The 2011 Super Bowl will be held in Dallas at the gigantic new Cowboys Stadium. To celebrate the event, the organizers have launched the North Texas Super Bowl XLV Host Committee's Kick-off Concert Series, with the first show being Faith Hill. Before taking the stage, this video played to the crowd, featuring a number of Dallas area celebrities and notables trying to sign Hill's song, "This Kiss."

Tony Romo really struggled with the high note unfortunately. Also, Jerry Jones NAILS it, he also looks like he's about 35-years old, hey Jerry, slow down on the Botox buddy!

Nolan Ryan has no signing ability. Neither does Dirk, but I am constantly impressed by his near accent-less English. 

Chloe Everton is an attractive blonde host for programming on Sky Sports television. Like most media people (and bloggers) she has a Twitter account. Or rather, HAD a Twitter account. 

Everton you see liked to use her Twitter account to pass along sports information to her followers, rather innocuous you'd think, but not for the prim and proper Brits. It seems that Ms. Everton has a gift for the innuendo and would Tweet things that sounded quite different than they are.

Things like:

• "(Rory) Delap is using a towel to mop up some of the wet ready for those long thrusting balls into the box."
• "Golf today. Played with three boys. I came first, must have been down to good length."
• "The sign on the ticket machine I am at says: 'slot out of action'. I know the feeling."
• "still in bed, not seen any action, been hoping for a big wicket"
• "@JimmyAnderson9 you are very good at swinging, must be the way you position your fingers"

The suits at Sky Sports apparently had already warned her once and now her Twitter account only has one post up, from December, that reads "Yep... easily amused."

The former PE teacher who achieved fame through a reality show called Shipwrecked, Everton has seen hundreds of fans come to her side, making a Facebook group in support of her. That should make all the difference...

[Daily Mail]

Former Detroit Lion Tommie Boyd caught 14 passes at the professional level in two seasons, he recently was making his living as the track coach at Fraser High School in the suburbs of Grosse Pointe. That job is presumably over now after his predilections for sex with young teenage girls has been revealed.

On Wednesday, at a hearing in district court, one of Boyd's former athletes explained how two years ago, when she was 14, Boyd came over to her home after practice to watch TV and eat pizza while her mom was at work. Boyd started making inappropriate comments and then groping her. These acts continued for several months. Then, over the summer Boyd offered her $5,000 to have sex with him, she agreed but then he ripped her off, paying her $200 instead. That's kind of a big difference.

He will be charged with first- and second-degree criminal sexual conduct and accosting children for immoral purposes. His troubles don't end there though.

Another student, now 19, has also come forward saying that she had a year-long sexual relationship with Boyd when she was 16, and that he had sex with her in a number of places, including at the school in the football room and he will be formally charged with that case later this month. 

Boyd's attorney has been quick to try and discredit the first girl, saying she has a number of other coach's phone numbers and has texted them "also asking for rides." Even if that's true, she was still 14(!) and Boyd was 36, he should have known better. 

[Detroit News]

The gold medal hockey game was held on February 28th, but that hasn't stopped the flow of stories related to the game. Yesterday we discussed the water usage patterns in Edmonton, today, let's look at the airlines. Air Canada reported yesterday that it had to delay a flight leaving Vancouver because the passengers refused to board the plane.

With the game still going on, despite repeated calls to board, the passengers remained rapt to the terminal televisions until the end of the game, refusing to move. 

"We incurred a flight delay for a reason Air Canada had not yet encountered in over 72 years of existence," chief executive Calin Rovinescu said.

Considering the importance of the game to Canadians, I don't think the airline minded too much. 

[Toronto Star]

LeBron James won his first MVP last season, he'll win his second this year, and it's never too early to celebrate his greatness, so here's a top-10 of his best dunks this season. Of course, it being LeBron he'll probably do 10 more dunks that will demolish these before the end of the season. 

Tiger Woods Golf will feature another person on the cover along with the eponymous star for the first time ever. EA Games insists that the addition of Rory McIlroy, a ROOKIE, was only to promote the game's Ryder Cup gameplay feature and that Tiger represents the US and McIllroy the Europeans. Sure. 

Clearly they can't just change the franchise, but at least for this iteration, EA was concerned enough about where Tiger had been putting his balls and his playing skins with non Elin Nordegren women to make this major change to the cover.

[Kotaku]

In 1997 when John Valentin was forced to move off shortstop for a hot-shot rookie he was understandably annoyed. However, once he saw the dynamic shortstop play, he quickly got over it. In his rookie campaign Nomar had 209 hits, 30 home runs and hit .306/.545/.875 all at age 23. Wow. 

Over the 7 full seasons he played with the team, Nomar was one of the most popular players in the history of the Red Sox. I remember lustily cheering "NoMAR's BETter" at Sox/Yankees games whenever Jeter would come to the plate, and it was true. Until he took an Al Reyes fastball off his wrist, Nomar was one of the most exciting and complete players in baseball. 

As a Red Sox player, Nomar hit 178 home runs, hit .318, was a 5-time All Star, won the Rookie of the Year (Deivi Cruz finished 4th!) , earned back-to-back batting titles and played some stellar defense. Nomar LOVED baseball. 

Unfortunately, Boston is a demanding place to play and Nomar's relationship with the media was never particularly strong. Steve Buckley and John Tomase at the Boston Herald were the most vocal in their displeasure with Nomar, because he wasn't accommodating to their needs. Because of that, they started writing hatchet jobs of him in their paper, leading to some fan backlash and definitely helping to lead him out of town. 

I remember July 31st, 2004 vividly. I was heading into my second job at a restaurant and the douchiest waiter there was dancing around, "We traded Nomar!" he gleefully squealed. I was not as excited. I thought the deal was fine, it seemed a little light in talent, but fair enough. Intellectually I understood it, but I was not ready to just celebrate the team jettisoning it's most popular star. The Red Sox were Nomar; 1997 was the dawn of the Nomar age, 1998 was the arrival of Pedro and the two of them were the team. 

Today, Nomar is signing a one-day minor league contract with the Red Sox and will then retire to join ESPN and Baseball Tonight. He played 14 seasons in the majors, finishing with a .313 career average, and an OPS+ of 124 and never saw a first pitch he didn't want to hit. A favorite of Ted Williams, Nomar was a hitting machine who could also play an excellent shortstop. 

It's a bit surprising Nomar is choosing to join the media, considering his contentious relationship with the press in the past, but today I'm sad I'll never get to see him make a rocket throw across his body and the diamond to nab the runner by a step. I'm sad I'll never see a line-drive double fly off his bat, I'm sad to see Nomar go. Sure the last few seasons have been painful (to watch and for Nomar) but he's always been a favorite, someone I've followed no matter what. 

This past summer, when Nomar arrived for the first time ever as a visiting player to Fenway Park was magical. The long, well-deserved, applause swelled around the stadium as Sox fans finally got the chance to say "thank you." It was special, just like Nomar.

There's nothing better than when baseball starts back up again, and there are very few people who do sports photography better than the Boston Globe. This gallery of shots from spring training only confirms that fact. Check out the full thing HERE for plenty more, but here are my three favorites.

[Boston Globe]

Sure, if Kobe Bryant makes a half-court shot everyone in the crowd cheers and goes wild, but when Benny the Bull, the Chicago Bulls mascot makes a half-court shot, with his back turned to the basket, it gets lost amid the hoopla of halftime. It's simply not fair. That kind of shot is hard, especially with a heavy ass suit on too. Sigh.

After joining the Red Sox, Curt Schilling started preparing for his post-baseball career when he started 38 Studios, a video-game company. Initially intent on creating the next big MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game) like World of Warcraft, today Schilling and his company are closer to that dream. EA Studios announced today that they have reached a publishing agreement for the first big game to come out of Schill's operation, the still codenamed "Project Mercury."

A single-player epic role playing game, based on the worlds of R.A. Salvatore and with artistic direction from Todd McFarlane, the creator of Spawn (and owner of Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball), the game will ultimately be available for PS3, Xbox 360 and the PC.

In the press statement Schilling said "We are creating an enormous world, with heroes and villains and a rich back story from the brilliant minds of R. A., Todd and Ken [Rolston, the lead designer] at its heart, and I can think of no finer partner than the global powerhouse that is EA Partners. Being able to leverage the expertise of EA's publishing organization to bring our first product to market is a dream come true for 38 Studios."

Looks like the big galoot is about to make a heap load of dollars. Fun!

[38 Studios]