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1. The Steelers ended the Patriots' 21-game win streak on Sunday with a 34-20 victory. New England's defeat was no shock, however, since the Patriots have never won the game immediately following a Red Sox world championship.

2. Another decades-old sports trend will be tested on Tuesday. In every presidential election since 1936, if the Redskins won their last home game before the election, the incumbent party won the White House; if they lost, the incumbent party was tossed out. So in what should be good news for John Kerry, the Packers beat the Redskins 28-14 on Sunday. At least, that's the tentative final score pending the resolution of the inevitable lawsuits challenging the illegal motion penalty on Washington's James Thrash.

3. Florida, Florida State and Miami all lost football games on Saturday, the first time that has happened on the same day since Oct. 14, 1978. Floridians fervently hope that the triple pigskin loss will still be considered the state's low point of the week after Tuesday night.

4. In what looms as yet another sports-related election omen, Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa told a Dominican newspaper that he was humiliated by being dropped to sixth in the order. When the most famous player traded away by the incumbent president complains about his spot in the batting order the weekend before the election, the incumbent always ... OK, so this is the first time it's  happened. We're declaring it the start of a trend. This could be big, people.

5. An estimated 3.2 million Red Sox fans packed the streets of Boston on Saturday for a parade to honor the World Series champs. While the huge crowds generally partied peacefully, pitcher Pedro Martinez was hit in the forehead by a baseball thrown by a bystander. Some fans blamed manager Terry Francona for the incident, grumbling that Pedro shouldn't have been left on the parade route so long.

6. Mets pitcher John Franco could be in hot water with MLB officials after published reports that he associated with suspected members of the Bonanno crime family, including leaving tickets to an early '90s Mets game for the alleged mobsters. Baseball prohibits its players from fraternizing with organized crime figures. Of course, that's nothing compared to the underworld retribution the Bonanno members face for consorting with a lowly Met.

7. Eagles receiver Terrell Owens had the last laugh in the Eagles-Ravens game on Sunday, catching the winning touchdown and then mocking Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis in the end zone by imitating Lewis' trademark dance. That exacerbated the bad blood that first boiled this summer when Owens spurned the Ravens and forced a trade to Philadelphia. Still, T.O.'s teammates defended him, saying that outsiders can't begin to understand how much time Owens puts in -- on his dance moves.

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8. The sports world certainly is fortunate to have ESPN's Stuart Scott serving as its conscience. During Sunday night's SportsCenter, Scott quite sensibly opened a report on the NASCAR race by discussing last weekend's private plane crash that killed 10 people, including key members of Hendrick Motorsports. The crash has had a tremendous emotional impact on the tight-knit NASCAR community.

But Scott couldn't resist demonstrating his superior capacity for sensitivity by blasting Kurt Busch, who entered Sunday's race leading in points. Busch blew his engine and finished 42nd, and SportsCenter showed Busch discussing the mechanical mishap. "It was catastrophic," he said. "It wasn't anything I could fix from the driver's seat. ..." Afterward, Scott said, "It's not really catastrophic, Kurt. It's an engine. The Hendrick racing team, they know catastrophic. Jeff Gordon, of that team, he had to leave with a broken rear-end gear. I'm sure he doesn't think that's catastrophic even though he finished 34th."

Given the context, did Busch really say that finishing 42nd and losing the points lead was catastrophic? Viewers didn't get to hear the specific question Busch was asked, but it seemed the "catastrophic" description was limited to what happened to the engine. In other words, it was a "catastrophic" or total engine failure, not a problem that he could fix from the driver's seat or that could be repaired in the pits. As for getting knocked out of the race and losing his lead, Busch called it "bummer luck."

It doesn't sound like Busch deserved a stern lecture -- and especially not from Scott. Less than five minutes earlier on the same broadcast, Scott himself gave a glowing homage to past end-zone celebrations by Terrell Owens, including this mock voice-over as T.O. danced with a cheerleader in 2002: "Yeah, what's up, girl. What your name is? How you doin'? Good, good, good. I love you, boo." Summing up the T.O. show, Scott informed viewers, "All that is just T.O. being T.O." Good thing T.O. wasn't discussing an engine failure, or Scott would have taken him to task.

9. Yes, Boston fans are still glowing after the celebration on the Busch Stadium turf last Wednesday by Red Sox players, coaches and ... Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore. The latter duo had received approval by MLB to film a new final scene for the upcoming Farrelly Brothers' movie Fever Pitch, about an obsessed Red Sox fan (Fallon) and his girlfriend, on the field immediately after the game. Fortunately, it seems Fallon's Taxi curse was short-lived.

10. Jeopardy! update: Ken Jennings had far fewer problems in winning Friday's show than 10 Spot readers did in handling the Tinker-to-Evers-to-Chance question discussed in Friday's edition. One reader even called the 10 Spot an "idiot" for supposedly messing up the order. Folks, please read the answer again, which specifically asked one to re-order the famous trio as if it had completed a 3-6-4 DP rather than the 6-4-3 DP of lore (thus, Chance to Tinker to Evers). As a bonus, 10 Spot reader Tim pointed out that three interlocking streets near his old high school in Oceanside, N.Y., are named for the famed trio. There was no such controversy in Friday's show, with Ken winning his now standard $30,000 after correctly providing the Final Jeopardy question. (Category: Films of the '70s. A: "The Babysitter Murders" was the working title for this 1978 thriller. Q: What is Halloween?) Ken has now amassed $2,125,301 in 63 victories.

The 10 Spot will be off on Tuesday but will return Wednesday.