Kobe Bryant is quite familiar with the exquisite pain of playing against Ron Artest's defense. He's grateful that frustration now belongs to his opponents — including Joe Johnson, the first top scorer to get locked down by the Lakers' new defensive stopper. Bryant had 41 points and eight rebounds, Andrew Bynum added 21 points and Artest extinguished Johnson's outstanding start in…
The Arizona Cardinals conquered their House of Horrors with a new approach: scary defense. A team built around the passing of Kurt Warner and receiving of Larry Fitzgerald and Anquan Boldin could be downright dominant with a stingy defense. And it sure wasn't the offense that carried the Cardinals to just their third win in 18 visits to the Meadowlands, 24-17 over the New York Giants on Sunday…
Brett Favre, Adrian Peterson and the Minnesota Vikings were anything but perfect. The Vikings couldn't gain a half-yard when it might have turned the game, then watched the Steelers' big-play defense end their unbeaten season with two long touchdown returns in the final 6 1/2 minutes. LaMarr Woodley's 77-yard fumble return and Keyaron Fox's 82-yard interception return on turnovers…
Who dat knew them Saints were this good? Drew Brees torched the Giants' league-leading defense, swarming Saints defenders ruined Eli Manning's homecoming and undefeated New Orleans matched its best start since 1993 with a 48-27 throttling of previously unbeaten New York on Sunday. "We wanted to really dictate the tempo of the game the whole way through," Brees said.
A Bay Area animal rights group is planning a protest against Michael Vick before his game against the Oakland Raiders on Sunday. The group In Defense of Animals says it will protest outside Oakland Coliseum before Vick plays his first road game for the Philadelphia Eagles since being reinstated to the NFL following an 18-month prison sentence for his involvement in a dogfighting ring.