GALE SAYERS

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(AP Photo/Butch Dill)NEW ORLEANS – The New Orleans Saints have placed running back Alvin Kamara, who leads the club in both yards rushing and receiving, on their COVID-19 reserve list. The move means Kamara is unavailable for Sunday's regular-season finale at Carolina and also could miss the Saints' first playoff game if New Orleans is unable to move up to the NFC's top seed. Kamara has 932 yards and 16 TDs rushing to go with 756 yards and five TDs receiving this season. His touchdowns rushing and 21 total touchdowns from scrimmage are Saints single-season records. Murray has 656 yards and four TDs rushing this season and in 2019 had 100-yard rushing performances in both games Kamara missed with leg injuries.

FILE - In this Nov. 14, 1993, file photo, Miami Dolphins coach Don Shula is carried on his team's shoulders after his 325th victory, against the Philadelphia Eagles in Philadelphia. Not long after came a seismic jolt, the helicopter crash of Kobe Bryant in the fog-shrouded California hills that reverberated across sports and across continents. Football lost a big piece of its heart: Don Shula, Gale Sayers, Paul Hornung, Bobby Mitchell. The losses, of course, came against a backdrop of a pandemic, its number of fatalities rolled out daily on TV screens. Kurt Thomas in 1978 became the first U.S. male gymnast to win a world title but lost an Olympic shot in 1980 because of the boycott.

Let’s start with:PAYTON’S PLANOn Christmas night, Saints running back Alvin Kamara tied a 91-year-old NFL record by rushing for six touchdowns in a 52-33 wipeout of the Minnesota Vikings. “I was thinking about our best play there,” Payton explained afterward. Payton wasn’t talking about Nevers’ record six TD runs. “A lot of these players — I’d say most of these players — have no idea how good Gale Sayers was,” said Payton. “It was a great moment.”Brees said Payton mentioned Sayers’ mark before the Saints’ last touchdown drive.

The world also said goodbye to U.S. Rep. John Lewis, a lion of the civil rights movement who died in July. Other former political figures who died this year include Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, New York Mayor David Dinkins, Arizona Gov. Here is a roll call of some influential figures who died in 2020 (cause of death cited for younger people, if available):___JANUARY___David Stern, 77. The guitarist who supplied the scratching, seething sound that fueled the highly influential British punk band Gang of Four. He fused African rhythms with funk to become one of the most influential musicians in world dance music.

Minnesota Vikings quarterback Kirk Cousins throws during the first half of an NFL football game against the Chicago Bears Monday, Nov. 16, 2020, in Chicago. (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast)CHICAGO – Kirk Cousins threw for 292 yards and two touchdowns, and the Minnesota Vikings overcame a 104-yard kickoff return by Chicago’s Cordarrelle Patterson to beat the Bears 19-13 on Monday night. Bears quarterback Nick Foles got taken from the field on a cart in the game’s final minute. It was the longest kickoff return in franchise history, surpassing Gale Sayers’ 103-yarder against Pittsburgh on Sept. 17, 1967. Still, the Bears lost their fourth in a row, matching their longest skid since coach Matt Nagy was hired in 2018.

FILE - From left are 1970 file photos showing Brian Piccolo and Gale Sayers. “It just amazes me,” Joy Piccolo O’Connell said in an interview from her Wisconsin home. You flatter me by giving me this award, but I tell you that I accept it for Brian Piccolo. … I love Brian Piccolo, and I’d like all of you to love him too. But Joy Piccolo O’Connell, who has remarried, thinks the biggest obstacle to the friendship between Piccolo and Sayers had to more to do with personality than color.

FILE - This is a 1970 file photo showing Chicago Bears football player Gale Sayers. Hall of Famer Gale Sayers, who made his mark as one of the NFLs best all-purpose running backs and was later celebrated for his enduring friendship with a Chicago Bears teammate with cancer, has died. (AP Photo/FIle)CHICAGO – Gale Sayers, the dazzling and elusive running back who entered the Pro Football Hall of Fame despite the briefest of careers and whose fame extended far beyond the field for decades thanks to a friendship with a dying Chicago Bears teammate, has died. Nicknamed “The Kansas Comet” and considered among the best open-field runners the game has ever seen, Sayers died Wednesday, according to the Pro Football Hall of Fame. “I played football a long time and I never saw a better football player than Gale Sayers,” said Hall of Fame tight end Mike Ditka, Sayers’ teammate from 1965-66.