A moment of silence for sports fans in Atlanta.

• Hiring Coach Petrino out from under his 10 year contract at Louisville, Louisville was a contender year after year, Atlanta killed a top 5 college football team.  Only to have him resign mid-season to go to Alabama to coach.

•  Michael Vick - the most exciting player in the NFL - done.

• In a Patriot-like, if you’re not cheating - you’re not trying move, Atlanta falsely has Shaq removed from a game after only his fifth foul.

I suppose Atlanta can ride on the outcome of UG-Athens beating Hawaii soundly in the Sugar Bowl, and their president’s war on the NCAA BCS.

Miami in it’s continuing struggle to get a ‘W’ gets the opportunity to change one of the losses to a win.

Miami can take advantage of Atlanta’s official scorer goof.

It’s the first time since San Antonio successfully argued for a replay against the Lakers in 1983.  The Spurs would go on to win that game.  Will Miami have the same success?

Home team scoring errors are an embarrassing part of the game.  It may have cost Atlanta a victory earlier this year when the ‘official scorer’ missed a basket by TJ Ford.   The Spurs also lost a memorable game due to home-team officials.  How about Derek Fishers shot with 0.4 seconds left on the clock.  Derek Fisher had the ball in his hands 0.4 seconds before the clock was even started - this one may have been a cost the Spurs another championship.

Now that we see that officials, other than the refs, can cost a team a game, what are the regulations on gambling with them?

New York - Isiah Thomas won’t be suspended for his contact with official Eric Lewis while be ejected from Wednesday night’s game against Houton.

Apparently the league has decided that the best punishment for Isiah or the Knicks was to actually have him coach the next game against Toronto.

The unfortunate side effect is that the NBA will be punishing not just Knick fans but basketball fans across the globe by letting Isiah continue to degrade the game of basketball.

(see Avery Johnson fined $25k)