When we last left full-time baseball writer, Peter King, he was talking you about your favorite sport: BASEBALL! Don’t you just love baseball? The innocence! The childlike zeal! Oh, what a grand game baseball is. Oh, were you here to read about FOOTBALL? Pfft. The gall of you people. Anyway, Peter also regaled us all with stories of BBQ pork nachoburgers and teased us all with a possible Marlins trade nugget. Don’t hold back, Peter! I’ll never buy you a Land Shark premium lager if you do!

So what of this week? Will Sam Bradford’s 50 balls affect his throwing motion? Why do those mean NFL people want to play a Super Bowl in Jersey? Don’t they know that will freeze little Peter’s little Peter right off? WANNA KNOW WHY THE MCNABB TRADE DOESN’T MATTER TO THE COLTS? And how does Trent Baalke faaaaaactor into aaaall of this? Read on:

This is what the most interesting trade in the NFL since Eric Dickerson to the Colts in 1987 came down to:

Wasn’t Cutlerfucker traded just last year? And Brittfar the year before?

From Washington’s perspective, Mike Shanahan looked at Donovan McNabb and saw John Elway.

EYE DOCTOR: Okay, Mr. Shananhan. Please read the top line on the chart.

SHANAHAN: Uh… Q… 6… Donovan McNabb throwing above a receiver’s waist when it matters…

EYE DOCTOR: Uh, Mr. Shanahan… you’re looking at the fern.

SHANAHAN: FUCK YOU!

From Philadelphia’s perspective, and I’ve written this a hundred times, Andy Reid looked at his team and saw Groundhog Day. Highly competitive every year, falling short every year, usually with some painful offensive futility involved.

REID: God, we just seem to make the same damn mistakes year in and year out. There must be a reason for this. There must be someone here who is causing us to come up short over and over and over and over and over again… What’s that, Marty? We’re down 4 with 30 seconds to go? Let’s kick a field goal. THEY’LL NEVER SEE IT COMING. Now, who could be responsible for all our woes?

I like the trade for both teams.

PHILLY FAN: FUCK YOU! FUCK YOU, KING! That trade SUCKED! Andy Reid can blow me! They FUCKED us!

(NOTE: Philly fan reaction the same regardless of any and all trade parameters)

I’ll be surprised if Washington isn’t at least four wins better this year, a .500 team.

Ooh, a .500 team! WATCH OUT, WORLD! You can’t handle Dan Snyder’s adequacy!

Reid always said through this that he’d do right for McNabb, his first draft choice with the Eagles when he became coach in 1999, and he did.

“You’re a great guy, Donovan. That’s why I’m trading you to the Redskins, who have one of the two worst owners in football, the shittiest stadium on Earth, and the most deluded group of fans you have ever seen in your life. Wait till they come up to you and start babbling on about Joe Jacoby. I did right by you, sir.”

Jason Campbell trade partners. I don’t think he’s worth much — maybe a fifth-round pick — but if, say, the Bills or Raiders want to add him to their mix, I’m sure they can have him.

And that’s pretty much all you need to know about Mr. Jason Campbell. Hey, he could be good enough to compete with Trent Edwards! What a kid!

The NFC East. I’d be worried about the Redskins right now.

They might go .500! FEAR THE DIRT WORSHIPPERS.

Profootballtalk.com reported this morning that Haynesworth, last year’s bonus-baby prize in free-agency, was offered to the Eagles as part of the McNabb deal.

SKINS: Say guys, as a sweetener, we could maybe be tempted to include Hayn…

EAGLES: Fuck no.

I said a couple of weeks that the Eagles had sent offensive coordinator Marty Mornhinweg and quarterback coach James Urban to Fordham to scout mid-round prospect Skelton at his Pro Day. I have heard the Eagles will now focus on Tebow and are likely to join the parade of teams working him out and spending time with him.

And if I’m the Eagles, I draft Tebow, make him the backup Wildcat QB behind Vick, and then sit back and count my billions.

Donte Stallworth, the 29-year-old wide receiver signed by the Ravens in February, broke a 13-month silence Thursday and told me his side of the harrowing vehicular homicide story in which he drove drunk and his car struck and killed 59-year-old Miami crane operator Mario Reyes. It’s a harrowing story.

When the cell phone rang in his Miami condo around 2 a.m. on March 14, 2009, Stallworth had been asleep for five hours. He’d worked out hard the previous day, a Friday, and gone to bed early, planning to sleep through the night and fly to Cleveland that Saturday evening. Monday was the start of offseason workouts for the Browns, and Stallworth planned to show new coach Eric Mangini he was set to be a stalwart receiver and team leader after having signed a rich extension with the team.

Stallworth also told King that, at the time of the call, he was healing AIDS babies, mediating seven different divorces, listening to his Rosetta Stone CD’s to learn Sanskrit, and applying to medical school. You know, just another boring night in the Stallworth household.

“If I could change one thing?” he said to me. “I wouldn’t have gotten out of bed at 2 in the morning.”

I BLAME THE BED!

Stallworth said, he went to the bar, met some women and did a couple of shots with them. “Four shots total,” he told me.

Keep that total of shots in mind.

“Obviously, I wasn’t expecting him to cross all the lanes,” Stallworth said. “By the time I saw him, I thought I had time to gently apply my brakes and…

“…perhaps warn the reckless fellow of the impending danger. Did I mention I was administering CPR to a blind and deaf dog that evening as well? Again, that’s just a typical night for me. I’m a boring guy.”

…hope he’d just stop [in the road while Stallworth's car passed]. I couldn’t turn left, because I’d go right into the concrete barrier. I thought maybe he’d see me and figure he should just stop and wait ’til I went by.”

“But he didn’t die from the impact,” Stallworth said, somberly. “His feet got run over by my tires, and he fell, and his head hit the concrete.”

So he kinda did die from the impact.

Stallworth’s blood-alcohol content was .126.

That was four and half hours after he started drinking. If only there were a way to know if Donte’s claim of having only four shots was genuine. If only there were some kind of online calculator where you could input Donte’s weight (about 190 lbs), his gender (male), the number of drinks he claimed to have (4), and the number of hours he was drinking (4). If only that site could give you a percentage such as… Oh, I dunno, .0333, that would be a clear discrepancy from Stallworth’s claim. And if only that site could help you calculate the number of drinks needed to reach .126, and that turned out to be 7-8 drinks.

If only such a site existed.

By the way, Stallworth did do only four shots total. Honest. Unfortunately, they were each served in this custom shotbucket.

2.1261932976.a-bucket-of-booze

Commissioner Roger Goodell added to that punishment by suspending Stallworth for the 2009 season. “[The commissioner] told me how much I hurt the [NFL] shield,” Stallworth said. “But he also said it wasn’t the end of the world.”

What’s that? You killed a guy? Eh, not the end of the world. At least you weren’t spotted in a strip club, THEN we’d have a problem.

“I understood why people were angry about the sentence,” said Stallworth. “I understand human psychology; I majored in psychology at Tennessee.”

I’m sorry. Listen, I really do sympathize with Donte Stallworth. And the whole situation is terrible. But that quote… COME ON. You try and read that again without bursting into shit-loosening laughter. You see, people, Donte Stallworth has a degree in psychology from Tennessee. That allows him to understand complicated things, like why people get mad when someone gets a relatively light sentence for killing a guy, or why children cry when they are not allowed to have seven bags of Fun Dip, or why you won’t let Ross Tucker try your stadium corn. HE GETS IT.

He served his time — in solitary confinement mostly — at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center in Miami, hard by Miami International Airport. He read, mostly, and wrote in a journal. He read the 9/11 Commission Report and a spiritual novel about a man who meets God (“The Shack”), a book about Albert Einstein’s thoughts about the planet (“The World As I See It”) and his Bible.

He also invented the flux capacitor, became penpals with 56 starving kids in Namibia, and built a seven-story house of cards. TELL ME YOU AREN’T DAZZLED BY THE TURNAROUND.

Chad Ocho Cinco visited.

“This nightclub is the fucking shit! They got people in cages! That’s hot!”

(Stallworth) always figured one team would give him a chance. He just didn’t know which one.

Really? You signed with the RAVENS. You couldn’t have guessed it would be them to let you into the fold? Dude, you could hit seven MORE people and the Ravens would give you a fucking roster bonus.

…when he went to work out for the Ravens in February, he ran the fastest 40 time they’d clocked at their new training facility — under 4.4 seconds.

But if I hear one more story about a guy at the combine running a fast forty, I’ll EXPLODE! Forty times only matter if you killed a guy. NO ONE DENIES THIS.

A text message arrived to Stallworth’s phone on the day of the accident. It read, “A lot of people know the kind of person you are. You’re a good person.”

Tom Brady, his quarterback in 2007.

NOTE: This text message was sent while Tom was nailing Gisele with Bridget and little John sleeping in the next bungalow over. Good nugget.

How does the McNabb trade affect the Rams? Maybe not as much as you think.

Flash back in this exact same column…

The Rams no longer will be tempted by any team, except perhaps Cleveland (five picks in the top 100), about moving up to get the number one pick. If you’re a Rams fan, start watching Bradford highlights.

How does the McNabb trade affect the Rams? It means they will 100% draft Sam Bradford now, which wasn’t the case before. Actually, that’s more like 90%, but that 90% means something.

But it doesn’t affect the Rams as much as you (or I) think! Make that 65%. A legit 65%.

“In San Diego, everything was taken away from me. There wasn’t an emphasis on running the ball. My best fullback [Lorenzo Neal] was gone. The linemen were pass-blocking. We had a passing coach [Norv Turner].”

n LaDainian Tomlinson, on the plummeting production that led to him being released by the Chargers on the eve of turning 31 this summer and to signing with the New York Jets as a backup to Shonn Greene.

Holy fuck, he said that? What a fucking shithead.

Yeah, Norv Turner is a HUGE passing coach. He only presided over Emmitt Smith’s career and yours when you didn’t suck. Moron.

To say it was the Chargers’ fault that he’s in decline … and make no mistake, that’s what Tomlinson is saying … well, it’s beneath the dignity and the greatness Tomlinson exhibited for so long.

It’s well beneath your usually sulkiness!

As we digest the Donovan McNabb trade, consider what happened the last time Washington coach Mike Shanahan took a 30-something quarterback under his wing and tried to win a Super Bowl with him. With John Elway, Shanahan actually won two.

“So yer sayin’ we’re gonna win at least TWO Super Bowls?! WOOHOO! Fire up the bandwagon, gize! THE RETURN TO GLOREE IS BACK! IT’S JUST LIKE THE DAYS OF EL RIGGO! SEE YOU SUPER SUNDEE, COOCH!”

The impact of this note is moot now that the Redskins have acquired Donovan McNabb, but I find it an interesting sign of an intelligent fan base.

Don’t. Please don’t…

The Washington Post asked its readers last week if they favored the Redskins moving up in the April 22 draft to acquire the draft rights to Oklahoma quarterback Sam Bradford.

Now, in most cases, fans of teams without a certain quarterback of the future would jump at the chance to take a kid who is a legitimate franchise quarterback prospect.

Unless they knew that QB might be overhyped and breathtakingly expensive, which is what fans of, oh, all 32 NFL teams know.

That’s why the result of this poll surprised me. Post readers, 25,330 of them as of this weekend, were 57 percent against, 42 percent in favor. (Don’t ask me why it doesn’t add up to 100 percent; I’m just reading off the paper’s Web site.)

ZOMG! They didn’t want Bradford! They’re so smart! It’s almost as if they’ve been burned before by splashy draft picks and free agent signings!

Those are some mature readers who know their football…

NO THEY AREN’T! COMPLETELY UNTRUE! I LIVE HERE! THEY’RE RETARDS! THEY CAN’T EVEN MERGE PROPERLY! THEY DON’T EVEN STAND UPRIGHT!

ZOMG! One Skins fan I knew asked me if I was going to pick Jerome Harrison in fantasy next year! YOU TALK ABOUT PEOPLE WHO KNOW THE GAME IN DEPTH!

…tired of an aging, leaky offensive line getting incumbent passer Jason Campbell chased all over the field. The fans don’t entirely blame Campbell for his mediocre play because, in part, of the weakness of the line.

No, they don’t blame Campbell at all. Some of them even STILL think Campbell could be awesome. The same Campbell who, in your words, would fit right in with the shitty-go-rounds in Oakland and Buffalo. THESE PEOPLE ARE DUMBER THAN ACTORS.

Not that GM Bruce Allen and Mike Shanahan are going to listen to the poll…

Unless Proposition 304 passes, and we all pray it will.

…but it’s interesting that a solid majority of a team’s fans would rather have a tackle many of them have never heard of than a quarterback who might be a longtime Pro Bowler.

THAT’S BECAUSE EVEN BRAINDEAD SKINS FANS KNOW BETTER! THEY AREN’T SMARTER THAN AVERAGE FANS! TUNE INTO THE FUCKING CHAD DUKES TARDMOUTH RADIO HOUR IF YOU DON’T BELIEVE ME!

Part of the job that’s always fun is going to new places. For me, a late-week trip to Indiana, Pa., about 60 miles northeast of Pittsburgh, to see a second-round draft prospect, Akwasi Owusu-Ansah of Indiana University of Pennsylvania, yielded some interesting surprises.

Did you know Indiana, PA, is NOT in Indiana?

Indiana, a borough of 15,000, has two Starbucks.

Holy fuck, THAT is an interesting surprise? Amazing factoid, gang. This town has a STARBUCKS. And not just one! Multiple locations! Never would have guessed!

I’m amazed that a college I thought had maybe 3,000 students is as big as it is.

AND it has a Dunkin Donuts! FASCINATING.

I think I believe Shaun Rogers. I think he didn’t mean to have that loaded (licensed) gun in his carry-on when he went through airport security. A stupid mistake, if you ask me.

“I didn’t mean to have it, Peter. I only use that gun to soothe the wounds of the many kiddie burn victims I visit at St. Jude’s Hospital. The gunmetal feels good on their horrible, horrible burns.“

Stole time in the last week for two of my top 20 movies of all time: The Princess Bride (I love Andre the Giant and Wallace Shawn, and Billy Crystal’s love of the mutton, tomato and lettuce sandwich is a killer) and Parenthood (Mary Steenburgen’s good from start to finish, as is Jason Robards).

And Ufford dies inside juuuust a little.

Let me lend my incompetent picks for the baseball races:

No.

MVPs?

No.

Don’t kill me if you see me at Fenway. Just calling it the races the way I see them. I don’t think the Red Sox have enough offense, and the bullpen may be weaker than the fans think. I still think it’s absurd that Sox fans got sold a bill of goods on what a bad defensive player Jason Bay was last year.

HOW DAY-UH THEY LIE TO THE LEGENDARY FANS OF CELTICS NATION?!

The Starbucks close by the IUP campus in Indiana, Pa., is certainly a friendly, inviting place. But it would help to get the drinks right. Two for two wrong in a 20-hour visit.

You people fucked up Peter’s Honey Gingerbread Double Custard Chocilatto! You’ve got a long way to go before I call you Pete’s!

This is the first year as a native Nutmegger that I have no interest in the women’s basketball tournament.

Good to know. I’m interested that you aren’t o longer interested in something I’m not interested in. But WHY don’t you care anymore, Pete? Does anyone here have a psych degree from UT so we can figure this out?