Cover-2

The "No Fun League" is finding out that you can push fun-loving fans only so far.

A week ago a league official saw fans lined up outside Ken Johnson's tent in Orchard Park, N.Y. Johnson, an institution at Buffalo Bills games for more than 20 years, has long served up what he calls "bowling ball shots," to fellow fans.

In a truly Buffalo-style tradition, happy imbibers swig down a shot of Polish cherry liqueur out of the thumb hole of a bowling ball.

The outraged official threatened to shut down Johnson's massive tailgate operation, which has been featured on the Food Network and on NFL Films. He grills meat on the hood of his red 1980 Pinto. He converted a filing cabinet into a pizza oven and cooks Buffalo's fabled chicken wings in a mailbox.

Rather than cause an incident, Johnson said he would move his tent to another lot not owned by the team.

On Friday Johnson got a conciliatory phone call from Christopher Clark, the Bills' director of security.

The upshot is that Johnson is going to stay in his traditional spot, keep on cooking, and keep his bowling ball strictly for personal use. (Heh, heh.)

Since he claims he spent $1,500 last season on the cherry liqueur alone, the decision wasn't that painful.

The NFL has evolved from the days when guys like Jack Tatum or Jack Lambert could cause running backs to throw up on themselves.

Now, with the myriad safety-oriented rules changes, the league doesn't have a feared head hunter.

"Through the [new] rules and regulations, you can't really hit or be as aggressive as guys like Chuck Cecil, Ronnie Lott, and Jack Tatum in their days," Titans safety Chris Hope told the Associated Press. "Growing up as a safety, I was always known as a hard hitter and I looked up to guys like Ronnie Lott. But you know what? We can't do that anymore."

One of the current nasty boys - San Diego's Shawne "Lights Out" Merriman, said there's still one truly fearsome hitter out there.

"I think you have to put Troy Polamalu up there for his relentless attitude and reckless abandon for his body," Merriman says of the Steelers safety. "You know if he doesn't care about his body then he definitely doesn't care about yours."

Houston's Arian Foster garnered national headlines a week ago for blitzing Indianapolis for a franchise-record 231 yards rushing in a 34-24 Texans upset. Since Foster was an undrafted rookie from Tennessee, it was a glamorous story.

But Rick Gosselin of the Dallas Morning News points out that six undrafted backs have rushed for 1,000 yards in a season in just the last decade: Kansas City's Priest Holmes (who won two rushing titles), Chicago's James Allen, Indianapolis' Dominic Rhodes, Pittsburgh's Willie Parker, Green Bay's Ryan Grant, and Buffalo's Fred Jackson.