Roger Goodell has instituted rules against videotaping opposing teams, he has been the league's disciplinarian to a whole host of guys who can't drive sober or keep their hands off their women. He's even concerned and set up a mechanism to make sure that players don't use gang signals when they make a great play. Meanwhile the last two weeks has been dominated by the Favre vs. Green Bay drama and he's been too busy to do anything I guess. He has finally decided to take some action and since the commissioner can't tell a player to get reinstated, he did the only thing he could do: yell at the Packers.

Thus today the news is that the Packers are shopping Favre all around the league; and not just to AFC clubs. The problem for Favre now is that whether or not he wanted to come back to Green Bay, the only people he thought he could count on to pull for him have turned on him. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has expressed itself in print and it has taken the side of the club. Like me, they are castigating the QB about his refusal to finalize reinstatement papers and continue to bash the club for refusing to commit themselves to him. This standoff is now more than a week old and didn't get fixed or even close to fixed this past weekend when Favre was in Green Bay. He honored his commitment to his long time center to introduce him as he was inducted into the Packers Hall of Fame. While there no one budged off their current position of telling the other to move first. I had hoped that an in person appearance would make the protagonists in this painful drama start to write the last act. I was wrong. This latest activity does not mean that Favre won't be with the Packers again. It just means that the club is seeing what it can get for him and who the QB would agree to go to. It does not mean that Favre will even play again. Any team that is considering taking a flyer on him has seen his behavior and how he parses sentences worse than any flip flopping politician. Who is to say that he won't up and quite on someone? Or better yet, use his club issues cell phone to try and find a better solution for himself once he has been traded somewhere. Beware out there, just beware.

The Giants and the Dolphins took their lumps and have moved on from eras in which they featured Jeremy Shockey and Jason Taylor on the field and in marketing campaigns. In the way that all players are ultimately expendable depending on the make up of the rest of your team, these men are gone and some of the reasons had to do with their dissatisfaction. Were they productive on the field? Absolutely, although Shockey's severe injury knocked him out of the 2007 season at a point when the Giants needed to win out to get into the playoffs. They did just that and some with access to Giants' sources were reporting that Shockey had become a problem. He was always a fiery guy and a possession receiver with grit and guts. But it appeared that working with young Eli Manning was just too much for him to take. He started berating the guy and made the huddle a place of tension instead of a place of calm. Quarterbacks need to have the belief and trust of their teammates to properly operate and give themselves the chance to do great things on the field. It seemed that once Manning had put in a couple of years and still didn't seem to be clicking on all cylinders Shockey wasn't happy. It also didn't help that Plaxico Burress and Amani Toomer kept looking like better targets for young Manning. But the coincidence of the Giants consecutive game streak, on the road, all the way to the Super Bowl was the last straw for the team and Shockey. When he was spotted in a suite in street clothes rather than on the sidelines with his mates it was the first time I'd ever seen such a display of disdain from an active player. He'll get New Orleans a great new target to take attention away from their talented wide receivers. With a healthy Deuce McAllister in the backfield, the Saints should be a contender again.

Jason Taylor's problems all stemmed from a tug of war or tug of wills between him and new head of football operations of the Dolphins, one Bill Parcells. We know that good old Bill wanted his star to be at the OTA's and mini-camps for appearance sake and to set a tone that the guy who is your marquee player knows who is in charge; that nothing, not even fame and fortune in Hollywood can compare to that. Taylor wouldn't bite and the tension was palpable in Miami. He wasn't going to hold out or even hope for an apology from Parcells who reportedly treated Taylor with disdain when he popped his head in to say hi during a hiatus from filming Dancing With the Stars. But the heavens shone on him instead and he ends up with a playoff contender as the new mainstay of their defense. The owner of the team loves guys like Taylor and from the tone of his press conference yesterday you can tell why.

Now, you think Brett Favre will get this kind of luck and be parachuted out of his disgruntled state into a new happy home? Nah!

Sunday brought another race in which Danica Patrick did not finish first. But, it was yet another opportunity for her to express her displeasure with the on-track behavior of a fellow driver. After Saturday's practice session she went over to the area occupied by one Milka Duno a fellow female driver. Apparently Ms. Duno was ignoring Danica's attempts to pass her on the track and the way she did it made Danica think she was in need of a talking to. This isn't the first time Patrick has had words with her colleagues on the Indy Car circuit. A couple of months ago, she was videotaped in her flame retardant driving suit storming down the track to try and get into the face of Ryan Briscoe after he had seemingly cut her off in the pits as they were heading back onto the track. Apparently he breached the rules of pit row by not yielding to the cars already heading out and the contact with her knocked her out of the race. Steamed is not the word for how she felt about her day ending early and she wanted Briscoe to know it. As race security officers tried to keep up with her and talk her out of getting to his pit area to confront him, she ignored their pleas. They prevailed however and she was stopped before she could get to her destination.

This weekend's dust up didn't feature her angrily walking towards Ms. Duno but it did reveal Danica being a bit put off and asking in a brusque manner about whether or not Milka had seen Patrick on the track or if she was just being rude about blocking her path to pass. Milka didn't like the attitude or the topic. She threw a towel at Danica not once but twice and stormed away. Now, remember, this happened after a practice session, not during or after the actual race (Patrick finished 12th and Duno, 25th). But the video is everywhere. There were no punches thrown, no spit flying, no screaming and yelling but it is not just a You Tube must, it is a front page espn.com piece.

On a day that Greg Norman loses the British Open in another last round collapse, the baseball pennant races are back in full swing and the NFL's big news is that Jason Taylor got traded to the Redskins, we have a one minute video of 2 beautiful women in track suits exchanging angry words. Think it has something to do with the allure of women fighting....even when they aren't in bikinis or mud? I understand that titillation is part of the marketing campaign for Ms. Patrick and she has done some swimsuit posing of her own. But a disagreement about track etiquette between these women is noteworthy only after you know who won the race or that there was a race at all. Indy Car will live or die by this and better figure out whether this is good or bad for their sport. As for Danica Patrick, the worst that can happen is that her racing becomes secondary to her temper flare ups. But then again if she were a man, say, Tony Stewart, it would make her the idol of hot shot car fans.

Are you kidding me? Greg Norman is cruising at even par and in second place after the second round of the Open Championship. I'm not much for blonds (sorry...)but he was always an exception for me. His style was swash buckling, his swing was monstrously fast and after he started his own clothing line, there was that hat that made him stand out on any course. And 15 years after he won over there the last time he's looking like he could withstand the pressure of a weekend at a major. Greg Norman knows pressure. This isn't pressure for him. In 1996 he melted down in front of an audience of millions on TV and tens of thousands in attendance at Augusta National as he lost a 6 shot lead at the Masters tournament on the last day. What made it worse...if that is possible, was that he lost to the guy who was playing in the same twosome as him and he watched as his green jacket was put on Nick Faldo, a long time friend of his.

Norman was never the same after that. And at 41 he was considered to be on the down slope of his career anyway. But that incident made it a reality. Pressure for him is playing out a nasty divorce in public from his wife of 20+ years and having to pay her more than $100 million. Why was he willing to do that? Chris Evert was waiting for him. They recently married in a much ballyhooed wedding in the Bahamas which they somehow sealed off from paparazzi. They are pretty much still on their honeymoon. When I watch him play now he is no longer swashbuckling, his swing is still pure and sweet but his club head speed is slower and he smiles a lot less. But he also swears less and isn't flailing around beating the ground with his clubs as we see Tiger Woods do so often. And his concentration is something to marvel at. Chrissie must be good for him.

And why not? She is more of a champion in her sport of tennis than he ever was in his prime on the golf circuit. Plus, she was known as the "ice queen" for her emotionless and focused thrashing of her opponents. Norman was quoted after today's round as saying that she helps him relax after a round so that he isn't stressing about it all. I'm sure that is true since they are on their honeymoon but I'm certain it also has to do with her calming effect on him. The worst is over and he's in Part 2 of his life with a partner that understands what it's like to be a world figure in your sport and how to keep on winning. OK then, let's see if the Shark attacks this weekend; it's not safe to go into the water my friends.

Remember the Curt Gowdy line from the 1988 World Series after the famous Kirk Gibson home run? "I can't believe what I just saw" is what was uttered. Well that was what I said this morning when I saw video of Brett Favre in a sports jacket on the red carpet here in LA for the Espy's taping. He was there to accept an award and was forced to have to sit through the usual host kidding from the stage. He wasn't happy about it as Justin Timberlake tweaked him a bit but what did he expect? He has dominated every sports news cycle for more than a week. Heck, he's solely responsible for me being interviewed more than 10 times in the last few days and getting to plug my new gig at Examiner.com as their national sports writer (http://www.examiner.com/x-426-Sports-Examiner). But I thought he was lame or something. I didn't think he could leave the state of Mississippi. If he can fly to California then is Wisconsin far behind?

He is scheduled to attend the Packers Hall of Fame induction ceremony to speak on behalf of a dear friend that is being inducted this year. That will mean he faces the folks he has trashed and driven crazy for the better part of 3 weeks. He'll be forced to confront them and vice versa. When Jonathan Papelbon was harassed during the parade prior to the All Star game he was shouted at by fans that were separated from him and lost in a crowd. Can you imagine what would happen if those same jerks had to face the tall and strong pitcher all by themselves? It might involve an arrest but you get the point: it's easier to say stuff about someone from afar. If the Packers brass and Favre can sit down and talk a bit, we might have a solution to this whole mess.

If the crowd starts chanting for him and there is a crowd outside with signs of encouragement, he might be more willing to take the first step and stop this foolishness of insisting that the team blink first. That step is to apply for reinstatement. Who among us believe that if he is a Packer again the team will sit him? Come on now. He'll either be there as a starter or a trade will be discussed. He will retire before he gets shipped to an AFC loser just so the Pack doesn't have to face him. But let's say that Aaron Rodgers can be accommodated in some monetary way to take back the clip board. If Favre is still the guy from last year the team can tell him he's One and Done as they say in the NBA. If he's the guy who loses games for them, there is Aaron Rodgers ready to take over and the situation will be over for all the world to see. If he isn't good enough it's over.

As you watched the feel good story of the baseball season, Josh Hamilton, cream the covering off the baseball, you had to wonder i