It looks as if NFL Commish Roger Goodell is keeping a close eye with the ongoing saga between the Packers and QB Brett Favre. AP is reporting that Goodell has spoken to the Packers management several times about the drama, and has even encouraged Pack GM Ted Thompson to talk to teams around the league about Favre and a possible trade. That story broke yesterday that the Packers have called several teams about the interest in a deal for Favre.

Favre has still yet to put out a letter of reinstatement, and it is not known as to when that is going to happen. For now, Green Bay is set on going to camp with the plan still in place that Aaron Rodgers is going to be the teams starting QB. One team that has been popping up more and more as a possible destination for Favre is Tampa Bay. The AP report says that Tampa Bay, where this seasons Super Bowl will be played, is “perhaps the most likely destination” for the former MVP.

The St.Petersburg Times ran a story that Bucs GM Bruce Allen asked unhappy QB Chris Simms about Favre last week. “He asked if I felt Brett would be able to come back and be good here if he didn?t have a lot of reps in training camp,” Simms said, according to the paper. “I said I thought he would but there would have to be some compromise with coach (Jon) Gruden. He’ll just want the play called and to drop back and throw it in there. But it’s something we talked about.” The Bucs have down played their desire to land a marquee name like Favre, and for now will stick with Pro Bowl QB from last season Jeff Garcia.

The Washington Redskins acquired DE Jason Taylor from the Miami Dolphins. The Skins gave up a 2009 Second Round pick and a 2010 Sixth Round pick to get the 11-year veteran.

According to reports the Redskins will not have to negotiate a new deal with Taylor as he will honor the deal he has in place. There still is no guarantee for the the Skins that Taylor will play beyond this year. Taylor has stated previously this would be his last year.

“We’re fortunate there was a guy that caliber on the market when somebody got hurt,” Washington executive vice president Vinny Cerrato said. “Normally, in most years, there’s not a guy of that caliber on the market.”

Taylor has started every game each of the past eight years. He had 11 sacks during the 2007 season, giving him 117 over his career.

“His play speaks for itself. I think it’s easy to talk about Jason Taylor. He’s got statistics and everything else to back up everything that he’s done,” Cerrato said.

He is expected to report to Redskins Training camp on Monday.

I guess I wasn’t that aware that a lot of Pro Football players had times to be in gangs. Otherwise why would the league be stepping up and monitoring players on the field and their hand gestures to make sure they are not the sign of a gang? Seems kind of odd for the league to suddenly with the opening of training camp a few days away for some teams to put this out to the media that they are calling a group in to go over tapes to see that players are behaving.

The LA Times said today that experts were going over tapes to see what players or team officials may be using hand gestures that are actually gang signs. Sounds to me like the league has a little too much time on their hands to be going over this stuff. I mean, is this really a problem in the league? I honestly think that the NBA is more of a breeding ground for gang sings than the NFL.

“We were always suspicious that might be happening,” it quoted Mike Pereira, the NFL’s vice president of officiating, as saying of gang-related signals. “But the Paul Pierce thing (fined for making a sign at a game vs the Hawks) is what brought it to light. When he was fined, that’s when we said we need to take a look at it and see if we need to be aware of it.” I guess I can applaud the league for taking a stance and making sure this DOESN’T become an issue, but to me, it seems like a whole lot to do about nothing.

I know it’s been covered ad nausea and everyone is sick of hearing about the possibility of Chip Rosenbloom and Lucia Rodriquez selling the Rams. But, Sports Business Journal is still running with the story that the Rams ownership group has hired an outside investment banking firm to locate potential buyers. I’m sure the group of people with 1 billion to spare couldn’t be too large of a group. Don’t they have an email group or something?

Profootballtalk.com has picked up the story

We have all known that Chip and Lucia will honor their late mother as long as possible and then they will sell the team. We shall see if the new owner(s) intend (or at least say they intend) to keep the team in St. Louis after 2014.

Published reports indicate that the Rooney family ownership of the Steelers could be in jeopardy.  Reports indicate that as many as four of Dan Rooney’s brothers are interested in divesting their 16 percent stakes in the storied NFL franchise in order to bring the club into line with ownership regulations of the NFL and to prevent possible future inheritance tax problems. 

Several sources place the value of the franchise somewhere between 800-million and 1.2-billion-dollars.  Several of the Rooney brothers have been in touch with Stan Druckenmiller, president of Duquesne Capital Financial, who is a Steeler season ticket holder and a multi-billionaire.  Druckenmiller has said that if he were to buy into the team the Rooney’s would still run the day-to-day operations. 

The Steelers, one of the most stable organizations in the NFL, will be shaking up some things at the top.  The team announced that chairman Dan Rooney and his son, team President Art Rooney II, want to purchase Dan Rooney’s brothers shares in the team.  The reason behind the move is that some of Rooney’s four brothers want to put some of their business efforts elsewhere.

What will this do to the Steelers players or fans for that matter?  Not a heck of a lot.  Dan Rooney says that he’ll do whatever he has to do to keep the Rooney family as the teams owners, and keep the team in the Steel city, which seems like it won’t really be an issue.  Art Rooney II has already said that the shift within the Rooney family should not affect the team or fans.

The Rooney family owns racetracks in both New York and Florida, and one big no-no that the NFL wants to make sure is not involved in their sport are people involved with gambling, and the Rooney’s have added forms of gaming that are inconsistent with NFL gambling policy.

The New York Giants will be allowing fans to buy a seat licenses in the new stadium they are building with the New York Jets. This license will allow a fan to buy season tickets for that seat, and will cost between $1,000 and $20,000 depending on location.

The Jets haven’t commented on if they will be following suit.

This new stadium, will have 82,500 seats is slated to open in 2010. Most of those seats will have a license available. Only 5,000 of those seats will cost $20,000. They are a little worried about upsetting fans as each seat that a season ticket holder owns will carry the license charge, which can get pretty costly. The seat license isn’t a season ticket; the tickets would be purchased on top of the licenses.

Giants’ co-owner, John Mara, had this to say; “We tried hard to come up with a plan that guarantees everybody the opportunity to stay in the building.”

The cost of the new stadium which is being split down the middle between the two teams, is $1.6 billion. Mara also said that it would be “extremely difficult” to build this new stadium without these seat licenses because they will raise between $300 and $400 million.

Once a person buys the seat licenses, they are guaranteed that spot as long as the team plays at that stadium. That license however can be sold or transferred to anyone for however much they can get for them.

Newsday is reporting that the new voice of NFL Network’s Thursday and Saturday night games is Bob Papa, the excellent radio play-by-play man for the New York Giants. Papa replaces the awful Bryant Gumbel, who mercifully left the position after two seasons in which many fans wanted to slit their wrists listening to the monotone brother of Greg Gumbel.

Papa is not only very good and solid as the Giants PBP guy, he’s also an excellent radio host on NFL Radio on Sirius, doing the morning show called “The Morning Drive” with regulars like former 49′er Randy Cross and Sports Illustrated columnist Peter King, as well as sometime fill-in former Giant Carl Banks.

The best part about Papa’s game is that he does not favor the Giants in anyway, and despite being in the biggest media market in the country, does a great job telling both sides of the story in a game. The other name that was up for consideration for the position was Tom Hammond, who the Newsday blog reports was at one point the leading contender when the job became open.