Knicks officials were understandably coy about the possibility of the Cleveland Cavaliers star eventually landing in New York, but the New York newspapers were full of stuff about it this week, and James did nothing to head off all the talk.

Knicks president Donnie Walsh wouldn't so much as concede that James will be available, let alone talk about signing him -- "It's two years from now and guys are playing on other teams," he said -- but he made it clear that he's looking for a good big man, which would be an obvious complement to James.

"I've always thought that you had to have a really good big man to have a great team," he told the New York Daily News.

Like James, Chris Bosh and Amare Stoudemire are eligible to be free agents in 2010, so you can begin to see the rudiments of a plan; James clearly wouldn't sign with the Knicks unless the team had other good players who would help make an NBA title possible.

Either way, what James does will likely hinge on just how much the Akron native would like to take his show to New York. The money will obviously be huge either way.

As of yesterday, more than 600 people had signed a petition at gopetition.com to get former Cincinnati Reds slugger George Foster as a contestant for season eight of Dancing With the Stars.

Why Foster, you might ask? It's a good question, but fortunately that Web site and foster's own Web site -- www.fosterville.net -- has a top 10 list of reasons why the soon-to-be 60-year-old former player should be on: 10. He is too old for American Idol. 9. He is the first contestant endorsed by the Braille Institute. 8. He wants to win and go to Disneyland. 7. He can't sing. 6. Never been connected with the "Mitchell Report." 5. His favorite movie is Happy Feet. 4. He's not a health risk -- Great shape for 60! 3. Dancing With the Stars is on his "Bucket List." 2. Would be the first former MLB player to compete. 1. Cincinnati has a high percentage of reality show viewers and voters.

Petition signers pledge to watch the show if Foster is chosen, so in this, as in everything, it is wise to be careful what you sign.

As he prepared his team to face Notre Dame this week, Southern California coach Pete Carroll was blunt in his assessment of his team's lone loss of the season. The Trojans were upset by Oregon State on Sept. 25 because of the hype surrounding the Ohio State game two weeks before, he says.

"It was too big of a relief of stress and buildup," Carroll said. "There was a whole year of talking about it. This was an unusually significant game. That's what I'm guessing."

The Trojans had a week off in order to come down from that 35-3 win over the Buckeyes. USC also is coming off a bye week in preparation for Saturday's game against Notre Dame, and Carroll's teams have won only 76 percent of the time coming off a bye week. In all other games, he has won 88 percent of the time.

So maybe it wasn't Ohio State's fault. Maybe it was the bye.

Jim Tressel's decision to stop his annual attendance at the OSU Alumni Club of Greater Cleveland's annual football appreciation banquet apparently has sounded the death knell for the 57-year event.

The club announced that this year's event, which drew a crowd approximately half of the more than 1,000 who attended the event in the past, would be replaced by a new scholarship fundraiser next year.

Tressel told organizers last year that he had to spread his appearances around the state, and that he would appear at a similar banquet for the OSU Alumni Club of Greater Cincinnati this year instead. Former OSU coaches Earle Bruce and John Cooper and current assistants Jim Heacock, Jim Bollman and Taver Johnson appeared at the Cleveland banquet this week.

So far, Wade Redden's decision to spurn the Blue Jackets' offer and sign with the New York Rangers has worked out well for Columbus. Redden has been decidedly mediocre for the Rangers and has become a target for the boo-birds in Madison Square Garden, much as he was in Ottawa.

His contract is doubtless a big reason for this -- Redden is being paid $8 million this season and will get $6.2 million in each of the next four -- but the New York Post's Larry Brooks shed some light on why the fans are booing in a couple of paragraphs he penned at the start of last week.

"They will struggle as long as Michal Rozsival and Wade Redden -- the two defensemen who receive the most ice time -- play to the inferior standard they have established the first quarter of the season," Brooks wrote.

"Rozsival's game has gone from bad to worse. Redden's has gone from bad to somewhat better to worse after a relapse the last two matches. Neither is the least bit physically involved. (Wait, that's what both are -- the least bit physically involved.) Neither has been acute reading the rush. Neither has been decisive with the puck. Neither has been able to make the power play hum. ..."

By contrast, Fedor Tyutin, one of the defensemen the Blue Jackets were able to get from the Rangers in a trade after New York signed Redden, has been playing well lately after a slow start. Tyutin has been solid, physical and smart, and seems to have excelled even more after he was paired with Marc Methot. Methot took over for Rostislav Klesla when Klesla was hurt, and the chemistry between Tyutin and Methot has been good.

A number of future major-college basketball players will be in action today at Harvest Prep in the All Ohio Slam-N-Jam Hoop Preview.

The nightcap of the nine-scrimmage event, scheduled for 10 p.m., will pit Northland against Cincinnati Princeton, possibly a preview of the 2009 Division I boys state championship game. Northland features juniors Jared Sullinger, who has committed to Ohio State, and J.D. Weatherspoon, who has committed to Xavier. Princeton's top player is junior Jordan Sibert, who will join Sullinger in Ohio State's 2010 recruiting class.

The 9:15 p.m. scrimmage will have Brookhaven opposing Cincinnati Aiken. The state's top-rated 2011 recruit, Chane Behanan, plays for Aiken. Behanan has committed to Cincinnati.

Defenseman Tom Preissing was a healthy scratch for the Los Angeles Kings this week, which could be regarded as a sign that he's available. Preissing is a right-shot, power-play defenseman known to be a good offensive player, qualities that fit the Blue Jackets' needs.

The Kings are in the midst of a youth movement, and Preissing is 29 and has a four-year deal at $2.75 million annually. His situation bears watching, anyway.

The Bill Cowher-Browns rumors might be more wishful thinking on Cleveland's part than anything; other cities also have been sounding the Cowher alarm. While Cowher's name is being linked to the Browns more than any other team, in part because of a profootballtalk.com report that the team has talked to him about the job, his name also has appeared in stories about the Kansas City Chiefs and Detroit Lions and even the Notre Dame and Tennessee college jobs.

Owner Randy Lerner said this week that the team hasn't made any overtures to the former Pittsburgh Steelers coach and that he would wait until after the season to make a decision on the status of coach Romeo Crennel and general manager Phil Savage.

When the Bengals released fullback Jeremi Johnson this week, it ended what had become a frustrating and disappointing relationship for the team. Johnson was a key member of the running game in previous years, but he was overweight throughout the offseason. Then he suffered a knee injury that forced him to miss the season, and the Bengals had to use Daniel Coats -- a converted tight end -- as the lead blocker in their base running offense.

"It certainly did not help," offensive coordinator Bob Bratkowski said.

Before the 2006 season, the Bengals signed Johnson to a six-year contract that made him one of the highest-paid fullbacks in the game. But he has since struggled with weight problems that tested the team's patience. He was held out of offseason practices, minicamp and much of training camp this summer because he was overweight, and it likely contributed to his knee injury.

"He kind of ate his way out of here," Bratkowski said. \

\ Bob Hunter is a sports columnist for The Dispatch.

bhunter@dispatch.com