This week on Only A Game, we endeavor to answer a most vexing question regarding the sexes: Why aren’t there more sports that pit women against men? Also, the New Jersey Devils rise from hockey purgatory, plus SI’s Peter King on the NFL, and a story of a sports hero who disappeared.

Major League Soccer gets its season underway on March 25. If all goes according to plan, the opener will pit the league’s new club, the Philadelphia Union, against last year’s expansion team, Seattle Sounders FC. But according to Bill Littlefield, there is some suspense regarding whether these clubs and the 14 other teams that comprise MLS will begin playing on time this spring.

This week on Only A Game, a preview of the 21st Olympic Winter Games, and a radio tour of Vancouver. Also, Burundi’s president takes to the soccer pitch to help repair a fractured nation, and the life and circus catches of the great Willie Mays.

Before 2009 becomes a thing of the past, Only A Game presents some of our favorite stories from the last year or so. There’s something for everyone: Santas in Speedos; dancing doctoral candidates; soccer at the Vatican; Dungeons and Dragons; golfing in Vietnam; and a collegiate logging competition. Enjoy! And Happy Holidays from all of us at Only A Game!

The Cleveland Browns have been beaten and befuddled. This week on Only A Game, how have their fans handled the humbling? Also, I’ll be speaking with the author of Onward Christian Athletes, who suggests that stars who point to the sky…should reconsider. Also, is President Obama leaving the hardwood in favor of the green?

This week on Only A Game, we celebrate a half century of mask making and some of the goalies who have benefitted from that craft. Also, generations of women come together on the hardwood, and a history of the Spartak Moscow soccer team.

It’s safe to say that many ordinary Russians needed at least a figurative escape from the U.S.S.R. under Stalin’s oppressive regime. In his new book, Spartak Moscow, author Robert Edelman contends that for many, that escape was soccer.

On Sunday, Major League Soccer will determine their champion, when the Los Angeles Galaxy and Real Salt Lake face each other in Seattle. According to Bill, the league is delighted with the presence of at least one of the teams in the championship game.

It’s lovely Los Angeles against frigid Philadelphia and agreeable Anaheim versus nippy New York. This week on Only A Game, the latest in Major League Baseball’s Climactic Shock Series. I’m getting the sniffles just thinking about it. And chills, too.

This week on Only A Game, Minnesotans, most of them shedding no tears, say goodbye to the Metrodome, a high incidence of brain injuries in the NFL, the NHL cranks up the slap shots and poke checks again, the basketball poetry of Jack Ridl, and in the Palestinian refugee camps of Lebanon, girls just wanna play soccer.