Sports Redux: Personnel Matters

Nobody can say anything official, but everyone in Foxboro is unofficially saying that Junior Seau, who never strayed far from the phone, will be back with the Patriots sometime soon. Maybe. The amount of information runs from Seau's optimistic "I want to thank the management of both for making my return to the NFL with the New England Patriots a reality", to Bob Kraft's gushing "I’d love to have him part of our team for as long as he wants to be", to Bill Belichick's terse "we don’t have anything to say about it."

Nothing official had happened by this morning, but reports are that Seau's passed his physicals and is raring to go. Of course, he's 40, but anchoring the defense any way possible doesn't look like such a bad idea after watching Denver march up the field in overtime on Sunday.

The Pats are also gratified to hear that the news could have been a lot worse on Matt Light's injury. There's been no major damage, and it's not out of the question Light will play against Tennessee on Sunday.

A very depleted Celtics roster was still enough to beat New Jersey in exhibition play. The Big Three were given the night off, and so much of the burden rested on Rajon Rondo, who rose to the occasion with 18 points and 13 assists. "He is doing it all the right way. He’s leading, he’s not gambling on defense, he’s executing offensively," said Doc Rivers, which means Rondo may officially be off the trading block. The C's also got a glimmer from last year's first-round pick, J.R. Giddens, who pulled down 13 rebounds in his longest stint ever in green. And if you want to read more about rookie Lester Hudson, we recommend today's Herald.

The US soccer team took a big hit yesterday, as superstar forward Charlie Davies suffered serious injuries in a car crash in Virginia. There's a slight chance he'll be ready for the World Cup next summer, but don't count on it. The US team, who's already clinched their World Cup bid, will play Costa Rica tonight in D.C. with heavy hearts.

And as HubBlog notes, the Red Sox "silly season" has begun, with the Globe going to a local funeral director to try to put the 2009 season into perspective. As if the end of the season were a sudden untimely death, instead of a mercy killing of a terminally ill team that was most likely going to be experiencing prolonged suffering and Yankee-related agony in the next few weeks anyway.