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The Lineup

Departments

6 Leading Off

13 Letters

14 Catching Up With...

17 Air and Space

Your ticket doesn't entitle you to be a foul-mouthed jerk by Steve Rushin

18 Scorecard

• The Britannica: sports bible?

• Buyout specialist buys out IMG

• Jamal Lewis faces jail time

35 Faces in the Crowd

37 Players

92 The Life of Reilly

Peeling off the pounds with Nebraska's biggest fan by Rick Reilly

Inside...

84 The NFL

• Unbeaten Falcons rule NFC South

• Texans' Carr in driver's seat

88 College Football

• Northwestern shocks Ohio State

90 The WNBA

• Sun's title hopes ride on Whalen

91 Boxing

• Tito shuts up Managua Madman

COLLEGE FOOTBALL

46 The Oklahoma Kid

Adrian Peterson has the unbeaten Sooners running wild. Can Texas stop him?

by Austin Murphy

BASEBALL

54 Swinging Away

After an MVP-caliber year, Gary Sheffield takes his cuts at Pedro, Barry and Ichiro

by Tom Verducci

PRO FOOTBALL

60 Painful Reality

Have oversized, ultrafast players pushed their bodies beyond the breaking point?

by Peter King

MOTOR SPORTS

64 Here Comes Junior

After a win at Talladega, Dale Earnhardt Jr. leads the Chase for the Nextel Cup

by Lars Anderson

PRO FOOTBALL

66 It's All in His Mind

Despite cerebral palsy, Doug Blevins has made himself into an astute kicking coach

by Karl Taro Greenfeld

72 Five Outs Away A year ago the Cubs and Red Sox came that close to the World Series, but it all blew up

by Tom Verducci

Cover

COVER PHOTOGRAPH BY JOHN BIEVER

INSET PHOTOS: Michael O'Neill (Sheffield); Al Tielemans (Clemens); Robert B. Stanton/Wireimage.com (Garner) COVER FLAP: Terry Reinna/AP (Earnhardt); Simon Bruty (Georgia)

SI Extra

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• For wall-to-wall coverage of the MLB postseason, including

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by SI's experts, go to si.com/baseball.

COLOR PHOTO

MICHAEL O'NEILL/BACKGROUND EXTENDED BY SI IMAGING

THROWIN' MY WAY?

Gary Sheffield leads the Yankees into the postseason (page 54).

COLOR PHOTO