In December 2007, Bill Parcells signed a four-year contract to become the the executive vice president for football operations of the Miami Dolphins. On Tuesday, the team announced that Parcells is giving up control of the team, leaving general manager Jeff Ireland in charge.  Parcells will remain with the Dolphins as a “daily consultant,” and continue to maintain an office at the team’s practice facility.

The team announced the move in a short statement:

Effective immediately, Jeff Ireland will assume full control over all aspects and decisions in regard to the Miami Dolphin football team and support staff. This was the intent of the structure put in place in the past. Bill Parcells will remain with the club on a daily consultant basis.’

The timing may seem a bit weird with the Dolphins opening the regular season on Sunday at Buffalo (they’re 3-point favorites), but the team sees the beginning of the season after the final training camp cuts have been made as the slowest part of the year for a general manager.

With Tiger Woods playing much better, at least by his post-scandal standards, there wasn’t much drama in whether he’d actually make the US Ryder Cup Team, but there was some doubt about who’d get the other three captain’s picks. On Tuesday, US captain Corey Pavin announced the four men he’d chosen to complete the US roster: Tiger, Stewart Cink, rookie Rickie Fowler and Zach Johnson.

European Team captain Colin Montgomerie said he was glad Tiger will playing against his team, while politely telling reporters he thought Pavin had made good picks. “I am delighted to see Tiger Woods amongst Corey’s selections,” said Monty, who’s had infidelity scandals of his own. “The Ryder Cup is a better event with him in it.”  Tiger has a career Ryder Cup record of 10-13-2, and has only been on one winning team in five tries.

Matt Latos (13-5, 2.25) was scheduled to pitch Monday night for the Padres, but instead stomach problems caused manager Bud Black to have reliever Tim Stauffer make an emergency start.  It turned out pretty well, as the Padres gutted out a 4-2 win at home against the Dodgers, breaking their 10-game losing streak and keeping their NL West division lead at one game. Latos is scheduled to start Tuesday night.

Latos, who’s been impressive in his second big league season, isn’t sure what got him sick, but is sure it sucked. “I have no idea what it was,” the pitcher said. “It felt like a knife was just stabbing my stomach. It was pretty bad.”

That made the decision to push his start back a day pretty easy for Black. “It just didn’t make sense to me to pitch a guy who didn’t sleep, who was throwing up all night, who when he came in looked as white as a sheet,” said the Padres skipper.

On Monday, the Atlanta Thrashers agreed to a one-year, $800,000 contract with 35-year-old left wing Fredric Modin.  What the Thrashers really like about Modin is what he did six years ago — help the Tampa Bay Lightning win the Stanley Cup. Thrashers head coach Craig Ramsay was part of Tampa’s coaching staff back then, and Thrashers general manager Rick Dudley was also in the front office.

GM Dudley said that experience dictated the signing:

I know Fredrik well from our time in Tampa, and he is an experienced and talented veteran who is tremendously respected in the locker room. He’s won a Stanley Cup, along with an Olympic gold medal, and possesses that winning mentality we are looking for.