Flag Football

I spend over 500 hours every year working as a volunteer for Catonsville Recreation and Parks programs to provide our community's children with recreational opportunities. I object to your promotion of i9 flag football ("New flag football league puts the fun in fundamentals," Catonsville Times, Sept 21). The paper should promote community-based recreational activities, not private enterprises that profit from divisions in the community and from a lack of exposure to existing programs.

Shame on the Catonsville Times for essentially running a story for the i9 flag football league ("New flag football league puts the fun in fundamentals," Sept. 21). Make no mistake, i9 is a for-profit business. The Times was misguided to devote a full page advertisement to this organization. Catonsville already has dozens of sports programs, offered to the children of the community under the Baltimore County Parks and Recreation umbrella. These are run 100 percent by volunteers, who are completely focused on the children - not turning a profit.

After his football team opened the 2011 season with a 40-17 win over Delaware last Saturday in Annapolis, Navy coach Ken Niumatalolo was beaming. Niumatalolo could not have been more proud of a quarterback, senior Kriss Proctor, who rushed for 176 yards and accounted for four touchdowns in taking over after the graduation of Ricky Dobbs.The fourth-year coach also praised his defense, with nine new starters, for making a team that reached the championship...

Bull Dog Flag Football is registering for the fall season, which runs Sept. 18 to Dec. 18 and includes post-season and tournament games. Games are played in Baltimore, Howard and Anne Arundel counties and the Glen Burnie area on Sundays (tournament games on Saturdays). Registration fee for 9-man and 8-man IE is $500, plus officials fees; registration for 5-man is $350, plus official fees. To register, go to eteamz.com/mdbulldogflagfootball. For more information, contact David Mitchell, BDFFL commissioner, 4BullDogFlagFootball@msn.com or 410-409-4866.

Turnout was light but the conversation was animated as the Greater Baltimore Highlands Community Association met May 16 at Christ United Methodist Church. State Sen. Ed Kasemeyer, who represents District 12 that includes our neighborhoods, Catonsville and part of Howard County, provided a report on the most recent legislative session in Annapolis. He acknowledged voting for a bill to aid illegal residents' children in receiving the tuition rate for state residents to attend Maryland colleges and universities.

Brett Favre says he can still play at a "high level" if he returns to the Vikings for a 20th NFL season. Favre hasn't yet said if he plans to play, but he's not sounding like a retired quarterback. Favre told the Sun Herald on Thursday on the Mississippi newspaper's website he would "love to go beat the Saints" in the season opener Sept. 9. • An apologetic but defiant Steve Smith expressed regret for breaking his left forearm playing flag football while also taking shots at critics who questioned the Panthers receiver's judgment.

It started around noon Saturday, a pub crawl through South Baltimore to raise money for a group of friends who for seven years have been playing flag football together. It ended with one of the team members at Maryland Shock Trauma Center, getting blood transfusions to treat three deep stab wounds to his back. Police say that a fight broke out among the group of people participating in the event, and that two women later attacked a 25-year-old man as he walked up the street. As he fended off their blows, he was stabbed from behind by a man. Police and witnesses who saw the initial fight said most people were wearing the official bar crawl T-shirts.

You spent three hours last Sunday screaming at the TV, watching penalty flags flutter to the turf like dead canaries and cripple the Ravens in that ugly 23-20 loss to the Pittsburgh Steelers. And you don't want to go through that again this weekend when they face the Oakland Raiders with a playoff berth on the line, because you'll end up pulling your hair out. Well, guess what? The Ravens don't want to go through it again, either.

Even after their unsightly 27-14 loss to the Green Bay Packers on Monday night, the Ravens still have a shot at the playoffs because they don't face a team with a winning record the rest of the way. The Ravens' biggest opponent over the final four weeks of the regular season might be themselves - or the officials, depending on your perspective. Penalties have dogged the Ravens throughout the season and have cost them a chance to keep pace in the AFC wild-card race. The Ravens' 12 penalties at Lambeau Field were the most in the 31-game John Harbaugh era. Their five pass-interference penalties (four of which were on the defense)

The Maryland/DC Anti-Car Theft Committee and the Howard County Police Department will offer a free Vehicle Identification Etching session for the Savage Community Association from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday. The event, an opportunity to have a unique vehicle identification number engraved on all the major pieces of glass in each car, will be held at the Savage Volunteer Fire Department, 8925 Lincoln St., Savage. The VIN is designed as a deterrent to theft and as a help in returning stolen vehicles to their rightful owners.