New Orleans Chooses Wisely Between Football And Culture

Because no one reads the newspaper, and SportsCenter's anchors are too perky for this early in the morning, Deadspin combs the best of the broadsheets and the blogosphere to bring you everything you need to know to start your day.

•For a New Orleans independent theater, Sunday was to be a screening of "Bright Star," the Jane Campion-directed biopic of John Keats. Who dat? Well, now they'll be hosting a viewing party for the NFC title game instead. Well, as Keats would say, "Beauty is football, football truth."

•Another loss for Duke ( this time to NC State)? That's twice this month. At this rate, they won't be fun anymore. Oh, who am I kidding, they're always fun.

•Brady's not playing in the Pro Bowl due to his injury. Ditto Big Ben. Rivers didn't want to play, and Peyton could be prepping for the Super Bowl. That leaves Matt Schaub and Vince Young as the AFC quarterbacks. Move it to Miami, they said. It'll be a big event again, they said. No one wants to go to Hawaii, they said.

•The list of the top selling NBA jerseys is out, and it's Kobe, LeBron and Dwight, of course. But the real surprise are Knicks and Bulls jerseys cracking the top 5 teams. Is it the mid-90s again? I guess that makes sense, because both are playing ugly, low-scoring basketball.

•Shani Davis and Stephen Colbert raced for the final Olympic speedskating spot. Colbert started the 500 meter race while Davis was still driving to the arena; Davis parked, signed autographs, suited up, and still beat Colbert by 13 minutes. Knowing the USOC, they'll probably give Colbert the spot because he's a bigger "name."

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It's Thursday. Open wide.