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(Every week there are a number of stories slip through the cracks here at ShakedownSports. These are just a few of them.)

–Chris Leak is returning to the football field. The former Florida quarterback says he will play in the brand new AAFL (All American Football League) this April. Leak spent training camp with the Chicago Bears, so playing in the AAFL should allow him to work with a much more talented offense.

–Todd Bertuzzi has offered Steve Moore $350,000 to settle the $15 million lawsuit Moore filed against him for his on-ice attack. Yep, there’s nothing quite ending a guy’s career and then lowballing him with an offer that’s 3% of what he’s asking for.

–Eric Lindros announced that he will retire. The good news for Lindros is that now he will have much more time to spend on his favorite hobby of suffering from post-concussion syndrome.

–Earlier this week middleweight boxing champion Kelly Pavlik severely cut his hands and arms in a window cleaning accident. One report said he needed 108 stitches, but Pavlik’s trainer said it wasn’t serious. What I don’t understand is that Pavlik is a wealthy boxing champion—why is he dangerously cleaning his own windows? And what was he cleaning them with? An uzi?

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(Every week there are a number of stories slip through the cracks here at ShakedownSports. These are just a few of them.)

Six days before his 45th birthday, Evander Holyfield will travel to Moscow to fight Sultan Ibragimov for the WBO Championship. While many are questioning whether a man of Holyfield’s age and physical fitness can win the fight, Holyfield has assured is doubters he is adhering to a top notch training regimen that includes watching Rocky IV three times a day.

The NBA released its 2007-2008 schedule this week and the Cleveland Cavaliers are scheduled to appear on national television a whopping 31 times. The news comes as a disappointment Cavs; they had hoped it would be all 82 games so they could save money by not hiring their own set of broadcasters.

Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops announced that this the team’s jerseys will once again have players’ names on the back after going one season without them. The decision was made so it will be easier for the both the team and police to identify players who commit crimes while wearing their jerseys.

Although his scheduled rehab start was rained out, yesterday Pedro Martinez returned to the mound and pitched 5 1/3 innings of simulated game. Martinez then left the game with a simulated shoulder injury.

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For your Tuesday afternoon viewing pleasure…

–David Beckham and Reggie Bush will soon be swapping sports.

–This baby girl will definitely hate boxing when she grows up.

–Willy Taveras is too fast for his own good.

–One of the worst draft picks of all time could soon help the Orlando Magic (and no, it’s not J.J. Redick).

–In news that have been earth shattering during the 2002 Big 12 football season, former Iowa quarterback Brad Banks was traded by his CFL team for former Texas Tech quarterback Kliff Kingsbury.

–Proving once again that anything is possible, last weekend there was a blind baseball tournament in Long Island. The question is how people heckled the umpires about their sub-par eyesight without being insensitive to the players.

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The Green Ranger is back. On Saturday Jason David Frank, the man famous for playing both the Green and White Rangers in “Mighty Morphin Power Rangers,” will take part in an amateur Illinois cage fight. His opponent with be an undefeated boxer named Ron “The Badger” McMasters.

Frank, who won his first two amateur bouts, is not fighting in a Johnny Morton-like attempt to capture past glory. He was a nationally rated fighter in the late 1980’s, and in 1990 he won the prestigious Grand Champion title at the Las Vegas Winter Nationals. In 2003 Frank was inducted into the World Karate Union Hall of Fame, and he is currently a 6th degree black belt. Now that he is free of Disney’s fighting restrictions Frank is ready to pursue an MMA career.

All of this could spell trouble for his opponent. Even if “The Badger” somehow manages to take control of the fight, Frank can just have Zordon summon a Megazord to crush him.

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There is one thing about the sport of boxing thatmakes it different than any other sport. In boxing the competitors don’t know who is winning. Think about that for a moment. In every other sport, an individual or team knows where they stand and they can then alter their strategy based on that. In football teams that are behind throw the ball down the field. In basketball they push it up the floor and take three pointers. These strategies are conducive to creating an exciting sporting event, because they increase the chance the game will be close.

In boxing you have none of this because people don’t actually know who is winning. What you end up getting is two fighters who play defense for the last three rounds because each thinks he is winning. Simply put, keeping the judges scores a secret creates less exciting fights. Is there anybody out there who doesn’t think the final rounds of the De La Hoya-Mayweather fight would have been more exciting if De La Hoya knew that he was behind on two of the cards? It’s also unfair to the fighters to not let them know where they stand. How many fights have there been where a boxer was shocked to lose a decision after taking it easy in the last round because he thought he had a lead.

It’s time for boxing to have the judges publicly announce their scores after every round. This may not actually fix any of boxing’s problems, but it’s worth a shot. Boxers may still feel like they get cheated out of victories, but at least they’ll know when it’s happening and have a chance to change the outcome before the fight ends. Most importantly, boxers will now be able to alter their strategy based on the score. The boxers who trail will be trying to turn the final rounds into a slugfest. The boxers who are ahead will likely accommodate them. Fights will become more exciting. Making scores public may sound like an unheard of idea in boxing, but it’s how every single other sports works. It’s time boxing joined them.

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Here’s an interesting story about what went on in the Oscar De La Hoya dressing room. In the two hours before the fight De La Hoya’s guests included George Lopez, J-Lo, Marc Anthony, and the ubiquitous Matthew McConaughey, who told De La Hoya “All right, man, take it.”

Apparently Royals catcher John Buck is a man of the theater. On Sunday night Buck attended a performance of “The 25th annual Putnam County Spelling Bee” and was one of four audience members chosen to participate in the play. Buck joined the cast on stage for the Spellig Bee scene, and after spelling three words correctly, including “demicatters” and “catarjunes”, he was the only audience member left on stage. Buck was then given a fake word with no definition so he could be eliminated and the play could continue as it was written. There were 2,400 people in attendance, meaning there was probably more pressure on Buck than during most Royals games.

If you ever want to know what it’s like to be hit in the head by a 300 yard drive just ask Freddy Adu. Earlier in the week Adu was hit in the head by a wayward drive while playing a round with some Real Salt Lake teammates. Fortunately for the 2011 Manchester United team, he emerged unscathed. I don’t know what it is, but the image of Real Salt Lake teammates getting together to play a round of golf at a posh Utah resort is one of the funniest things in the entire world.

One man’s rise is another man’s downfall. Two Steelers fans were finally able to get personal seat licenses at Heinz Field–the only catch was that they had to buy them from a bankruptcy court. I can just picture two men who have lost everything and the only thing they’re concerned with is the fact that they’re losing their Steelers tickets.

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