You may not have noticed, but I was gone last week - on vacation. Out of the office. Avoiding work, and avoiding alarm clocks, at all costs. It was a brief respite from my responsibilities here at the Volcano - including Cup Check - that allowed me to come back rejuvenated and recharged. 

What did I do on my brief sabbatical? In truth, not much.

Did I travel to Europe or Korea for experimental, non-FDA approved stem cell treatment, in a desperate attempt to combat the tuft of hair that recently sprouted from my ear? Nope, though it is tempting.

Instead, I tinkered with my fantasy football teams (yes, I have three, which, you're right, IS absolutely ridiculous). Putzed around in the yard. Cussed at the Broncos. Stabbed my Josh McDaniels voodoo doll in the face.

Basically, it was the usual ... there was just no work involved with any of it, which was pretty awesome.

I also had some time to think. And I've come to a decision regarding this column. The "Strikes" you've come to know and love are out ... kicked to the curb like Matt Hasselbeck. It's the dawning of a new era for Cup Check. Don't think of it as rebuilding. It's more like retooling. Or something.

My hope is the new-look Cup Check will be more effective than Tarvaris Jackson. It almost has to be, doesn't it?

Instead of the "Strikes," which had started to feel as restricting as the 12^th Man packed into a pair of 32-inch pants, the Cup Check column will now be slightly more focused while also more comprehensive. Each week I'll dedicate the bulk of the column (what you're reading now) to one theme or story (usually more interesting than this one). And below you'll find the "Box Scores" - a concise roundup of the week in sports entertainment and/or stupidity.

I expect it to be a winning combination. Or at the very least an entertaining one.

Of course, this comes from the same guy who has Rex Grossman AND Kyle Orton as the only quarterbacks on one of his three fantasy football teams. Take it for what it's worth.

BOX SCORES

According to reports on ESPN.com, NASCAR driver Kurt Busch lost his cool (once again) recently, getting into altercations with two separate journalists following last Saturday's Sprint Cup race at Richmond International Raceway. Both reporters asked Busch about his feud with fellow driver Jimmie Johnson, which was apparently not a line of questioning he was interested in answering. Busch, who has since apologized, had to be physically restrained during the first altercation with NASCAR.com reporter Joe Menzer on pit row. Later, in the press tent, Busch ripped up an earlier press conference transcript from AP reporter Jenna Fryer. NASCAR announced this week that Busch would not be formally punished for the tirade, as this kind of WWE-style redneck machismo is good for business. ... Luther Campbell, the former 2 Live Crew leader and later Miami-Dade mayoral candidate, filed a defamation lawsuit this week against former University of Miami booster Nevin Shapiro, who's currently serving a 20-year sentence in a federal prison for his role in a $930 million Ponzi scheme. Campbell's lawsuit claims Shapiro slandered the rapper in a Yahoo Sports investigative report published in August, allegedly detailing Shapiro's long and lavish history of providing UM football players with improper benefits. In the Yahoo report, Shapiro claims his misdeeds were simply a continuation of the "benefits" Campbell, or "Uncle Luke," bestowed on UM players in the '80s and '90s. There's no real joke here, other than the idea of the guy from 2 Live Crew suing someone for defamation. ... After Monday Night Football cameras seemed to catch the New York Giants' Deon Grant blatantly (and poorly) pretending to be injured in an effort to slow down the St. Louis Rams' no-huddle offense, the NFL this week issued a memo to all 32 teams threatening fines, suspensions and loss of draft picks for any player or team found guilty of faking injury. Somewhere Joe Nash smiled. ... Ron Artest, or shall we say Metta World Peace, debuted on ABC's Dancing with the Stars this week - and was quickly booted from the show by voters because, amazingly, he's even worse at dancing than he is at rapping. The good news is he didn't fight anyone in the stands. The bad news is I think he thinks people take him seriously. ... Finally, as was first reported by the Boston Herald and later picked up on by Deadspin.com, recently a party of 22 Stanley Cup champion Boston Bruins were dining at the hip Boston-area restaurant Red Lantern when they ran into C-list actor Ryan Reynolds, Canadian by birth. After some reportedly terse exchanges over the outcome of last year's Stanley Cup (in which the Bruins bested the Vancouver Canucks), Reynolds sent the Bruins 22 shots of high-end tequila as a gesture of reconciliation. In a classy move, the Bruins reportedly refused the shots and instead sent them to a nearby bachelorette party.