mckendry. chris: that would be us, hi, everyone. "sportscenter" rolls on and there's more injuries to report. another quarterback has cracked a rib. we'll talk about the latest rib injury. and michael crabtree and the jets, what is going on there? john: tampering? let's get to it. >> he's inside the 20, demds the 10, gets into the end zone, touchdown! [captioning made possible by espn, inc.] john: it was a tale of two quarterbacks last night, eli manning and tony romo. how much help did eli have and how much is romo to blame? merrill hoge in studio. serious issues around the nfl. the latest on the jets accused of tampering with michael crabtree and how injuries are impacting several teams. the red sox closing ground in the a.l. east. hey buster olney, is it baseball or not? we're talking everything right here right now. closed captioned by the national captioning institute ---www.ncicap.org---

john: at this hour live on "sportscenter", san francisco 49ers have reportedly filed tampering charges against the jets with michael crabtree. sources tell the "new york daily news" crabtree threatened to sit out this entire season and re-enter the draft in 2010. earlier this morning jets' coach rex ryan said the allegations are ridiculous. our insider adam schefter has more on this story as we speak. he's getting miced up. meanwhile, matt hasselbeck has suffered a fractured rib according to a league source, unclear whether he'll be sidelined in the seahawks' next game, which is against the bears next sunday. chris: well, it's monday and merrill hoge is with us each and every monday. >> hello, chris. josh: the giants were in town in dallas, neither team up much at any point and a game-winning field goal made twice. let's get to it. there it is, the $1.1 billion

home. >> and over 100,000 people, good friends of jerry jones', come on over. chris: 105,000, roger goodell, george w. bush, a former president in the house, and lebron james. but you know what? when 105,000 boo, merrill, it's loud. >> i know! and if you don't like watching it on the field, just watch it over the screen. you can tell the giants are adjusting. they know what tony's going to do. they feel like they got to get to something different. they didn't expect just to throw it to him, though. chris: that's bruce johnson taking the pick. tony romo throwing it behind his receiver and a bit over his head to boot. >> that's why we talk about accuracy all the time. got to be accurate, accurate, accurate where only your guy can catch it, not when the other guy can catch it. >> this is justin tuck, appears to be flozell adams, and look it, he trips him. doesn't look too bad, but tuck jammed his shoulder on the play and he'd leave the game.

later in the drive, tony romo passing to his left side, and kenny phillips somehow comes up with it, taking it all the way back to the end zone as he throws another one. this one went behind jason witten. >> i mentioned accuracy, and that ball needs to leave jason witten so he can run with the football. when it's that far behind, it's hard for witten to stop and an unfortunate bounce off his foot. chris: well, the quick whistle, the giants get the ball but not the touchdown. as the whistle blew, came off the foot. romo had three picks. threw each one while his team had the lead and then the giants took it back off the turnovers. eli manning, mario manningham, giants up 20-14. >> and i thought eli did a great job of bringing manningham back into the field of play, not leaving him out once he cleared the defender. chris: that was a great catch. he had 10. 150 yards on the game for manningham. fourth quarter, jibets down 24-20. manning to steve smith. 22-yard strike. wide open.

giants up 27-24. take another look. >> chris, we call this the jerk route. usually this is a wide receiver on linebacker, but it's wide receiver on defensive back but he still made him look like a jerk because he beat him so bad. chris: smith made a few people look jerky. marion barber -- >> he's gone, chris! the factorback, we've got a blownout wheel here. whoa, slow down. chris: he scored the first touchdown in the new stadium, we should note. barber came out of the game at that point and it's feel limple jones up the middle. >> not a bad replacement. when you can have felix jones as your backup guy, you got to feel good about that. chris: cowboys up a point with 3:40 to play. next giants drive, third and 6th. >> all the key elements to throw the football. he chris: later in the drive, tipped and caught by manningham. another first down. take another look at it. >> you might need a little luck too. chris: lucky and good. lucky and good. that was on third and 4. so manning and the giants getting in field goal range. four seconds, lawrence tynes,

37 yards. >> can't watch. can't watch. chris: it's up, it's good. and the giants start to celebrate. >> no, it doesn't count, chris. chris: hold on, hold on. time-out. >> exactly. chris: look at wade phillips. no, y'all get back. >> and it really helped him. who did it help? it heppeds the giants kick even a better one next time. chris: another 37-yarder, there it is, the game winner twice. giants over the cowboys in the big debut. look at, oh, jerry jones, can't stand to watch. 33-31, the defending n.f.c. east champions off to another strong start, they're 2-0. so dallas holds brandon jacobs to 58 yards. and bradshaw to 37. they took away the rung game, merrill, and yet two 100-yard receivers in smith and hang ham. giants have gone 13 games without a single 100-yard receiver. tony romo, a week after throwing 353 yards, well, he was just 13-29, 127 yards in

this one. he'd never thrown for so few yards in a full game in his career. and again, for the trivia buffs, it's marion barber, stadium's first touchdown. it was a good game, good watch, albeit very tough on the host. >> my hat's off to the giants team and also to the cowboys for the kind of football game that they played, too. they battled, they came back, we came back, you know, it was one of those type of games right to the wire. >> i am disappointed for jerry, because you know, i wanted to win this one for him. i mean our team, i think, overall wanted to because he's such a great owner and he's -- you know, he's put this out for us, basically, for the dallas cowboys. so i do feel bad about that. >> guys have been working hard and putting themselves in a position to have a successful season, but i kind of took that away today. if the guys keep doing what they're doing, keep getting better, keep grinding it out, we'll keep going and going forward and i'll improve. and i'll fix this and we'll be better tomorrow. i'll be better.

chris: well, let me take you next level with eli manning, masterful going down field. he completed 12-16 passes, 10 yards or more, including two long touchdowns. giants unable to score any touchdowns in the red zone, but manning's deep passing sparked this offense. rejoined now by merrill hoge. merrill on mondays. last night a tale of two quarterbacks, you might say. but let's start with the good. eli manning on that game-winning drive, 7-9, and he wasn't sacked in the win either. show us how the pass protection, key what he was able to do as they went downfield. >> i'm glad you said he wasn't sacked. that was the foundation of everything. we did see eli manning develop and evolve and grow as a quarterback. but let's take a look at the pass protection he had. if you're going to be able to throw the football down the field or be accurate on critical moments in the game, you've got to have time. you've got to have protection. now we're just going to look through this. the cowboys do blitz it. they get lucky on the tip, it goes the giants' way. if you go from the end zone angle, this is where all that hard work when you have to

execute together as a team, because as you have all these blitzers coming, you know, you really have to have guys that see things together. the back here, bradshaw, as he works across, i mean the offensive linemen, they may take their responsibility, guys that show up in their face, then he has to cleanup, and there do it beautifully as they go, as manny goes back to throw the football. bradshaw, because he's so deep he can let the offensive linemen make adjustments, make things happen for them early in the game and things like that happen. then you have time for your quarterback to throw the football. and it's always overlooked, you know, how that back blocks, how that offensive line, how they do their job, but really, at the end of the day, eli manning had the time, and because he had the time, he was able to orchestrate that winning drive. chris: on the flip side, it's tony romo, three interceptions and as i said, each interception his team had the lead and he gave it back. >> yes, he did. chris: was this a case of bad tony romo or good giants' defense? >> well, we always like to have visual evidence if it's an individual's -- the reason for losing a game or the mistakes

he had, because there's lots of ways you can throw an interception. wide receivers can dump on you. we're going to see it from this particular angle. it's hard to see what tony romo is looking at. you've got a deep safety, a guy that's really there so you can't get the ball down the field and tony romo has to be responsible for him. from the next angle that we're going to see, you'll see what i'm talking about. there's one guy right there, now tony romo has to be aware of that guy. it is his responsibility to know where that guy is if he wants to move him and throw this ball down the field, then he's the one that's supposed to move him. if he doesn't do that, then he surely can't throw the ball down the field and hang it like that. so when you look at his interceptions, they want wide receivers dumping on -- it wasn't that they had wide receivers dumping on him, it was inaccurate throws and bad decisions by tony romo. and he even mentioned in his press conference, i will correct those things and he knows he must. chris: we saw jason witten with the arm out behind him. >> usually in front of him you make a first down. that's the difference between being accurate and inaccurate.

chris: merrill hoge with us throughout this life "sportscenter." sit tight, merrill is back in a minute. but as we talked about a few injuries in that game, adam schefter is here with us in studio as well. giants and cowboys key injuries. let's start with justin tuck, suffered a shoulder injury after being tripped by flozell adams. what's the latest? >> chris, he did not like the way that flozell adams tripped him and he accused flozell adams of doing this throughout his time in the league. and justin tuck called the trip bush league. he did go down when flozell stuck out his leg on this particular play. you'll see tuck fall to the ground, hurt his left shoulder. now after the game, justin tuck said he thinks he'll be able to play sunday at tampa bay against the buccaneers, which is good news for the giants. however, he is going to undergo an m.r.i. today just to make sure that it was nothing more severe on that shoulder. and of course, on the dallas side, you saw marion balder pull up with a strained quad injury. his left quad gave out on that particular play. he did not enter the game and come back in, but the cowboys

do have other running backs. so in the event that barber would be unable to continue after suffering the strained quad on this particular play, they would have felix jones to lean on, they would have choice to lean on, and it's not a knee injury, it's a quad. it can be painful but it can be overcome. chris: it's a quad or just a bum wheel, i think, and merrill called it. he had 124 yards on the ground. adam sit tight. back with you throughout the show. john: patriots, jets, picture-perfect, sunday in new jersey. all right, merrill, rex ryan. >> let's get it on, baby. john: no wes welker, he's out. >> no welker, no problem, that's why they lost, correct? no! that's not why they lost. john: sanchez pressured and turns the ball over but they do get the ball back. >> the best thing sanchez has done when he's struggled early, he's responded during the course of a game. john: tom brady looked good.

but reef vis held moss to four catches for only 24 yards. >> and that right there is the best corner in all of football right now. john: all right. second quarter, welker's replacement, julian edelman out of kent state. 98 yards and one big drop late in the first half. >> couple drops, but for the most part, played very well. john: back to the jets. look at sanchez, gets in the way of jarvis green. >> made a great block now, you know. you love the e6r9, but it was a great block, too. john: brad smith, great effort to get the first down. and there it is right there. >> rise and blow, man, rise and blow. >> 6'3", 285, not rex ryan, jarvis green. sanchez could not move the ball in the first half but they came out in the second half and right down the field. there's cotchery for a 45-yard pickup and dustin keller. >> and that's got to be a rope. look at the touch up over the defender. john: so the jets take a 10-9 lead. later, a field goal, 13-9.

sanchez. leon washington, can he make the yellow line? barely! good spot. third down pickup. sanchez, 14-22, 163, no interceptions. boy, the patriots sitting back in zone and he went right over the top very well, merrill. >> great touch idea. had a lot of balls that had to be bullets and others had to have touch on, did it all well. penetration, number one kill in the running game, jets get it. >> patriots threw it more than they ran it. couldn't get the run there. back to sanchez. just don't throw an interception. at least take the sack. >> this might have been the smartest play. instead of trying to throw the ball down the field, bad things happen. take a sack, defend plays. john: there's brady, 216 yards. edelman, the rookie from kent state. >> and you know what? that's what happens. no matter how great you you are, when you have to move your feet constantly and constantly getting hit, you don't play the

same way at the quarterback position. john: patriots down to their last shot there. there's the back shoulder pass, but this time great coverage by the jets. fourth and 10 now, brady, again, you talk about pressure in coverage. and bringing it, and the jets bring the heat, 16-9. they win backing it up. >> the patriots are a hell of a football team. i jut thought we were the better team today and that's all we said, you know, the whole time going in that we believe that we're the better team today. and we went out and showed it. i think our fans were huge in this victory. in fact, we're giving a game ball to our fans. it will be up in our trophy case as we thought they were the difference. >> they outplayed us and outcoached us. they just performed better than we did over the 60 minutes, and i think that was pretty much the story of the game. we had our chances. we didn't take advantage of them. they had their chances and they did. >> it's frustrating to -- you know, i think we had really

high expectations for this game and we just, you know, didn't put it together very well. we've got to get back to work and try to take the positives from the game and then learn from the mistakes that we made and move forward just because, you know, we play a tough atlanta team next week. john: so the jets put a ton of pressure on tom brady yesterday. new york sent at least six rushers on 45% of brady's pass plays, almost half, including a seven-man overload blitz on the patriots' final offensive play of the game. brady completed just 6-21 passes when facing six or more pass rushers in the game. so the pats held without a touchdown for the first time in 37 games. merrill, you talked about the pressure throughout the highlight. illustrate it for us. >> well, one thing we've got to point out, too, we mentioned in the highlight, reef vis is the best corner in football. and when you know he's that good, it really gives you a lot of flexibility with your defense. the first thing you've got to point out is reevis is right

there, lined up on randy moss the majority of the time. there is a deep safety. they do have a single high safety in this one. but what really stands out to me is how they -- the timing and the execution of things. and let me show you what i'm saying. we'll pull it up a little bit. when you stop it right here, your linebacker right here, he's first. now, he must take the running back inside fred taylor, because that's going to create an alley right here for our defensive back, who's coming right behind. but the timing behind them, and then one guy does his job freeing the other guy up so that he can hit brady. the timing of things, the execution of it, the discipline of it to do your job, best corner in football all over randy moss the entire game. once he made this play, i think randy moss said you know what? it's not going to be my day, didn't play as hard. we know that happens a lot of times for randy. but the way the jets play, this is just new system put in. for the design and the execution of it and the timing of it to be that good this early in the season is scary for the rest of the nfl.

john: they looked great. tennessee at home next week at new orleans and on espn at miami, "monday night football." that should be a good one. thank you, merrill. the jets made more news today. the san francisco 49ers have accused them of tampering, yes, with michael crabtree. the niners believe the jets contacted crabtree's agent, eugene parker, to let him know they'd be interested in trading for his rights or in drafting him in 2010 with a better salary than the 49ers are currently offering. rex ryan was on "sportscenter" earlier today. >> we'll let the league, you know, go through that and handle that, but you know, i think it's ridiculous. but we'll let the league figure that out. john: well, teams can be fined money or docked draft picks if found guilty of tampering. adam schefter joins us now. adam, how serious are these allegations? >> john, the league always looks at allegations of tampering in a serious way. you'll remember back in 2006, the new england patriots accused the new york jets of tampering with wide receiver deion branch.

the league looked into the matter and eventually absolved the jets of any wrongdoing, but now there is yet another accusation, this time involving michael crabtree and whether or not the jets were involved there. the league will look into this, but the 49ers are sending a clear message that they do not want anybody interfering with michael crabtree in any way. these cases are always difficult to prove and it's going to be difficult in this case for the league to prove it. but if they find something, it could cost the jets in the end. john: niners 2-0 so far without him. thank you, adam. >> thanks, john. chris: much more football on the way, guys. jay cutler looking for redemption after week one. does he find it against the steelers' defense? how he came up big late. and the ravens-chargers, also down to the wire. why ray lewis said this moment was unlike any in his career. >> that was probably one of the greatest plays in my career because of my team, because of what we did as a team. chris: think about his career.

we've got to see that play. and while the yankees start a huge series tonight, could the red sox be fighting for the division? buster olney on whether the a.l. east is up for grabs. ♪

are we good? there's always a couple of drops left. ♪ what are you doing? using all of the toothpaste. see? whoa, whoa! hey, hey, hey, hey! what, baby? i thought we were just fixing the front step? no, i got this thing all day. just getting my money's worth. how about we give this a try? get a lot for a little with the enticing tastes... of mcdonald's dollar menu. like the juicy, meaty mcdouble... and the tender, crispy mcchicken sandwich. ( slurping ) okay, we're done. ♪ ba da ba ba ba

>> welcome back, everybody. very excited about this game, really going into the season, baltimore at san diego. last year, the slug 'em teams had it over the sling 'em teams. of the sling 'em high scoring teams, sandy was the last one standing. baltimore, they leave nobody standing. here we go from the murph, the big q in the chargers' home opener. philip rivers and company barely won. they forget to bring little darren sproles. so l.t. isn't playing. sproles gets the brunt of it. 81-yard touchdown. 7-1, lightning bolts. willis mcgehee, three-yard touchdown, two for mcgehee. 14-10, baltimore second quarter. 14-13, baltimore. joe flacco, off his back foot. kelly washington, wide open! 27 yards and you know what? we're going to dance.

dancing, yeah. how was he wide open, tom? >> look at the fake. it's a bubble screen. you see the fake of washington, acts like he's going to throw a blocked run. that's actually the first time i've seen it. little wrinkle in that offense. >> ravens are able to do a lot more. ray lewis still thinks he can do it in his 14th year. i guess so. and rivers nonchalantly makes it. ravens' defense gave up a lot of yards but making big play as they lead 21-16 and keep it that way. now flacco to the storming mormon, todd heap. he's into a big season. you can feel 2, he's healthy, worked out. nine-yard touchdown. speaking of a big season, philip rivers and vincent jackson, it's beautiful. >> but you put it right on the receiver's chest, front chest. great catch by jackson. >> and a beautiful throw, rivers who now has his arm looked at 28-23. 31-26, under three minutes to go. how's it feeling? i feel good enough to go to

vincent jackson again. you bet ya! 38 yards. under a minute to go. the chargers at the ravens 23. they're down three, but a touchdown, to naanee from boise state and he almost catches it, but frank walker, a good play. >> outstanding right there batting that ball away at the last second. >> so next play, second down. rivers now underneath to naanee who makes the move but tries to get extra, almost fumbles it, could have, did a nice job. third and 2. they'd throw one on third and 2. it's incomplete. now fourth and 2. everybody on their feet. and there's ray lewis. you might want to watch him. and play's over! the play's over! darren sproles, who is going to expect a run on fourth and 2? ray lewis. >> and watch ray lewis, he sees that hole clear. if you get blocked out, you step up. nobody has ever done it better than ray lewis. boy, did he get into the backfield this a hurry. >> so ray lewis in his 14th

season saves the day. a superior game, a fun one to watch. phillips rivers throwing for 436 yards against the ravens. but joe flacco and company kept the heat on offensively scoring 31 points and ray lewis' 12th tackle of the day sealed the deal. >> when the game was on the line, as soon as phillip dropped down i shot and got it. he was there. he was there, man. so honestly, that was probably, to me, because of for my teammates, man, i told them that we will not lose this game. that was probably one of the greatest plays of my career because of my team, because of what we did as a team. >> wait a minute, i just heard ray say something. >> yes. >> one of the greatest plays of my career. >> quite a career. >> a pretty good career. >> yes. >> his team's going places. i know preseason doesn't matter, tom. 4-0 plus 2-0 equals 6-0. >> you mentioned slug 'em sling 'em. they used to be slug 'em. if you gave up 17 points, you

had a hard time winning football games. now you've got flacco and company becoming a prolific offense throwing the ball down field and i know ed reid, ray lewis and company, when that defense is playing up to their potential, they catch up, this will be something to deal with. the baltimore ravens, there's been a shift. >> and for san diego, injuries, jamal williams, the pro bowl nose tackle. l.t. out. it's on philip rivers to win at least in this quarter, and boy even though they lost on this day, pretty impressive. sproles carried them away. >> you can't help but like him. if he's on your team you love him. playing against you, you captain stand him. >> in the end, ravens win it. and teams known for their defense, they're 2-0. did i say defense? steelers-bears, here we go at soldier field. and so you knew this would be low scoring even without troy polumalu and brian urlacher. jay cutler trying to shake off the fourth pick last week, and bang! that's tyrone carter playing

for troy polumalu nailing greg olsen. >> safety deep, and he comes over and gets a tremendous leg on olsen. carey hit. >> third and goal from the 6,, to kellen davis, let's go to a bigger tight end. touchdown, tied at 7-7. here it is again. >> great job of getting your body in between the defender and the ball and good delivery by jay cutler. >> now we're tied at 7-7. big ben drops back, steps up, feels the rush like very few do, to rashard mendenhall. he falls down, whoop, gets up. two bears miss him. big ben involved here. and hunter hillenmeyer, that's it. replacement for urlacher, everything going on this vote, the yeas are place. mendenhall. first and 10, bears, 41. mendenhall with a big hole this time right up the gut. he could gsh go -- all -- the -- way down to the 2-yard line. setting up first and goal, pittsburgh, and ben surveying

the scene. and makes the move outside! takes it himself! leaps into the end zone! 14-7 urlacher looking on, wants to be out there to help. bears at their own 48. fourth quarter. cutler to olsen. how's he doing? he's fine this time. same two collide but he holds ball. >> what a throw by jay cutler. >> third and goal. what they have in fort knox, it's gold, right? so swray jay throwing to johnny knox! and it's gold! we're tied at 14-14. now pittsburgh coming back, third and 2. ben roethlisberger, these two, he and santonio holmes were the heroes much in the super bowl. oh! oh! that sends jeff reid out who missed a makable field goal earlier fourth quarter. two?! really? so we stay tied. jeff reid normally pretty darn good, but not on this day. just over three to go.