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 The Giants had made a living by beating the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl, now a couple of months it seems like that they’re going by that same mantra. In despite of not having the retired Michael Strahan, and injured defensive end Osi Umenyiora. The Giants held the Washington Redskins to 11 first downs and 209 total yards, giving the indication that the Giants defense is back in a 16-7 victory over Washington on Thursday night. Super Bowl MVP Eli Manning(19-35, 216 yds and 1 int) and Plaxico Burress(10 catches 133 yds) came up big for the offense, while we saw Jason Campbell and the new look Washington Redskin offense struggle for most the game.

The Giants defense, which led he league with 53 sacks last season, contributed to the score by forcing Washington to couple of three-and-out series. The only worry for the Giants defense is defensive end Mathias Kiwanuka who went down with a ankle injury on the final play of the game, but he said that he would be okay. He was switched from linebacker due to end when Umenyiora was lost for the season with a knee injury in the preseason.

Campbell finished 15-27 for 133 yards, but was very inaffective on 3rd down conversions.

“The thing that hurt us was not converting those first downs when we had the opprotunity,” Zorn said.

   The Cincinnati Bengals announced Thursday that they have begun “the process of listing the former Chad Johnson as Chad Ocho Cinco for all club business, per the legal change of his surname effected in Florida.

“The list of appropriate changes will include Ocho Cinco wearing his new surname on the back of his jersey for Sunday’s season opener at Baltimore.”

Ocho Cinco officially changed his name to Chad Javon Ocho Cinco in Broward County, Fla., last week. The league had not changed his name on its Web site or the team’s Web site.

“It’s something I don’t think anyone has ever done before,” the Pro Bowl receiver told the Bengals’ Web site last week. “Have I ever had a reason for why I do what I do? I’m having fun.”

Two years ago, Johnson gave himself the moniker in reference to his uniform number 85 — Ocho Cinco means “eight five” in Spanish — and put it on the back of his uniform before a game. Quarterback Carson Palmer ripped it off before the kickoff. After the season, coach Marvin Lewis — who dislikes Johnson’s attention-getting stunts — referred to the receiver as “Ocho Psycho.”

The receiver asked the media to start calling him by his new name this week. The Bengals couldn’t change the name on his uniform until the NFL gave permission.

In an e-mail to The Associated Press on Thursday, league spokesman Greg Aiello said simply: “It’s his legal surname.”

The receiver has declined to talk about the motivation for his attention-getting change. Lewis said the receiver had been considering it since last March.

Johnson has been a concern for the Bengals this season. He unsuccessfully lobbied for a trade in the offseason, threatening to sit out if he didn’t get his way. When the Bengals refused, he relented and showed up for minicamp, but complained that his right ankle was bothering him.

He had bone spurs removed from the ankle and was limited at the start of training camp. In the second preseason game, he landed awkwardly and temporarily dislocated his left shoulder. Johnson is wearing a harness and expects to play in the season opener against Baltimore on Sunday.

Thunder can be heard from miles away, an early warning that a storm is about to arrive. So, perhaps it’s only fitting that the name of Oklahoma City’s NBA team didn’t sneak up on anyone.

Six weeks after the name first surfaced, team officials officially announced Wednesday that the team formerly known as the Seattle SuperSonics would be known as the Oklahoma City Thunder.

“It’s hard to keep a secret,” team chairman Clay Bennett said after stepping to a podium on the ground floor of the downtown office building where the team is headquartered.

The announcement had long been anticipated, but everyone knew what was coming.

The local ABC affiliate reported in mid-July that Thunder had been chosen as the nickname. Then the NBA Web site listed NBA.com/thunder as a link to the Oklahoma City team’s page. Then the Orlando Magic’s site listed games against the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Even the logo and colors leaked out over the weekend. Then, prior to the 5 p.m. announcement, Thunder merchandise started showing up on the NBA’s online store.

“I thought it was great fun. Maybe I have a warped sense of things,” Bennett said. “I thought it was a lot of fun. I was disappointed in the image being released.”

      Details of the scandal involving Mario Chalmers and Darrell Arthur are beginning to emerge as the NBA and the players’ association investigate the events that led to their expulsion from the league’s rookie transition program Wednesday.

Several sources said Thursday that NBA commissioner David Stern was so angered by the two former Kansas players’ involvement with marijuana and women at the program that he made the call to remove them from their rooms at the Doral Arrowwood resort in Rye Brook, N.Y.

Chalmers and Arthur, who just months ago helped lead the Jayhawks to the 2008 NCAA championship, were dismissed from the four-day program after being found in their hotel room with women — a violation of the program’s no-visitors rule — and marijuana.

According to sources, Chalmers and Arthur were caught in Arthur’s room at the Doral Arrowwood resort in Rye Brook, N.Y., when a fire alarm went off Wednesday at about 2 a.m. Hotel management went to the room, but the players refused to allow them in.

Management then left to get security, which used its own key to enter the room minutes later. Once inside, security found Chalmers, Arthur and at least two women. There was a strong stench of marijuana in the room, and one person was in the bathroom with the door locked, repeatedly flushing the toilet, sources said.

The police were called to room, which they searched, but neither marijuana nor drug paraphernalia was found. Representatives from the players’ association were also on the scene by that time.

Chalmers and Arthur were allowed to spend the night at the resort and were seemingly planning to attend a kick-off address by Stern later Wednesday morning. But after being told of the violations shortly before beginning his speech, Stern immediately had the players removed from their rooms.

Several sources described Stern as being furious.

The commissioner’s anger was apparently evident when he began his speech; he mentioned Chalmers and Arthur by name and told the 67 rookies in attendance that the two would be thrown out of the program and forced to attend the 2009 session.

Sources said Chalmers and Arthur have already been fined $20,000 apiece and could start the regular season on the NBA’s suspended list. But league spokesman Brian McIntyre would not confirm that.

“We’re still looking into it,” McIntyre said Wednesday. “Once we have all the details, appropriate sanctions will be taken.”

Under the rules of the collective bargaining agreement, Chalmers and Arthur could soon be subjected to a drug test. If they fail, they would be required to enter the league’s marijuana program, but they would not be suspended from playing in any games. Stern, however, could push to suspend the players for violating the rules of the rookie program.

Chalmers, who sank a game-tying, buzzer-beating 3-pointer that forced overtime in Kansas’ 75-68 championship victory over Memphis, was drafted 34th by Minnesota. He was quickly traded to Miami, where he is expected to vie for the starting role at point guard after playing well during summer league. Chalmers played three seasons for the Jayhawks.

Arthur, also an early-entry candidate who played two years at Kansas, was a sympathetic figure on draft night. Roundly believed to have lottery-type talent, Arthur fell to the 27th spot after erroneous rumors of a health problem circulated throughout the league.

Then, after being selected by New Orleans, the 6-foot-9 forward was traded to Portland, then Houston, before finally settling in Memphis.

Kansas coach Bill Self stood by his former players Wednesday.

“We really don’t know all the facts yet, and I certainly would never comment publicly on any personal matter concerning any player I have ever coached,” Self said. “Beyond that, I can say that both Mario and Darrell were great to coach. They played a huge role in our success the past few years, in large part due to their unselfishness and the sacrifices they made for our program.”

  Detroit running back Rudi Johnson said Wednesday that the player who was waived to make room for him on the Lions’ roster Tatum Bell took his luggage from team headquarters.

“All this happened when he got released,” Johnson said. “He came in to get some stuff out of his locker and that’s when he scooped up the bags.”

After being cut by the Cincinnati Bengals, Johnson came to Detroit to work out for the team and meet with Lions president Matt Millen on Monday. During the meeting, which ended with Johnson agreeing to a free-agent contract, the two Gucci bags that he had received as a Pro Bowl gift were taken from inside the team’s headquarters.

A message seeking comment was left Wednesday with Bell’s agent, Kennard McGuire.

Johnson met with the Detroit media for the first time Tuesday, and talked about Bell in a positive manner—saying they had discussed the Lions and that Bell, also a running back, had given him advice on the team and the city.

However, shortly after Johnson praised Bell, team security director Ricky Sandoval showed him footage from the team’s surveillance system.

“Ricky showed me the tape Tuesday afternoon,” Johnson said. “What makes this crazy is that I’ve talked to him after games, and I talked to him a couple hours prior to this—I guess it was before he found out he was going to be released.”

Johnson said a woman returned the bags to the practice facility Tuesday evening, but that the contents were gone.

“I got the bags back—empty,” he said. “So he’s got a bunch of my underclothes. What he’s going to do with that, I don’t know. He’s got some socks and boxers.”

Johnson said he was also still missing about $200 in cash along with his ID and the credit cards, but said that he did not plan to involve the authorities.

“I don’t need the police for this,” he said. “I got my bags back and the credit cards are canceled.”

Johnson did speak with Bell after the bags were returned.

“I didn’t want to talk to him, but I let him know where I stand,” he said. “He knows how I feel about it, and it isn’t anything positive.”

Lions coach Rod Marinelli declined to comment on the issue after Wednesday’s practice, but the team issued a short, uncredited statement before Johnson confirmed the reports that had started on the Internet Tuesday night.

“We are aware of the media reports regarding former player Tatum Bell,” the statement said. “Our sole focus continues to be on our regular season opener in Atlanta. We will not have any further comment on the media reports involving Tatum Bell.”

Daunte Culpepper summed up his thoughts Thursday in two words, which ushered in the start of a new era for the former Pro Bowl quarterback.

“Farewell NFL,” he wrote.

With that, a career once filled with such promise came to a most unceremonious end.

Culpepper, who starred for the Minnesota Vikings before a major knee injury in 2005 curtailed his career, announced his retirement in an e-mail Thursday morning, saying he’s simply grown tired of fighting for one more opportunity.

The 31-year-old was the Vikings’ first-round draft choice in 1999, became their full-time starter a year later, and teamed with Randy Moss to pile up yards and touchdowns at an impressive rate.

But he hurt his right knee in October 2005, never played for the Vikings again, and never seemed to return to his past level, either.

“When free agency began this year, I had a new sense of excitement about continuing to rebuild my career in the same way that I had rebuilt my knee after my catastrophic injury in 2005,” Culpepper said. “Unfortunately, what I found out was that the league did not share any of the optimism about me as an unrestricted free agent that I expected. In fact, there was an overwhelming sense that there was no room for me among this year’s group of quarterbacks.”

 Redskins defensive end, Jason Taylor will be sidelined 10 to 14 days with a sprained right knee. Which could make him unavailable for the season opener against the Giants on September 4th.

Taylor underwent an MRI on Sunday, and was estimated to miss 10 to 14 days. Taylor was hurt in a 47-3 preseason loss against the Carolina Panthers on Saturday. The initial X-Rays showed that there was no damage to his right knee.

Riding 27 points from Dwyane Wade (Miami Heat) and 20 points from Kobe Bryant (Los Angeles Lakers), the 2008 U.S. Men’s Olympic Team (8-0) dethroned reigning World Champion Spain (6-2) in a fight-to-the-finish 118-107 victory that earned the USA the Olympic gold medal Sunday afternoon at Wukesong Arena in Beijing, China. The gold was the USA’s 13th all-time in Olympic competition and its first gold medal finish in a major international competition since claiming gold in the 2000 Olympics.

  Receiver Chris Henry is back with the Cincinnati Bengals because their owner has a soft spot for troubled players.

Henry signed a two-year deal Tuesday with the team that let him go after he was arrested for the fifth time, a decision that seemed to mark a change in philosophy for owner Mike Brown. Instead, it was an aberration. The Bengals took him back at Brown’s behest.

Coach Marvin Lewis, who had no interest in bringing back the troubled receiver, said Brown wanted to give Henry yet another chance.

“I obviously know that at the end of the day, that the owner has the final say-so on whether or not he wants to give a guy an opportunity or not,” Lewis said, following an evening practice. “Mike has wanted to give Chris this opportunity, and asks that we do the best job that we can to try to prepare him and get him ready to play football.”

The Bengals released Henry after he was accused of punching a college student and breaking his car window with a beer bottle in March. Henry was one of 10 Bengals arrested during a 14-month span — a local judge referred to the receiver as a “one-man crime wave.”

The decision to let Henry go seemed to mark a major change for the Bengals owner.

“His conduct can no longer be tolerated,” Brown said at the time. “The Bengals tried for an extended period of time to support Chris and his potentially bright career. We had hoped to guide him toward an appropriate standard of personal responsibility that this community would support and that would allow him to play in the NFL. … But those efforts end today, as we move on with what is best for our team.”

Bengals receiver Chad Johnson landed awkwardly while trying to make a catch in the first quarter against Detroit on Sunday night, then left the game to have his left shoulder examined.

Johnson

Cornerback Brian Kelly hit Johnson as he tried to pull in a pass from Carson Palmer on the Bengals’ first series, jarring the ball loose. Kelly came up with the interception and an off-balance Johnson landed on his left side.

The Pro Bowl receiver rolled around on the field in pain for several seconds, then got up and went to the sideline. Trainers examined the shoulder on the field before Johnson went to the locker room for further examination and treatment. He was ruled out for the rest of the game.

The Bengals already were without Pro Bowl receiver T.J. Houshmandzadeh, missing his second preseason game with a sore hamstring.

The Bengals don’t have much experience at receiver behind Johnson and Houshmandzadeh. Rookie Marcus Maxwell started Sunday in Houshmandzadeh’s spot. The Bengals released No. 3 receiver Chris Henry after his latest arrest in the offseason.

Johnson had lobbied for an offseason trade, but the Bengals refused. He abandoned his threat to sit out the season and reported to training camp on time, but wasn’t able to participate in practice initially because he was still recovering from surgery to remove bone spurs from his right ankle. He looked close to full speed in practice last week.

Missing Johnson would be a huge setback to the Bengals, who also played without starting running back Rudi Johnson on Sunday. Rudi Johnson was slowed by a hamstring injuries last season and has missed the first two preseason games with a sore hamstring.