Lisa Olson Fanhouse Exclusive

EAST HARTFORD, Conn. -- No, way. The universe isn't meant to be this cruel. Time was supposed to stop with 38 seconds remaining on the clock, just this once. Just for Jazz. It wouldn't have healed the broken hearts stretching from Connecticut to South Florida, but it sure would have inspired an outbreak of happy hugs and welcome smiles.

But the ripples generated by the murder of UConn cornerback Jasper "Jazz" Howard travel far beyond a mere game of football, so perhaps this is how it was destined to end, with the scoreboard flashing Rutgers 28, Connecticut 24, with Tim Brown, Howard's best friend from childhood, choking back tears after scoring an improbable, last-second touchdown for the winning side. As much as it hurt the crowd on hand for the Huskies' first home game since Howard was killed -- and "hurt" is a gentle description, because the emotions that overtook Rentschler Field were funereal and raw following Brown's stunning 81-yard TD with 22 seconds left -- there is beauty in how it ended.

And love.

And a friendship that will live forever.

More than eight weeks have passed since boxing legend Alexis Arguello allegedly shot himself in the chest with a 9mm pistol. It was a suicide, declared Nicaraguan government officials, and they closed the case almost as quickly as they shut his casket.

But in an exclusive interview with FanHouse, Alexis Arguello, Jr., the son of the Hall of Fame great, says he plans to fight the government's findings and prove that his father was the victim of foul play.

At some point, both women must have figured happiness was tangled up in the bling, the fame and the muscles. When Sahel Kazemi looked at Steve McNair, she probably saw kindness and generosity, toughness and security. Were those the same qualities Amanda Rodrigues detected in Arturo Gatti?

The fine print in the lives of McNair and Gatti are eerily similar: McNair, an All-Pro quarterback, overcame injuries to his calf and ankle to earn NFL co-MVP honors in 2003, retired in 2007, was murdered at the age of 36. Gatti, a champion boxer, fought nearly one-handed for several rounds yet still won an epic match in 2003, retired in 2007, was murdered at the age of 37.

NEW YORK – Sycophants have Plaxico Burress' back, no matter where he turns. It's as if he has transported a gang of 300-pound offensive linemen, stuffed them in power suits, swapped their playbooks for legal briefs and mesmerized them with his shiny Super Bowl ring.

That some of these wannabe teammates draw paychecks from the Manhattan District Attorney's office is hardly surprising. Burress was, after all, on the receiving end of one of the greatest touchdowns in New York Giants' history. His fans are omnipotent, to the point where there have been serious internal disagreements within the DA's office over how to handle the criminal charges pending against the wide receiver, prompting NFL commissioner Roger Goodell to explore punishing Burress even while the case against him meanders along.

NEW YORK -- The numbers lie. They belittle his game, put question marks next to his future. They are scrawny numbers, single digits that can't begin to explain the trials and tribulations that rode shotgun in Brandon Jennings' season abroad.

Some blips were minor, the kind every expatriate learns to abide. The rich food, the exotic chants shouted in the gym with an adjoining trailer concession stand. The lack of dryers. Jennings still laughs at how the Italians, such a civilized society, live blissfully without machines that hasten one's ability to wear fresh undershirts every day. And don't even get him started on the crazy drivers who turn the streets of Rome into death traps.

"Oh, everything was different," says Jennings, in a quiet moment after the horde of cameras and notebooks have departed. The afternoon went by in a whirl, beginning with a TV crew trailing him from his midtown hotel to Wednesday's NBA media meet-and-greets, where Jennings was peppered with questions about his season playing pro ball in Italy, his harsh (and now retracted) comments concerning Spanish guard Ricky Rubio, and the one subject that turns Jennings' perpetual smile into a sneer:

---

---

NEW YORK -- Chip Woolley sometimes looks like he wants to dart out of a room as fast as he can. He fidgets with his welterweight-sized belt buckle, adjusts his 10-gallon black hat, scuffs his cowboy boats on the marble floor and nervously smoothes the mustache that frames his mouth like parentheses. Put the cowboy on the track, training horses and bucking giant odds, and Woolley's as calm as a yogi.

NEW YORK -- Bob Reilly remembers the kid's body being put in a coffin, and the coffin getting hoisted into a beat-up van, and the van driving 150 miles on a dirt road until it reached the family's mud hut in an East Africa village. It was ages ago, in the 1970s, and the kid's name was John.

"He dropped dead running a 10,000-meter race," Reilly says now. "These tragedies happen in every sport. You can go out jogging and drop dead of a heart attack. But the purpose of sports is not to inflict injury. We can't ever forget that or what do we become? We become barbaric."

NEW YORK – Jimmy Rollins swears he isn't obsessed with teams from New York. He doesn't spend late nights worrying about whether the Mets might finally shake the choke collars from around their necks, doesn't wake up thinking the Yankees just might be built for October.

So why does it seem Rollins is forever talking about the Mets and the Yankees? Two seasons ago he made a remark that proved to be pretty prophetic, saying his Philadelphia Phillies were the team to beat in the NL East, and Mets fans reacted as if Rollins personally removed the frontal lobe from Jose Reyes' brain. Now from Rollins' crystal ball comes this enticing prediction: the Phillies will play the Yankees in the World Series this October.

Major League Baseball is in the early stages of investigating player agents who may be connected to the sport's steroid scandal.

"It's a whole new territory we're looking into," a person with direct knowledge of the investigation told FanHouse. "Our information has led us to believe there are some [agents] worth going after."

The 50-game suspension of Manny Ramirez last week proves MLB's intention to rid the game of performance-enhancing drugs is expansive in its scope and aggressive in its tactics.

Now that nearly 30 players have been suspended for using PEDs since the penalty phase of testing began in 2004, the natural progression, say people familiar with baseball's Department of Investigations, is to target the suppliers, as well as users.

GLENDALE, Ariz. - They steered clear of the net. A ladder rested underneath the basket, waiting for someone to climb it. The twine dangled, waiting for someone to snip it. Instead, the University of Connecticut players and coaches purposely walked on by, as if the traditional removal of the net and wearing it around the neck might jinx the journey.

"It was a team decision because we've got bigger goals," UConn guard A.J. Price was saying after the Huskies beat Missouri, 82-75, in Saturday's Elite Eight West Regional Final and advanced to the Final Four. "We can cut down a net in Detroit."