I covered the news conference today in Seattle announcing that KIRO, which has partnerships with both the Seahawks and the Mariners, is going to an all-sports format on April 1, competing directly with KJR. Their launch is meant to coincide directly with the start of baseball season.

The above photo includes Chuck Armstrong at the far left, KIRO GM and VP Dave Pridemore, KIRO VP/market manager Carl Gardner and Seahawks CEO Tod Leiweke.

KIRO is becoming an ESPN station, which for all intents and purposes means that KJR no longer is able to air ESPN material. What this means for John Clayton I am not sure. When I reached him at home, he did not want to comment. He has had his Sports Saturday show for almost two decades and is very proud of what he has been able to develop. KJR program director Rich Moore said he thinks Clayton will stay with KJR. "John is a very big part of our radio station, and we want him to continue that tradition. We anticipate that he will be able to do that."

KIRO has not announced what shows it is going to do or what talent it is going to hire, saying only that they are going to build more shows around the Seahawks and Mariners, obviously, but also do its fair share of local programming. They will hire a program director over the next few weeks and then start zeroing in on hosts and co-hosts.

Carl Gardner was pretty clear that KIRO, owned by Bonneville, a Mormon-owned company, is going to have a different flavor than some of the KJR shows, particularly Mitch's morning show, which sometimes focuses on women. "Bonneville has a high standard," Gardner said. "Our view is you can be entertaining and funny without being blue."

Dick Stockton
Brian Baldinger
Laura Okmin

Same crew as two weeks ago, when the Eagles were in town.

Sam Rosen
Tim Ryan
Chris Myers

Dick Stockton
Brian Baldinger
Laura Okmin (sidelines)

With John Madden sitting out Sunday night's broadcast of the Seahawks-Bucs game, Cris Collinsworth will step in to replace him, joining Al Michaels and Andrea Kremer on the broadcast.

I was emailed this item from the Washington Post's publicity department: Washingtonpost.com’s Len Shapiro is reporting that John Madden will stay home in the Bay Area and sit out Sunday's night's Tampa Bay Buccaneers home game against the Seattle Seahawks in central Florida. This ends a 476 game streak for Madden, who never missed a regular season week in an NFL football booth in 28 years. NBC Sports President Dick Ebersol first broached the possibility of taking a day off this weekend with Madden last spring.

Chris Rose
J.C. Pearson
Nischelle Turner

Kenny Albert
Daryl Johnston
Tony Siragusa

The curse that beset the Seahawks early in the season may have been lifted. Fox Sports’ Jay Glazer reported this morning that NY Giants receiver Plaxico Burress has been suspended for two weeks for insubordination and will not play against Seattle in two weeks.

Here's the AP report.

According to the report, Burress failed to show up for work on Monday and did not respond to several phone calls by the team to explain his unexcused absence both Monday and Tuesday.

Burress just signed a lucrative contract with the Giants, and reportedly has a history of showing up late and missing practices.

Burress has 18 catches for 259 yards and a touchdown on the season. Last year he finished with 70 catches for 1,025 yards and 12 TDs while playing with a sprained ankle, and caught the game-winning touchdown in the Super Bowl.

Losing the big receiver will hurt New York’s ability to stretch the field, and will make the Giants rely more on its running game.

In New York’s last two games against Seattle, Burress has six catches for 109 yards in a 24-21 OT win for Seattle on Nov. 25, 2005, and Buress had a case of the drops in a Sept. 24, 2006 game in Seattle, finishing with only one catch for 23 yards in a 42-30 Seahawks win.

Seattle also will face Green Bay when they travel to Seattle on Oct. 12 without the services of All-Pro cornerback Al Harris, who likely will miss the rest of the season with a torn spleen.

The other big news story of the day is Matt Millen’s woeful tenure as head of the Detroit Lions appears to be over. Multiple news outlets are reporting that the Ford family has decided to let Millen go, and perhaps pursue former Pittsburgh head coach Bill Cowher to fill that role.

Sports Illustrated's Peter King recently visited the Seahawks. Here is his piece on his trip to the VMAC.

OK, so here is the situation that Mike Holmgren finds himself in this week:

With only four days between now and the game against the Oakland Raiders, and his top three quarterbacks suffering some sort of injury, what does he do against the Raiders?

He certainly is not going to throw Matt Hasselbeck out there and risk having him injured just before the season opener in Buffalo. He does not yet know the severity of Charlie Frye's knee injury, though Frye said his knee was sore. And while Seneca Wallace played tonight, Holmgren said he did not even plan on allowing Wallace to throw a pass until they found themselves down by a point with 2 1/2 minutes left.

A lot of course will depend on what they say on Tuesday about Frye's injury and if that will restrict him. But it is an interesting question nonetheless: Who does Holmgren go with?

And before you say Dalton Bell, this was Holmgren's response when he was asked about playing Seneca late: "We didn't have any choice really. I wasn't going to put Dalton Bell in against them."

NEW YORK – Jan 6, 2008 – NBC Sports scored the best overnight rating for an NFL Wild Card Saturday in four years. NBC's Wild Card Saturday, featuring Washington-Seattle in the afternoon and Jacksonville-Pittsburgh in primetime, averaged a 16.1 overnight rating and 28 share – the best overnight rating for an NFL Wild Card Saturday in four years (2005 on ABC: St. Louis-Seattle in afternoon and NY Jets-San Diego in primetime, 16.5/28).

The 16.1 overnight rating is also a three percent improvement over the 15.6/28 average for the two Wild Card Saturday games last year (Kansas City-Indianapolis in afternoon and Dallas-Seattle in primetime).

Gm 1: BEST OVERNIGHT RATING IN 3 YEARS
The afternoon Wild Card Saturday game (Redskins-Seahawks) was the best overnight rating for that game in three years. The Seahawks 35-14 home victory over the Redskins earned a 15.4 overnight rating and 29 share, the best for an afternoon Wild Card Saturday game in three years (2006 on ABC: Redskins-Buccaneers, 15.7/30). The 15.4 overnight rating was also a 12 percent improvement over last year's afternoon Wild Card game (Chiefs-Colts on NBC,13.8/27). The overnight rating peaked with a 17.5/31 from 7-7:30 p.m. ET as the Seahawks sealed their victory.

Gm. 1 Top 10 Markets:
1. Seattle: 35.8/70
2. Washington DC: 33.8/58
3. Richmond: 23.8/36
4. Jacksonville: 22.4/35
5. Portland: 19.9/42
6. Milwaukee: 19.2/32
7. Indianapolis: 18.8/33
8. Fort Meyers: 18.1/30
9. Charlotte: 17.6/31
10. Nashville: 17.0/27