exhausted that any and all free time they have is spent either eating or sleeping.

Baseball just simply isn’t as demanding as that, which allows them to work on some of the game’s finer points, like perfecting the “hot-foot,� determining exactly when to shove a towel full of shaving cream into a teammate’s face during a live TV interview, and everyone’s favorite, learning exactly how to place a bubble-gum bubble on your pitcher’s head.

Pressure
Imagine if an NFL wide receiver went all of camp without catching pass in any of the scrimmages or games. For a month in game-competition, every pass that came his way either sailed through his hands or bounced off his chest. To top it off, he was often running the wrong routes and missing blocks. The chances of him making it past cuts and onto the final 53-man roster would be slim to none.

Translate that to baseball, where the opening day starting lineups are usually already set before February even begins. A player could have an awful spring: terrible at-bats, poor fielding and too many strikeouts, but come April, he’s in the starting lineup (just ask Ichiro, who struggled last spring and started 0-for-21).

Practices
Seemingly as soon as a football practice begins, players are in full pads, flying around and running into each at full speed. This continues for hours at a time, in extreme summer heat, and often, twice-a-day.

Baseball practices, on the other hand, feature fielding fungos on perfectly manicured fields, hitting balls of a tee, first base running drills (seriously), covering first base on sacrifice bunt roughly 3000 times and doing whatever it is those Red Sox are doing in that picture – it seems highly likely that one could go through an entire practice without breaking a sweat.

Not RealClearSports.com’s best work. The three reasons listed above are supposed to be in favor of spring training, but I’d say every one of them favors training camp.

If you’ve been keeping tabs on the latest news surrounding the 2009 NFL Scouting Combine, which runs February 18-24, you already know that there are plenty of rumors to sink your teeth into.

Perhaps the two biggest rumors are that Georgia quarterback Matthew Stafford, who could go to the Detroit Lions with the first overall pick, will not workout at the combine. Instead, he’ll wait until his Pro Day in March to show off his passing skills, which might irk some teams with high draft selections in April. Why should a team drop millions of dollars in guaranteed money on a player that won’t even throw a single pass at the combine?

The thought process behind the decision is that since Stafford is already the most polished quarterback in the draft and should be the first signal caller taken off the board, why risk a bad performance at the combine? Instead, any team that wants to see him throw, can do so at his Pro Day in Athens, which no doubt makes for a more comfortable environment for Stafford.

Another combine story that has emerged is that Texas Tech wide receiver Michael Crabtree might not even be in Indianapolis this week as he feels that he has too much to lose by working out at the combine. That means teams that want to see him run the 40-yard dash will have to wait for his Pro Day in late March. Apparently Crabtree has been training with former Olympic sprinter Michael Johnson and maybe he doesn’t feel that he would be ready in time to run the forty at the combine.

With two of the bigger prospects not expected to workout this week, who should fans keep an eye on as the combine kicks off on Wednesday? Below are 10 names that are sure to cause a buzz this week in Indy. Some might dramatically improve their draft stock with a great workout, while others might doom their stock with a bad showing.

1. Aaron Curry, LB, Wake Forest
Curry is arguably the best defensive prospect in the draft, so that alone is reason to pay attention to how he performs at the combine. But an even better reason is that he could go No. 1 to the Lions, who are in massive need of defensive talent, especially at linebacker. Many pundits believe the Lions will take Georgia quarterback Matthew Stafford with the first overall pick, but new head coach Jim Schwartz is a defensive guy (he was the Titans’ former D-coordinator) and Curry is versatile in that he can play either outside or inside in a 4-3 scheme. Linebackers are generally safer choices in the first round, which is even more reason to believe Detroit could go with Curry at No. 1.

Forbes.com ranked the top 10 best college football towns in America.

1. Ann Arbor, Mich.
University of Michigan
At a time when most quality of life news out of Michigan is focused on Detroit’s woes, there are a lot of things to like about Ann Arbor–even if the hometown Wolverines missed a bowl this season. A four-bedroom home runs just $303,750, while median salaries are $51,232, making this the 14th most affordable market on our list. Schools ranked eighth overall, and Ann Arbor has the fourth lowest crime rate of any college on our list.

2. Palo Alto, Calif.
Stanford University
Those who follow the Director’s Cup know Stanford always seems to finish at the top of the table, and last year was no exception. A family-size home costs big bucks, however–a cool $1.67 million, to be exact. Though with venture capital and technology firms around Stanford bringing in big money, the median earner in Palo Alto makes $119,046, the most of any college town on our list. Schools ranked first, and the crime rate was the second lowest. If it weren’t for the 42nd ranking in housing affordability, living on the Farm would have ranked first overall.

3. Madison, Wis.
University of Wisconsin
Both the state capital and a legendary party city, Madison is one of the Midwest’s best college towns. While on the courts and playing fields, the Badgers mustered an 18th ranking in the Director’s Cup, Madison performed stronger in our quality of life rankings: seventh in affordability ($264,950 for a four-bedroom home; $50,852 median income) and 13th in our score of crime rate and education quality.

4. State College, Pa.
Penn State University
While most people aren’t sure what exactly Penn State’s mascot, a Nittany Lion, is, the teams bearing that logo finished ninth in last year’s Director’s Cup. Home prices for a four-bedroom house are $307,500. Public schools rank second of the college towns measured (even though this is technically a borough), and State College had the lowest violent crime rate of college towns measured, according to FBI data.

5. Lexington, Ky.
University of Kentucky
If you like basketball and horse racing, there’s no better place in the world to live than Lexington, Ky. Besides the university’s hoops team and the tracks around the city, there is quality affordable housing to be found. A four-bedroom, 2,200-square-foot home costs just $234,500, while median earners make $45,622 a year.

I know Ohio State fans won’t like seeing Ann Arbor listed at number one, but let me say from personal experience that the atmosphere surrounding Michigan Stadium is unique. (Not to say the other college towns mentioned on this list aren’t, but there’s just a nostalgic feeling about Ann Arbor.)

I’m sure every town listed has something special about it. I always think about that one MasterCard commercial where the two friends travel to all of the MLB parks over the summer and how cool it would be to hit up a ton of sports towns throughout the course of a year.