Indianapolis

Seahawks wide receiver Nate Burleson signs with Detroit

The Seahawks suffered their first loss of the season just two hours into free agency. Free-agent wide receiver Nate Burleson agreed to terms on a five-year contract with the Detroit Lions, a deal first reported by Scout.com and subsequently confirmed. It was a five-year contract worth a total of $25 million with Burleson assured of receiving $11 million of that total, first reported by ESPN and subsequently confirmed. Burleson did not return a message immediately from The Seattle Times. Burleson, 28, played the previous four seasons with Seattle after signing with the Seahawks in 2006. He returned from a torn knee ligament suffered in 2008 and caught 63 passes last season, on pace to finish with the most catches in his career until suffering an injury in Houston that kept him out the final three games. Last week in Indianapolis, Seahawks GM John Schneider said that he had talked to Burleson and while the receiver was headed toward the free-agent market, the two sides would stay in contact. The hope was Burleson would return. “Love to have him back,” Seahawks coach Pete Carroll said. Burleson said repeatedly his hope was to remain in Seattle, his hometown and where he attended O’Dea High School. He wasn’t offered a contract he found satisfactory. Free agency began at 9 p.m. Pacific on Thursday. By 11, he had a deal in Detroit. Burleson averaged 12.9 yards per reception in 2009, highest in Seattle. He caught 15 touchdown passes in his four seasons as a Seahawk. Seattle might be interested in Aaron Kampman, a 6-foot-4, 260-pound defensive end, but reports the Seahawks were in hot pursuit of Kampman were premature, according to a report from the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel. Burleson was one of the beneficiaries of the new economic realities of the NFL, which not only shed its salary cap but had about 200 fewer unrestricted free agents. Those two facts were the result of a process that began two years ago when owners voted to opt out of the current collective-bargaining agreement. If a new CBA wasn’t in place by March 5, 2010, there were a number of ramifications. Two of those were that the salary cap would vanish and players would need six accrued seasons to qualify for free agency. That meant Seattle players like center Chris Spencer, defensive end Darryl Tapp and guard Rob Sims — who would have been unrestricted free agents under the old rules — were now restricted. Seattle made what are referred to as “original-round tender offers” to those three players and wide receiver Ben Obomanu, giving Seattle the right to match any offer sheet those players sign with another team or receive a draft pick in the round that player was picked as compensation. Spencer was a first-round pick, Tapp a second-rounder, Sims a fourth and Obomanu a seventh. The size of the one-year offers to those players was dictated by the number of accrued seasons in the NFL and ranged from $1.226 million for Spencer, who has five seasons, to $1.1 million for Obomanu, who has three.

Note

• Seattle elected not to tender qualifying offers to linebacker Lance Laury and tackle Brandon Frye, making those players unrestricted free agents. Laury was not tendered an offer last year, but still re-signed with Seattle later.

Paramore preps ‘brand new’ release

Paramore is preparing to release its third album, “brand new eyes” on Sept. 29 via Fueled By Ramen. The Nashville group – who sounds nothing like Nasheville — tapped superstar producer Rob Cavallo (Green Day, Kid Rock, My Chemical Romance) to man the decks. The set’s first single “Ignorance” will be released to radio at the beginning of next month and will go up for sale on iTunes, Amazon and all other digital stores on July 7. Pre-sales for the record also goes up on July 7 via the band’s website. “brand new eyes” will be released as a normal CD as well as a doozy of a deluxe version, limited to 15,000, which “includes the album on CD, a 40-page hardcover journal with Paramore frontwoman Hayley Williams’ handwritten lyrics and notes on the album, a color vinyl 7″ single with four acoustic songs, a DVD featuring an exclusive making-of documentary (with interviews, behind-the-scenes footage, the ‘Ignorance’ music video and making-the-video footage, plus rare band vignettes from www.paramore.net), a 16-page full-color booklet, an exclusive Paramore poster, five limited edition collectible Paramore photos printed on hardstock paper, and a numbered certificate of authenticity” according to a release from Atlantic. Whoosh. “brand new eyes” is the follow-up to Paramore’s breakthrough set “RIOT!,” released in 2007. The group gained even more exposure as its track “Decode” was included on the soundtrack to “Twilight.” However, as the band told Billboard, fans shouldn’t expect any Paramore songs on the “New Moon” soundtrack. “We don’t want to be, like, the vampire house band,” drummer Zac Farro explains. “It was really fun to be a part of that, and great exposure, but I think ‘Twilight’ was it for us. We don’t want to seem like we’re trying to get in every single movie they put out.” The band has been previewing new material as it has been opening for No Doubt on the road, now through the beginning of August. They are also scheduled to air an “MTV Unplugged” special in September.

Here is the tracklist to “brand new eyes”:

1.      Careful
2.      Ignorance
3.      Playing God
4.      Brick By Boring Brick
5.      Turn It Off
6.      The Only Exception
7.      Feeling Sorry
8.      Looking Up
9.      Where The Lines Overlap
10. Misguided Ghosts
11. All I Wanted

Here are Paramore’s/No Doubt’s tour dates:

JUNE
27        Wantagh, NY                        Nikon At Jones Beach Theater
29        Cleveland, OH                       Blossom Music Center
30        London, ON                          John Labatt Centre
JULY
2          Milwaukee, WI                      Summerfest – Marcus Amphitheater
3          Detroit, MI                             Palace Of Auburn Hills
5          St. Paul, MN                          Xcel Energy Center
6          Kansas City, MO                   Starlight Theatre
8          St. Louis, MO                        Verizon Wireless Amphitheater
10        Indianapolis, IN                     Verizon Wireless Music Center
11        Chicago, IL                            First Midwest Bank Amphitheatre
13        Winnipeg, MB                       MTS Centre
15        Calgary, AB                           Pengrowth Saddledome
16        Edmonton, AB                       Rexall Place
18        Vancouver, BC                       General Motors Place
19        Seattle, WA                            White River Amphitheatre
21        Concord, CA                          Sleep Train Pavilion
22        Universal City, CA                Gibson Amphitheatre
24        Sacramento, CA                    Sleep Train Amphitheatre
25        Mountain View, CA              Shoreline Amphitheatre
27        Universal City, CA                Gibson Amphitheatre
28        Universal City, CA                Gibson Amphitheatre
31        Irvine, CA                               Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
AUGUST
1          Irvine, CA                               Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
2          Irvine, CA                               Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre
7          Tokyo, JPN                            Summer Sonic 2009
8          Osaka, JPN                            Summer Sonic 2009

Beach Bodies top ten serie on RTV – Danica Patrick

Top 10: 2009 Beach Bodies So far
These are our top 10 2009 beach bodies today with number 9 . If you come back tomorrow you will find number 8 here, and so on for ten days long. Enjoy

No.9 – Danica Patrick
Born: 25 March 1982
Birthplace: Beloit, Wisconsin
Best Known As: The woman driver who finished fourth in the 2005 Indy 500

Even though Danica Patrick is hell-bent on taking over the testosterone-fueled world of IndyCar, she’s still very much in touch with her feminine side. She recently finished third at the Indy 500, but we’d like to assert that her sultry spreads in the 2009 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition and Shape will forever be career highlights, at least in our books. Danica Patrick placed fourth in the 2005 running of the Indianapolis 500, making her the top-finishing woman ever at the famous auto race. It was Patrick’s first Indy 500 appearance and she was named Continue reading →