After announcing his retirement from football today, New England Patriots Linebacker Tedy Bruschi was paid a pretty ultimate compliment by his coach Bill Belichick, who called him “the perfect player.” Given the polarizing Coach Belichick’s low status in the sports landscape for saccharine appreciation, it probably won’t stick.

Hopefully, what will be remembered, by Pats fan or otherwise, is Bruschi’s unlikely and lightning fast recovery from a stroke in February ’05 just three days after winning his third Super Bowl with New England that saw him back on the playing field by mid-October of the same year.

Tedy Bruschi, Half man, Half God, Half [possible] Centaur was born days, possibly half an hour, after that first game back against the Bills in ’05.

Now, these guys don’t like the Patriots, and they’re probably editing screengrabs of today’s retirement press conference, with heartfelt embraces between Bruschi and and Belichick, to Let Me Go by Heaven 17 for their next video installment on their YouTube channel – Belichick’s Camera Crew. However, since Bruschi recovered (he obviously did not “stroke out”) and went on to lead the team in tackles in 2006 and 2007, and will probably be appointed the new senior senator of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts…we can laugh about this, right?

Thanks for 13 hard-nosed years, Tedy.

I’d put Johnny Depp in the top-10 actors of his generation. The guy has come a long way from playing Officer Tom Hanson on 21 Jump Street (that dangling earring. regrettable for Depp, I’m sure), and has shown versatility and longevity on the silver screen. However, when it comes to playing crazy people, Depp is in a class unto himself. Jack Sparrow, Willy Wonka, Ichabod Crane, Ed Wood, Ed Scissorhands – all certifiable. You give him a character with any sort of twitch, and Depp will give a smashing performance. Looking back, he’s been a rum swigging swashbuckler, a opium induced inspector (don’t see From Hell if you can help it), a slasher barber – it makes me wonder, why should sports star be the exception?

Hence, that is why I posed the question to sports blog intelligentsia: Which Athlete Should Johnny Depp Play in a Movie?

The creme appears below, with a poll daddy guy at the bottom for you to cast a vote. Anyone interested in participating in one of my weekly polling exercise, email me here.

My personal submission for this: McEnroe. The film will span Johnny Mac’s entire career, and then some – ending with that awkward hug he gave Federer after he lost Wimbledon last year. Federer will be played by the kid from that Twilight thing or somebody, BUT, more importantly Rafa will be played by Benicio, and the deleted scenes will include Depp and him driving through the desert in a ballbuster on the way to Vegas, hyped on mescaline.

…And just because they already made that movie, doesn’t mean we can’t do it again, because McEnroe actually did stuff like this. Now he just makes totally ridiculous commercials…

Here’s the best of the rest…

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