The Atlanta Falcons signed Michael Turner to a 6-year, $34.5 million deal today. The move makes Jerious Norwood the logical backup and most likely puts Warrick Dunn on unemployment. It also significantly decreases the chances that Atlanta will draft Darren McFadden, who now may fall to the Oakland Raiders at #4. Gulp. Atlanta could be looking to bring in Matt Ryan with the 3rd overall pick. The Falcons seem doomed to walk the Earth with a below average receiving corps, but if the second of those two moves take place, they'll have sured up their QB and RB position for the next half decade. Nice start to the post Bobby Petrino era.

"For the third straight fight, Wladmir Klitschko entered and left the ring as the best heavyweight in the world, by far. And at the same time, he left us feeling disappointed that we even tried to care about this abysmal wreck of a division." Bad Left Hook couldn't have summed it up any better. Klitschko dominated the fight throwing jab after jab after jab. He never needed his powerful right...not once. It was a like a father playing his son in 1-on-1 using, but handicapping himself by only his left hand. Ibragimov didn't throw a single effective punch the entire fight. Not good.

On the bright side, Kelly Pavlik's most likely next opponent fought on the undercard. He goes by the name of Duddy, and he's not a big fan of defense. He is a crowd pleaser though and in times of snoozefests like last night's championship fight, he'll draw significant attention with his bloody faced style of fighting.

Looks like "Suck my Ass" wasn't a 20th century invention.

"A firm called Robert Edward Auctions got its hands on a document from 1897 in which Major League Baseball ruling committee prohibited players from using foul language toward fans, umpires, and other players. It lists several offending phrases, including but not limited to..."

Another Saturday Night, another opponent that Calzaghe critics thought Joe would lose to. After a unanimous decision over Mikkel Kessler this past weekend, who's next? The answer, just about every big name in the business. Bernard Hopkins? Kelly Pavlik? Jermain Taylor? 2008 could be an exciting year for boxing fans if any of these fights come to fruition.

The floodgates are open. The best part about the lower weight classes is that there are few boxers who can manufacture a major payday and Manny Pacquiao is one of them. What does that mean? Every major player at that level is stepping up their trash talking in hopes of gabbing Manny's attention and lining up a fight. Check out what Casamayor had to say.

Said Casamayor of Pacquiao's performance on Saturday, "It was mediocre at best. He's a regular fighter and he just comes forward and throws a lot of punches. Between me and you I think he's a maricon. He's calling out the lightweights like David Diaz and saying he wants to move up in weight, but he doesn't mention my name. I went up to his face a few days before his fight with Barrera and all he did was look at me and smile like a little girl. To me he's a B-level fighter at best."

If you're a fight fan and you didn't watch Pavlik/Taylor on HBO, you should be ashamed of yourself. Two undefeated fighters no more. Pavlik ate a furious combo in the second round leaving him on the canvas. It was a pounding that referees other than Steve Smoger would let end the fight. He returned to his feet with 90 seconds left in the round and surived clinching and holding. The two traded the next four rounds before Pavlik ended Taylor in the seventh with a furious combo that left the former champ slumped over in the corner. Great fight and I'd expect a rematch.

We have a new middleweight champ!

It must be true. Teams really are gunning for you the year after they see you in the Super Bowl. That or Shaun Phillips just hates Cedric Benson and Ron Rivera, the brainchild that he is, believes he's smarter than everyone in the league, employers withstanding.

A follow up to the 11 guys you meet in pickup basketball...

First, the Ghost's fight is cancelled and now this. Vitali had to bow out of his comeback fight with Jameel McCline because of a back problem. Boxing needs a major fight to steamroll it's way through really soon. I'm having withdrawals.

This video is hilarious even if they are missing a few characters. Never Fouls Guy is classic. I think I just played him the other day.

Stepping out of his weight class, Floyd Mayweather Jr. will join the upcoming cast of Dancing with the Stars and face non other than Mr. Las Vegas himself, Wayne Newton, amongst others. I have to agree with Bad Left Hook here. Jr. can't be all that worried about Hatton if this is how he'll be spending the weeks prior to the December 8th pay per view fight. There is some good that will come of this though. Mayweather is a relatively charming, charismatic guy when he wants to be. The primetime show will give him, and more importantly the sport of boxing, some much needed positive publicity. There's no reason why a fighter as good as Mayweather should be a relative unknown outside of the boxing community.

Monster Park will keep the naming rights to the stadium, but the grass they play on belongs to Bill Walsh. It will be called Bill Walsh Field.

It's a little confusing, but in the end, a good thing.

Juarez jumped ship because he didn't want a piece of the Ghost, that's what happened! Well, not exactly. He got a shot to take on Juan Manuel Marquez and took it. Golden Boy Productions is still looking for a challenger for Yardbarker's own, Robert Guerrero. Check out Bad Left Hook for further details.

If you're a boxing fan, you owe it to yourself to click through on this article. Bad Left Hook talks about all of the good stuff going on in the sport, as well as the quote of the year courtesy of Ricardo Mayorga.

Here are the events HBO has on tap.

"How about this November from HBO? On November 3, we'll see the long-awaited showdown between the top two 168-pounders in the sport, Joe Calzaghe and Mikkel Kessler, in front of 60,000 strong in Cardiff. On November 10, HBO goes to pay-per-view for a huge welterweight title battle between Top Rank's Miguel Cotto and Golden Boy's Shane Mosley. Then, on November 17, we take a step down in star power for a fight between Humberto Soto and Joan Guzman. What in the hell has gotten into boxing lately? Fights we want to see being made? Top guys fighting each other? Truces between the two big American promotional companies?"

I could care less about Shaun Alexander, so I'm less annoyed than the fella over at 12 Seahawks Place, but this is still heavy on the wrong side.