The interview sessions with the players ended today, and I don’t think anyone regrets that, players or media. If you’ve been here since Sunday, you’re tired of talking to players by Thursday, and most of the players are tired of talking by Monday afternoon.

Actually, the players usually are cooperative. You run into an occasional stonewall. I heard a colleague talking about a less than pleasant encounter with Patriots punter Chris Hanson. Giants guard Chris Snee, who is married to the daughter of Giants head coach Tom Coughlin, declined to answer my question today (Thursday) about playing for his father-in-law. He said he’d answered that on Tuesday and Wednesday and wasn’t talking about it anymore. Fair enough.

If the players are at the Super Bowl, they’re generally pretty happy, so they can endure the mandatory media sessions. Some of the best people to talk to during these sessions are the assistant coaches. They’re really happy to be at the Super Bowl. Assistant coaches often are some of the most cooperative, friendly members of the team. I had a long talk with Dave Merritt, the coach of the Giants safeties, today. He used to coach at VMI. He loves the place. Said he wants his three sons to go there.

The geography of Arizona is interesting. Today, on the bus ride between the Patriots session and the Giants session, I was looking at the mountains in the distance. There are a lot of mountains in the distance. There are mountain ranges and individual mountains sitting there. In the early morning haze, some of the individual mountains look like big lumps of coal that have been plopped down in the desert.

I almost typed “dessert” there, perhaps because that’s something I often have too much of. Well, maybe that’s a topic for another time.

Until then, I remain your Phoenix correspondent. 

A reader very thoughtfully sent me an article with “double” Super Bowl significance, althought not quite in the way you might imagine.

This story—here’s the link—http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/30/dining/30curious.html?_r=2&ref=dining&oref=slogin&oref=slogin-- appeared in the New York Times and discussed the amount of bacteria put into a bowl of dip when someone “double dips” a chip. If you are a Seinfeld fan, and how can you not be, you might recall the episode when George Costanza attends the funeral of a relative of his girlfriend. At the wake, George “double dips” a chip. He dipped the chip, took a bite, then dipped it into the dip again.

His girlfriend’s brother, Tim, yells at George, “You double dipped the chip. That’s like putting your whole mouth in the bowl.” George disagrees, calls Tim, “Timmy” and, as usual, all manner of ill-feelings ensue.

With the Super Bowl upon us, a food microbiologist at Clemson, Prof. Paul L. Dawson, used this Seinfeld episode as inspiration for scientific study and instructed his students to determine whether “double dipping” a chip added bacteria to the dip. He doubted that it would. Turns out that it does.

In the article, Dawson says that when you look around the room during your upcoming Super Bowl party, decide whether you’re willing to kiss everyone in the room, because that’s essentially what you’re doing if anyone has double-dipped a chip.

The reader who sent this to me thought it particularly relavent with Super Bowl Sunday upon us. I agree. He also thought it would be a topic worthy of discussion with Eli Manning.

Again, I agree.

Manning, the youngest of the Manning quarterback family, is an avowed fan of Seinfeld. You might recall that last week, in a move that can only be described as idiotic, a Green Bay-area television station removed Seinfeld re-runs from its air. The reasoning was that since it was Eli Manning’s favorite show, they wanted him to feel as uncomfortable as possible. As if playing football in -20 degree weather wasn’t discomfort enough.

I tried to get close enough to Manning today to ask him some Seinfeld questions. This is not something you can do in the middle of a press conference. I’m not interested in becoming a footnote in Super Bowl history, the fool who started a Seinfeld riff in the middle of Eli Manning’s explanation of splitting the Cover-Two defense.

My thinking is that if I can get to him right at the end of a press conference, I can ask him if he has wanted to answer, “Yada, yada, yada” to any of the questions he has been asked this week. Or if he has driven down Van Buren Avenue in downtown Phoenix, and if he has, did he have to give the secret sign of the Van Buren gang.

He might enjoy that. I’m thinking he’d appreciate a break from questions that involve the Patriots pass rush and dealing with the versatility of the New England linebackers. 

Manning is an interesting study. The contrast between Eli and his brother Peyton, who won the Super Bowl last year with the Indianapolis Colts, is stark.

Peyton is older, and it shows. His voice is more mature. His stature during the press conference was relaxed. His answer were crisp and detailed. There always was a chance that a question might send him off on a tangent that went in a direction entirely different, but quite enjoyable and enlightening, than anyone expected. Peyton is an extrovert.

Eli appears to be an introvert. He’s handling his press responsibilities fine, but I don’t think he’s having the time of his life. If he doesn’t have an answer for a question, his reply is short and quick, and he looks for the next question. He’s not going to offer much elaboration. He particularly seems to dislike questions that compare his private life with that of Patroits quarterback Tom Brady.

What strikes me most about Eli Manning, though, is how young he looks. He’s 27, but I don’t think he looks much older than he did when he was drafted in 2004. I look at him on the podium and wonder how someone so young can stand the pressure, physical and mental, and perform so well in such a demanding game. How does a kid like this throw the ball so hard, I wondered today as I watched him field questions.

OK. That’s it for now. See you later. 

A lot of reporters don’t like media day during the Super Bowl week, and I really can’t blame them. The “event” is held at the stadium where the game is played, and it seems like the quarters get tighter every year.

It’s hard to move from one player or coach to another, and the mere attempt to walk about 20 yards can take as long as five minutes.

Media day also draws a wide variety performers to the scene. That’s where you’ll see Mo Rocca, who works for NBC or the Today Show or something like that, now. Biff Henderson, the stage manager for David Letterman on The Late Show showed up a time or two.

A lot of reporters find this silly, and there have been times when I’ve agreed with that. For several years Downtown Julie Brown, an MTV person, came out to media day and that act got old pretty fast.

Yesterday, as you might have heard, a young woman, Ines Gomez Mont, from TV Azteca in Mexico City came to media day dressed in a wedding gown. And as one reporter described it, not much of a wedding gown at that.

One guy said, “Who’s the bigger fool, her or the people interviewing her?” Intersting question. I pondered it for a moment, then said, “I’m the bigger fool because I’m going to talk to her.”

I did it because I’m always looking for something to put in one of the postcards I’ve been doing from the Super Bowl for about 20 years now. Anything to lighten the mood, I always say.

Ms. Gomez Mont was there to get publicity for TV Azteca, and that’s fine. Her act was to ask Tom Brady and Eli Manning to marry her.

A lot of people might find this silly, and it’s hard to argue with that.

But I was thinking about all this, and thought that Ms. Gomez Mont served to reveal a larger picture as well.

When she asked Brady her question, he was amused. He also was completely charming and handled the situation with great aplomb. It was a bit of insight into why his teammates like him so much. Sure, they would like any quarterback who produced as much as Brady does.

But his charm, his ability to react so quickly to any situation, his sense of humor all came through in that one, silly little moment.

I remember when Brady came to his first Super Bowl. From the first interview session, his teammates spoke of him in glowing terms of him. And there was more to it than just his strong arm. He possessed some difficult to define quality that spoke to his leadership because he was replacing Drew Bledsoe, who had been the Patriots quarterback for quite some time.

When Brady led the Patriots to that last-second victory over the Rams, he cemented his relationship with every player on that team, especially the offensive linemen.

If learning something like that about a player means you have to put up with a crowd of people in a small space, then I think putting up with the silliness for a couple of hours is well worth it.

Now, I do have some problems with “media day.” Every day, Sunday through Thursday, is media day at the Super Bowl. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are the only days in the entire season where players can be sure they will be fined a substantial amount if they do not show up for interviews.

So calling Tuesday “media day” to me is a misnomer. They should call it picture day—it’s the day the teams pose for their Super Bowl pictures—or Improv Day or Stadium Day or something like that.

The crush of people also makes it difficult to find players and coaches who are not given designated podiums or sites in the stands. But you have a better chance to get those people on Wednesday or Thursday, so I guess I shouldn’t complain.

So, anyway, that’s what I got out of “media day” this year. It’s always nice to learn something about a player, no matter what it takes to get that little kernal of information.

See you later. 

Let’s talk Redskins.

Trying to explain the things the Redskins do is difficult, if not impossible.

Yesterday, we heard that Pete Carroll talked to the Redskins about the job and that Steve Mariucci might be a candidate before the search ends.

The Carroll talks didn’t get very far. With so many names being attached to the job, it’s difficult to tell if there’s any juice behind the Mariucci talk. He’s been out of coaching for a while, though, and as we saw with Marty Schottenheimer and even Joe Gibbs, the game changes and things are rough in the early going for coaches who return after extended absences.

Dan Snyder and Vinny Cerrato are scheduled to talk to Ron Meeks, the Colts defensive coordinator for the second time, on Tuesday.

Then, they’re supposed to come to Arizona for the Super Bowl and to meet with Jim Fassel again.

Snyder might talk to Steve Spagnuolo, the Giants defensive coordinator, and Josh McDaniels, the Patriots offensive coordinator after the Super Bowl.

He might as well. He’s waited this long. He might find that he’s got the next Joe Gibbs after he interviews one of those guys.

Snyder says he’s not going to select a coach until after the Super Bowl. I think there are two reasons for that.

He might really want to talk to one of those Super Bowl assistants.

And he’s a pretty solid league man now, and he doesn’t want to do anything that would appear to be an effort to upstage the Super Bowl.

Who’s the best man for the job?

From a media standpoint, Fassel and Mariucci are pretty good. Things didn’t end well for either in the last jobs, and both have been out of coaching for a while. It’s tough to see next year as being a step forward with a coach who has been away from the game.

Either of the two assistants would be interesting choices. But you have to wonder if either would come to a team where the offensive and defensive coordinators already are in place and where a number of assistants appear to be staying off of Gibbs’ staff. The Patriots are going to be good for a while. McDaniels will have other opportunities. Spagnuolo is the older of the two, 48 to 41, but he’s not so old that he has to start thinking, “This is my last chance.”

And how long will Snyder extend this process. If he’s interviewing Meeks twice, Fassel three times and Gregg Williams four times, will one interview with one of the Super Bowl coaches be enough?

Maybe that’s the thing. Snyder does multiple interviews because none of the candidates “wow” him.

We’ll see. 

The selection of those coordinators would seem to be an indication that Fassel is the guy. He’s said to be high on Zorn and probably could live with Blache.
One thing is certain. Continuity is out the window. Next week will be interesting.

Things are relatively quiet here in Phoenix. The media is drifting in and the crush of fans won’t start until later in the week, Thursday or Friday.

I often get asked about my favorite Super Bowl cities. I’ve been to a few of them, and I put New Orleans at the top of the list, followed by San Diego and, here’s a surprise entry in the competition, Minneapolis.

I’m not alone in thinking the Super Bowl should be permanently assigned to New Orleans. Many think this is because sports writers like to eat and it’s difficult to find a bad restaurant in New Orleans. They exist, but you’ve got to spend some time looking. And there are worse things to search for.

Another reason most writers and many fans like New Orleans is the compact nature of the area. On game day, you can walk to the Superdome. It’s a great luxury to be able to do that instead of taking a bus ride through heavy traffic. There have been some years when the teams were staying in hotels around the French Quarter and you could walk to the daily press conferences. That’s really nice.

New Orleans also could use the business right now.

San Diego is not compact and you spend a lot of time on buses during Super Bowl week. But the weather is unbelievable. The last time the game was there, Tampa beat Oakland, the weather was spectacular all week. You could not help but feel good mentally and physically after a week of that.

The problem with living in San Diego is that I understand it’s extremely expensive to live there.

I sometimes wonder why Eli Manning chose New York over San Diego. If you’re young, have plenty of money, and the first player taken in the draft will have plenty of money, wouldn’t you want to live in a place where the weather if perfect about 340 days of the year?
Not that I mean to say anything bad about New York. It’s a great place to visit.

The weather is unbelievable in Minneapolis, too, and not in a good way. There has been only one Super Bowl there, Washington beat Buffalo, and I doubt there will be another, at least not unless the Vikings get a new stadium, with 75,000 seats and ample luxury boxes.

The Minnesota legislature has been reluctant to sign-off on such a project, and there’s something to be said for that.

I don’t mind challenging weather. It makes you feel alive. Or something like that.

Another reason I like Minneapolis is that it has one of the great places to run of any NFL city. About 3 miles from downtown is Lake of the Isles Park. It’s a huge lake, sitting in the middle of a neighborhood that has houses similar to those you see on Monument Avenue, between Lombardy and Roseneath Road.

When you’re running out to the park, you go through the sculpture garden of the Walker Museum of Modern Art. There’s a huge cherry perched on a huge spoon in the sculpture garden, and it’s been there for decades.

When I was there for a Washington Redskins game in December, I took my Gore-Tex running pants, a heavy sweatshirt, extra gloves and a stocking camp so I could run to Lake of the Isles Park. It was worth squeezing all that stuff into my suitcase to make that run again.

The weather in Phoenix has cleared up considerably from Sunday’s rain. And Phoenix is not a bad place to visit. I’ve not been in the new stadium yet. We go there tomorrow for “Media Day.” Actually, Monday through Thursday are media days. Tomorrow is more of a picture day. That’s when they take the Super Bowl team picture.

OK, I’m going to sign off here. I’ll be back often this week. See you then.