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Mr. (Aaron) Rodgers’ imperfect neighborhood

There’s something magnificent about watching an athlete in his prime. Witness Novak Djokovic. The same can be said of Aaron Rodgers, arguably the NFL’s finest player. Having won the league’s MVP Award last season, he’s off to a dream start as his team, the Green Bay Packers, has gone 3 and 0, including a decisive 38-28 win over the Kansas City Chiefs. (Next up – the troubled San Francisco 49ers, whose QB, my beloved Colin Kaepernick, isn’t exactly inviting comparisons to Rodgers this year. Did anyone say 4 and 0?)

Rodgers, the NFC’s offensive player of the week, is probably what casual observers think of when they think of a quarterback. (And indeed, he was in part the inspiration for Tam Tarquin, the golden QB and love interest in “The Penalty For Holding,” the forthcoming novel in my series “The Games Men Play.”) ...

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(Madison Square) Garden of earthly delights

Pope Francis’ celebration of Mass at Madison Square Garden tonight prompted my friend, sports publicist and blogger John Cirillo, to email me a post on his favorite Garden moments, which got me thinking about my own.

But first, a little history. The Garden, named for President James Madison, really was once a garden – a rooftop garden that was part of an elaborate Moorish-style complex designed by architect Stanford White, who was shot there in 1906 by a crazed Harry Thaw over Thaw’s wife (and White’s former mistress) chorus girl Evelyn Nesbit. (She figures in both E.L. Doctorow’s novel “Ragtime” and the movie “The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing.”) ...

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