Roster

THE SIGNING of first-round draft pick Sean Couturier is more of a housekeeping move than an indication that the young center has a roster spot waiting for him. But don't tell that to Couturier. "Obviously, I needed a contract to make the team," he said. "Now that it's done, I still have to work hard and prove myself and hopefully I stay around. " The chances of Couturier staying around beyond training camp aren't as remote as maybe they were a week ago, though. He had a strong game on Tuesday in Toronto and general manager Paul Holmgren tossed a bouquet of verbal roses yesterday after the 3-year deal was made official.

RON JAWORSKI treats opportunity like a Doberman treats prime rib. So when Tim Tebow was released by the New York Jets on April 29, Jaworski took a shot by reaching out to the unemployed quarterback and offered him a roster spot with the Soul. He's still waiting for a reply. "I haven't heard back from him and I'm not going to push it," said Jaworski, one of the Soul's owners. "If he decides he wants to play Arena Football, we'll make a spot for him. " Jaworski and Soul coach Clint Dolezel sent Tebow a list of plays they had in mind for him, most were around the goal line.

Of all the starters left over from the Andy Reid regime, Brent Celek might have reason to fret the most in Chip Kelly's first offseason of player acquisition. The Eagles tight end saw his new coach add two competitors at a position where teams sometimes carry only two players on the 53-man roster. Although Celek did not have the best of his six seasons in 2012, tight end was hardly the No. 1 priority for the Eagles. And yet Kelly signed James Casey on the first day of free agency and selected Zach Ertz out of Stanford in the second round of the draft.

There's a jazz man's adage, attributed variously to Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington and Miles Davis, that goes something like this: "There are two kinds of music, the good and the bad. I play the good kind. " Don Was, the bass player, producer, bandleader, songwriter, and now president of the storied jazz label Blue Note Records, divides the world differently. "There are two kinds of music," Was says. "Generous music and selfish music. " Was was talking from his home in Los Angeles as he got ready to head to Philadelphia to for the Non-Commvention, the national gathering of mostly public radio non-commercial music stations, hosted annually by WXPN (88.5 FM)

If ever our town could pull together enough ambition to stage a string-quartet festival, it would be like striking a vein of artistic gold. Were any presenter visionary enough to host visits from the world's most charismatic pianists, aficionados would rush in. And if you blended these prospects - along with a singer or two - into a single series, what you would have is the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, which, clocking an impressive one score...

DeSean Jackson and Jeremy Maclin have spent their careers playing under the same head coach, offensive coordinator, and position coach. They have started together for four seasons, but the offense they're learning now under coach Chip Kelly is considerably different from what they've done in the past. Among the changes: how they receive the play and how they run their routes. Instead of going to the huddle to hear the play from the quarterback, they get directions signaled from the sideline.

Jrue and Justin Holiday have beaten some incredibly long odds as brothers who will play on the same NBA team. The Holidays became 76ers teammates after Justin, 23, was called up this weekend from the Idaho Stampede of the NBA Development League. The Sixers waived guard Jeremy Pargo to make room for Justin on their 15-man roster. The 6-foot-6, 180-pound guard, who practiced with the team on Monday, is signed through the rest of the season. "Now I get to play with [Jrue] at the highest level," Justin Holiday said.

NOT ALL THE players on the Eagles' roster are surprised by Chip Kelly's fast-paced practices. For five players, in fact, it's business as usual. That's because they played for Kelly at Oregon, where the 49-year-old coach perfected the practice routines he's initiated with the Eagles. Kelly, who took over for Andy Reid in January, was Oregon's head coach for the past 4 years. And he was the Ducks' offensive coordinator for 2 years before that. Eagles linebacker Casey Matthews is a former Duck who played under Kelly.

THERE'S NO question that to a large degree, Atlantic City has cast its lot with the twenty- and thirty-something, party-hearty crowd as it attempts to transform itself from a gambling destination that happens to have dining, nightlife and entertainment to a dining, nightlife and entertainment destination that happens to have gambling. But that doesn't mean casinos have put up "No Kids Allowed" signs along the Atlantic City Expressway. As a matter of fact, several gambling dens this summer are betting that fare far more wholesome than beer pong tournaments and fishnet-clad "new burlesque" dancers will improve their bottom lines.

BY THE TIME he's ready to play Saturday night, Michael Keir might be exhausted from shaking his head back and forth. Keir, a 6-2, 215-pound quarterback from Roman Catholic High, remains bothered and bewildered, even disgusted, by the fact only 28 players will represent Non-Public vs. Public - the roster limit is 50 per team - in the 39th annual City All-Star Football Classic, set for 7 o'clock at Northeast High. "Twenty-eight? That might be generous," Keir said yesterday. "Since they counted up that many, I'd bet we've lost a few more.