Manning

Peyton Manning threw for 309 yards and three touchdowns Sunday night, and Indianapolis never trailed in beating AFC South rival Tennessee, 31-9, for its NFL-best 14th consecutive regular-season victory. Manning joined Kurt Warner and Steve Young as the only NFL quarterbacks to open a season by throwing for at least 300 yards in the first five games. Manning reached another milestone when he threw a first-quarter touchdown pass, the 343rd of his career, to end a tie with Fran Tarkenton and move into third place behind Brett Favre and Dan Marino.

NEW YORK - A New Jersey man who was a teenage store clerk when 6-year-old Etan Patz vanished 33 years ago Friday told police he lured the boy into the store with promises of a soda, strangled him, then dumped the body into an alley - a dramatic confession that could solve one of the country's most chilling missing-child mysteries. New York Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, speaking at a news conference Thursday night, said Pedro Hernandez, 51, of Maple Shade, N.J., had spoken to investigators for more than three hours, that his confession had been videotaped, and that Hernandez had told people over the years that he'd been involved in a horrible crime.

Lorenzo Bromell isn't likely to forget the hit -- and not only because it drew a hefty fine from the NFL. Peyton Manning won't soon forget it either. The collision came in 2001, when Manning was in his fourth season as quarterback of the Indianapolis Colts, and Bromell was a defensive lineman for the Miami Dolphins. Manning wound up with a hairline fracture of the jaw, and the now-retired Bromell secured the dubious distinction of being the only player to knock Manning out of a game.

A 6,600-acre Nevada wildfire burning near the California border was caused by people, fire officials announced Wednesday. Though the exact cause of the Topaz Ranch Estates fire is under investigation, it was ignited by humans, said Rita Ayers, Sierra Front Interagency Dispatch Center's fire information officer. “It was a private residence burning that exceeded the regulatory standards,” Ayers said, suggesting that a bonfire may have been the trigger.

Peyton Manning threw two touchdown passes and the Indianapolis Colts rallied four times to win, 27-23, Monday night. Manning had the ball for less than 15 minutes but threw touchdown passes of 80 yards to Dallas Clark and 48 yards to Pierre Garcon. The first score came on the first play from scrimmage, the latter with 3 minutes 18 seconds to play. "It was about being efficient when it counted, in the fourth quarter," Manning said. "That's really what the game's about."

What the Indianapolis Colts need to do to defeat the New York Jets in the AFC championship game Sunday (noon, Channel 2): Let 18 be 18 Not only is he the smartest quarterback in the game, Peyton Manning knows as much about football as any coach out there. Jets players have said he can walk up to the line of scrimmage, take a look at the defense, and point out what every player is going to do. So the Colts need to let him do his thing, and they will. Never mind the fact that Indianapolis has the league's 32nd-ranked rush offense; it is not a running team, and makes no pretenses about that.

Peyton Manning doesn't like to waste time. So, for instance, when the Indianapolis quarterback runs on the treadmill, he doesn't just chug along like everyone else. He practices the two-minute drill while jogging, gesturing and calling out plays as he racks up the miles. "The first time I saw that I was like, 'What is he doing?' " Colts guard Ryan Lilja said. "I'd never seen that before, but then I realized it makes perfect sense. This guy is a next-level thinker." For one NFL team -- either Manning's Colts or the New Orleans Saints -- the next level is just four quarters away.

New York Giants quarterback Eli Manning returned to practice Friday and showed no ill effects from the injured right heel that kept him out the previous two days. Yet the team is still being cautious about his status for Sunday's game against the Oakland Raiders. Manning is listed as questionable, and Coach Tom Coughlin said it will more than likely be a game-time decision whether he will play. "If the medical people think he can play, then he will play," Coughlin said.

Now that Charles Woodson has beaten out Peyton Manning for the Heisman, I can't wait until spring when Tom Arnold edges out Anthony Hopkins for best actor at the Academy Awards. CARL WOLFSON Van Nuys

The first time Peyton Manning hunkered into an NFL huddle, called an NFL play, scanned the field and fired a pass to an NFL receiver, it didn't come as the No. 1 overall pick of the Indianapolis Colts. It came with the New Orleans Saints. And the future four-time NFL most valuable player was in high school, more than a decade before he would lead the Colts to Super Bowl XLIV against the Saints. He grew up in New Orleans, and his father, Archie, was a former star quarterback for the Saints who was always around the team because he was their radio analyst.

BEIJING - The sensational Chinese murder investigation in which the wife of an ousted Politburo member stands accused of poisoning a British expatriate may include evidence from blood samples taken from the victim's body before cremation, according to people familiar with the case. Henry C. Lee, a forensic scientist who gained international recognition for his work in the O.J. Simpson murder trial, said that he was asked this year to analyze a blood sample that most probably came from Neil Heywood, the dead Englishman.

Perhaps it was the hands -- too big for the apparently frail woman in the poofy blonde wig. Perhaps it was the dubious expression on the face of the temporary home health aid. But the video that was supposed to help Thomas Parkin prove his elderly mother was alive only sent a Brooklyn, N.Y., jury into giggles, and Parkin now faces at least 13 years in prison for donning the strange disguise in a scheme to reap his dead mom's riches.

A man was recovering Monday after a fight in a Dodger Stadium parking lot following Sunday's game, renewing questions about how quickly and effectively security responds once a game ends. The fight began about 9 p.m. after a minor traffic accident. According to Los Angeles police, Arthur Morales, 30, knocked the victim to the ground while his pregnant girlfriend watched, stunned. At that point, Morales' friends got out of the vehicle and joined in. "They held the victim down on the ground and ... the fourth one kicked and punched him in the head," LAPD Cmdr.

Special-teams play is considered crucial to playoff success, but the Boston Bruins won the Stanley Cup a year ago with a so-so power play and the Kings reached the Western Conference finals this spring without getting significant production with a man advantage. The Kings also won their first three games against the Phoenix Coyotes despite scoring only two power-play goals, each generated during a two-man edge in Game 2. But their power play's failings were magnified Sunday when they had a chance to advance to the Stanley Cup finals but were stymied six times in a 2-0 loss that sent the series back to Jobing.com Arena in Glendale, Ariz., on Tuesday.

A minor traffic accident after the Dodgers' win over St. Louis on Sunday night sparked a fight that resulted in the beating of one man and the arrests of four others, Los Angeles police said. The beating victim was treated for non-life-threatening injuries at a hospital and released, police said. A pregnant woman who was a passenger in his car was taken to the hospital for observation as a precaution and also was released. Occupants of the other vehicle, four men in their 20s, were booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon and were being held in lieu of $30,000 bail, Los Angeles police officer Bruce Borihanh said Monday.

SANA, Yemen -- A suicide bomber targeting soldiers rehearsing for a military parade killed as many as 96 people Monday in a sign that Islamic militants are taking their fight to the capital after intense battles in the provinces with U.S.-backed government forces in recent weeks. The blast appeared to mark a shift in tactics by an Al Qaeda-linked group that for months had been concentrating on towns in the south. It indicated that militants, who have been unnerved by increased U.S. military and drone strikes, are expanding north in a campaign to upend the fragile government of President Abdu Rabbo Mansour Hadi.

EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. -- The great unknown for the New York Giants in the playoffs is Eli Manning. If Manning performs the way he did against the New England Patriots this past weekend and throws four touchdown passes or something close, the Giants (10-6) have a good shot at beating the Buccaneers (9-7) in Tampa in Sunday's NFC wild-card game. The concern is that the bad Manning could show up in the postseason once again. He is 0-for-2 in the playoffs and his performances have been nothing for anyone in the Manning family to brag about.

GREEN BAY, Wis. -- Stopping a third-string quarterback is one thing. Now the Green Bay Packers' depleted defense must face Peyton Manning. The Packers (3-3) came into the season hoping that a strong defense would lead them into the post-Brett Favre era. Instead, they've struggled through a string of injuries, finally snapping a three-game losing streak at Seattle last Sunday. Of course, it didn't hurt that they were facing third-stringer Charlie Frye instead of Matt Hasselbeck. They'll get no such break in Sunday's game against the Indianapolis Colts (3-2)

The Man Who Changed the Way We Eat Thomas McNamee Free Press, 339 pp., $27 Ask your average Food Network viewer or Yelp poster about Craig Claiborne and you're likely to be met with a blank look and a "Who?" How fleeting is fame in the food world. Claiborne is one of the giants of this modern age, even if today - less than 20 years after his passing - he is largely forgotten. People remember James Beard because of the foundation that keeps his name alive. Julia Child lives on in television reruns (even if some fans now believe she looked just like Meryl Streep)

I love my dog. Sure, he has issues - what lover doesn't? He wheezes when he sleeps, or when he's awake. There is an unexplainable darkness to his soul that emerges when he's under extreme stress. He also has a taste for the blood in mosquito bites. (The vet thinks he might be a vampire.) Being from L.A., our dog is prone to anxiety attacks and an almost debilitating sense of envy, particularly when coming upon younger, fitter dogs, which almost all dogs are. The last time we weighed him, he was close to 300 pounds.