Seau puts Patriots on hold

The New England Patriots have injury problems at linebacker, have needs to address right now, and Junior Seau says he'd like to help.

Just get back to him in a few months.

"I have my phone open in November and December for the Pats if they need help," the 40-year-old Seau told Sirius NFL Radio. "I'm just letting them know that. They understand that if they need any help going further into the postseason or in the midst of December, which is a crucial time ... I'll be able to look at it, and we'll assess that as that happens.

"... This body can give you six games, but that's about it."

Seau, a 12-time Pro Bowl selection in his 19-year career, spent the past three seasons with the Patriots, retiring after playing four games last year. He also retired briefly in 2006 before coming back.

• GOOD SPORTS -- Sometimes the cliche about sports building character is accurate. Such was the case last week when two freshman football teams from high schools in Missouri arranged for a running back with Down syndrome to score a 65-yard touchdown.

Maryville was leading St. Joseph Benton 46-0 with 10 seconds left when the game was stopped so Benton coach Dan McCamy could run across the field to ask Maryville's defensive coach if he would give up a shutout to help a cause.

McCamy wanted to know if Maryville would allow 5-foot-3-inch, 110-pound Matt Ziesel to score a touchdown on the game's final play.

Maryville obliged, Ziesel chugged all the way down the right sideline, and thanks to a YouTube video of the play, the teams soon were toasted throughout the region for sportsmanship and having their priorities in the right place.

"It's amazing how one play can mean so much to one kid and then to a team and then to a community," McCamy told the Kansas City (Mo.) Star. "And now it's spread not just to the community of St. Joseph, but now it's spread across the region. How something so simple can impact so many to me, that's the amazing part about it."

• PAPER LION DEPT. -- Penn State football coach Joe Paterno says he limits his newspaper reading to the bathroom.

"The first thing I do is look at who died, all right," the 82-year-old said during his weekly Monday news conference. "Second thing I look at are headlines.

"Something that says, 'Paterno Is the Greatest,' I read it. If it says I'm a bum, I don't even look at it."

• ONE-LINERS -- From Reggie Hayes of the Fort Wayne (Ind.) News-Sentinel, on the new Nike sneaker inspired by Michael Jordan's graceless Hall of Fame induction speech: "Air Grievances."

More from Hayes, on Seattle Mariners hit machine Ichiro Suzuki: "The best player whose name sounds like a car dealership since Whitey Ford."

• TALE OF THE TAPE -- Sultan Kosen, an 8-foot-1-inch Turk, has been declared the world's tallest man by Guinness World Records, the London Daily Telegraph reported.

According to Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times, Kosen, 26, planned to celebrate quietly at home with family, friends and 29 NBA scouts.

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