• Don't expect the Steelers to make too much of a fuss about their long-awaited fifth Super Bowl title on Sept. 7, when Miami visits Pittsburgh in the NFL's Kickoff Weekend Thursday-night regular-season opener. Making a grand to-do of hanging a Super Bowl banner at Heinz Field -- akin to what the then defending-champion Patriots did the past two Thursday-night openers at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro -- is not the Steelers' way of doing things. The venerable Rooney informed me of this Monday, after the league announced its glamour Week 1 matchups.

"It's a big game, and it's a great way to open up, back on NBC, but no, we don't do the banner thing,'' Rooney said.

But aren't the Steelers going to do a little commemorating or self-congratulation in the pregame?

"No, we don't do things like that,'' he said. "We gave them all rings, and we have a trophy for winning that game.''

• I'm for anything that honors the late Wellington Mara, who as the longtime owner of the New York Giants was considered the conscience of the league. But renaming the NFL's Wilson game football "The Duke'' in tribute to him doesn't seem like enough of a homage. (Mara, who died in October, was named after the Duke of Wellington, and he was nicknamed "The Duke'' as a child.)

And if Mara, who spent 81 years with the Giants, gets the game ball named after him, how do we honor the likes of, say, Redskins owner Daniel Snyder, when it comes time to do so? I've got it -- how about "The Danny'' kicking tee?

• There's absolutely nothing not to like about the NFL's opening-week slate of headline games. Here are the story lines worth anticipating:

Miami at Pittsburgh, Thursday, Sept. 7: Daunte Culpepper's first game as the Dolphins' quarterback (if he's all the way back from his knee injury of Oct. 30) against a Steelers team that will be beginning a new era without retired running back Jerome Bettis.

Dallas at Jacksonville, Sunday, Sept. 10: The nationally televised 4:15 p.m. doubleheader game will be the Cowboys' first chance to show off receiver Terrell Owens, and it'll come in Alltel Stadium, where Owens had a spectacular game in defeat in Super Bowl XXXIX for Philadelphia. Just after that game was when it all started to go wrong for Owens as an Eagle.

Indianapolis at New York Giants, Sunday night, Sept. 10: A no-brainer for the league. It's Peyton Manning versus Eli Manning, in the first brother-against-brother starting-quarterback showdown in the NFL history. How about their famous father, Archie Manning, does the pregame coin flip?

Minnesota at Washington, Monday, Sept. 11: In the first half of a rare Monday-night doubleheader, new Vikings head coach Brad Childress makes his debut (minus Culpepper) against a Redskins team that is coming off a season of accomplishment rather than underachievement for a change.

San Diego at Oakland, Monday, Sept. 11: In the nightcap, the Chargers will debut the Philip Rivers era in Oakland's infamous Black Hole, as the Raiders' new/old head coach Art Shell gets his career redux underway. If you live in the Eastern Time Zone, better get your nap in Monday afternoon or call in sick Tuesday, because this one kicks off at the sleepy hour of 10:15 p.m. ET.

• The quote of the day came from Tagliabue, when asked about Seattle and Minnesota's ongoing free-agency feud, in which both teams have signed one another's players to an offer sheet and inserted "poison pill'' clauses that make it virtually impossible to match: "The mind of creative people has no limits. But it's not in the spirit of the deal [the collective bargaining agreement], and we will be talking to Gene [Upshaw, the players union chief] about it.''