Dad pulling for Saints over Peyton

As the New Orleans Saints and Indianapolis Colts each close in on a 16-0 regular season, former Saints quarterback Archie Manning appears to be pulling more for his former team than for his son, Colts quarterback Peyton Manning.

"When I think of what all the long-suffering Saints fans have been through, no one deserves what's happening now more than they do," he told nola.com. "I remember our kids growing up, going to games with (my wife) Olivia, listening to all the boos, and asking their mother, 'Is it all right if we boo?' "

There was never more booing than in 1980, when the Saints started 0-14 and finished 1-15.

At the time, a friend of 4-year-old Peyton told him, "Your daddy's team is so bad they couldn't beat Grambling." When Peyton came home, he asked Archie, "Who's Grambling, and when do you play 'em?"

The insults aimed at Archie got so bad that Olivia, who was expecting her third child -- New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning -- stopped attending games.

The Saints appeared on their way to a win in Week 14, leading the San Francisco 49ers 35-7 at halftime, but found a way to lose 38-35 in overtime in what was then the greatest comeback in NFL history.

New Orleans followed that loss with its only win of the season, a 21-20 triumph over the Jets in New York. For Archie Manning, the victory was "the closest thing to winning a Super Bowl."

• COMMISSIONER FOR A DAY -- If Boston Celtics forward Paul Pierce ran the NBA, he'd make three changes: eliminate the age minimum, shorten the season to 60 games and raise the rim 3 inches.

"The athletes today are crazy. You see the way guys are jumping these days. I would raise the rim three inches," he wrote in his blog for the Boston Globe. "Then, you have to learn the art of the jump shot. You'll have to know how to play this game a little bit better then. Raising the rim, you'll see improved play. You'll see increasing fundamentals. I'm telling you."

• JUICE TV -- It's hard to imagine life behind bars as fodder for a TV sitcom, but O.J. Simpson apparently has been jotting down ideas for one based on his time at Nevada's Lovelock Correctional Center, where he's serving a sentence of nine to 33 years on assault and kidnapping charges stemming from his 2007 armed robbery of two sports memorabilia dealers at Palace Station.

One hilarious episode could focus on the fact that Simpson -- who is black and was acquitted of the murders of his white ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her white friend, Ron Goldman -- often counsels his fellow inmates on such issues as race relations and anger management, the New York Post reported.

Besides the side-splitting prison shower scenes and abundant humor to be mined from the "mystery meat" served in the prison cafeteria, "The Juice" also can joke about his relationship with his wacky cellmate, who he initially feared was plotting to kill him and whom his daughter reportedly described as "a white supremacist."

Yes, the laughs never stop at Lovelock.

COMPILED BY TODD DEWEY LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL