QB: Matt Cassel, Kevin O'Connell RB

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McAllister also insisted he tried to play by the rules in wake of the Saints' 37-32 victory over the San Diego Chargers on Sunday at Wembley Stadium.

"My initial reaction to it, we've been kinda going through this process for a while, you guys just found out about it," McAllister said. "But we've been going through this process for a while. Whatever happens, that's what's going to happen.

"We've hired counsel, he's going to do his job. He'll put a case together but whatever the NFL rules, that's what it will be."

The New Orleans Times-Picayune reported Saturday that McAllister and Saints defensive ends Will Smith and Charles Grant had tested positive for Bumetanide, a drug which can mask the presence of other substances, including steroids.

Head coach Sean Payton declined comment and said the NFL will deal with the issue.

"It's a league policy. Its not a club's position to comment on," Payton said. "I think the league will handle it and they're the ones that will make the comment in regards to it."

Under the league's policy regarding anabolic steroids and related substances, a first violation typically results in a four-game suspension, although it can vary depending on circumstances.

McAllister, 29, suffered a torn ACL last season -- his second major knee injury with the team. Due to an injury to running back Reggie Bush, he was the main option in the backfield against the Chargers, rushing for 55 yards and a touchdown and hauling in four receptions for 30 yards.

However, McAllister sounded almost resigned to the fact that he faces a league-mandated punishment.

"The biggest thing is you really hate to put yourself in a situation like this because you want to play by the rules, not only these eight years I've been in the league but four years in college, four years of high school you always try to play by the rules," McAllister said. "I don't know how much you guys know, but my counsel, he will put something together.

"Whatever happens, happens."

The good news?

The Saints players' appeal, in which they have decided to band together and appeal as one, is set for the middle of November, meaning those of you relying on McAllister for depth (or heaven forbid, for actual production) have time to come up with a backup plan. ...

Meanwhile, Pro Football Weekly's Dan Parr reports that team insiders say the earliest date for Bush's return is likely Nov. 24 -- a Monday-night tilt against the Packers. If he remains on schedule, Bush will miss only three games, given this week's bye.

Bush suffered the knee injury in Week 7 during a punt return. The third-year veteran underwent surgery Oct. 20 in Birmingham, Ala. This type of surgery is common but there is an added level of concern about Bush, since he's the focal point of New Orleans' offense.

Bush is the only player in the league with at least 250 yards each as a receiver, rusher and punt returner.

The unsettling truth for Bush is that knee injuries will be a constant danger for him, and after a certain number of them, the duration of his career will be threatened. This is Bush's second knee injury in less than a year -- he suffered a partially torn posterior cruciate ligament last season, which caused him to miss the final four games.

Parr notes that few running backs his size (203 pounds) are asked to handle such a large workload, and he's constantly exposed to a harsh beating, which inevitably leads to injuries.

Payton has made an effort to utilize Bush less on inside runs, and Bush makes a point in his running style to avoid tacklers.

However, he needs to continue working on that aspect of his game. Hard hits are unavoidable in football, but he'll have to do all he can to minimize the number of those he allows his vulnerable frame to sustain. ...

Even with Bush remaining at home, Drew Brees threw at will against the Chargers, connecting on 30 of 41 passes for 339 yards with three touchdowns and no interceptions. He wasn't sacked and was rarely hurried, which helped him finish with a passer rating of 121.9 against his former team.

As usual, Brees distributed the ball well, hitting eight different receivers.

With tight end Jeremy Shockey held to just one catch for 6 yards, the bulk of the passes went to tight end Billy Miller (seven catches for 82 yards) and receiver Lance Moore (six catches for 90 yards) against the Chargers.

Neither man was expected to be major contributors when the season began.

Marques Colston had his first catches since thumb surgery, finishing with two catches for 56 yards. According to PFW, it may have appeared as though the Saints rushed Colston back to the lineup too quickly but that's not actually the case.

Colston is completely healed from the thumb injury that kept him out of five games but it's taking him longer than anyone anticipated to get used to playing at regular game speed. ...

McAllister, fullback Mike Karney, receiver Devery Henderson, tight end Mark Campbell and Moore each scored one touchdown.

McAllister's score was the 51st of his career. The touchdown moved him past Joe Horn and into second place on the club's all-time list. McAllister and Horn had been tied for second since McAllister scored on a 1-yard plunge against the San Francisco 49ers on Sept. 28.

McAllister has 46 rushing scores, four receiving touchdowns and one on a fumble and is now just three TDs away from becoming the team's all-time leader. Former running back Dalton Hilliard had 53 from 1986 to 1993.

With 306 points, McAllister is now tied with Horn for second place behind Hilliard's 318 points among non-kickers in Saints' history. ...

As the Sports Xchange pointed out, David Patten, who returned to practice last week after missing three games with a groin injury, did not play against the Chargers. It'll be interesting to see if Patten can work his way back into the mix ahead of Moore after the bye.

And finally. ... The Saints released place-kicker Tyler Mehlhaff on Tuesday, leaving the team to spend its bye week trying to fill the position for a third time this season.

Mehlhaff, who the Saints drafted last spring but cut after training camp, was brought back to replace injured kicker Martin Gramatica in Week 6. In three games since, Mehlhaff was 3-of-4 on field goals and 9-of-10 on extra points. He missed an extra point in London.

The Saints have had five different kickers on their active roster during the past three seasons, the others being Olindo Mare, Billy Cundiff and John Carney.

Carney, now 44, has been kicking for the New York Giants this season but could be released with Lawrence Tynes no longer injured.

DEPTH CHART AS OF WEDNESDAY AT 14:00 PT  

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Burress was benched for the first 18-1/2 minutes of his first game against his old team Sunday because he missed a mandatory treatment for his injured neck on Saturday morning. But Burress said his neck was actually feeling good after Friday's practice, and he had no idea he needed to report for treatment on Saturday, too.

"I practiced on Friday and I felt fine, and I had treatment Friday at the stadium," Burress said. "After practice I thought I was in the clear. I felt good. I guess I was supposed to be in to get treatment. (Coughlin) told me Sunday. But I practiced on Friday and felt pretty good. I got a lot of reps at practice.

"I guess I was supposed to be at treatment. I didn't make it."

That misunderstanding might have been enough to save most players the embarrassment of a benching, but Burress has run afoul of Coughlin's rules too often to get the benefit of the doubt. This was the third time in his three-plus seasons with the Giants that he was punished for violating team rules with a loss of playing time, including his two-week suspension earlier this year.

Between team fines, league fines and loss of pay, Burress has already been docked $204,000 of his $2 million salary this season -- and those are just the penalties that have been made public. Clearly there have been more, and it's increasingly obvious that the coach and the team's No.1 receiver are engaging in an ugly war.

"It's just a bad situation all around," said receiver Amani Toomer. "We want him out there, but we do have team rules. Everything that happened was how it had to happen. It's not a good situation for the whole team."

Burress said that when Coughlin informed him of his punishment, he was only told that he wasn't going to start. He ended up sitting out three full series, and didn't enter the game until there was 11:27 left in the second quarter.

He finished with three receptions for 15 yards and once forced the Giants into a timeout because he didn't know his position in a called formation. ...

This latest incident came after a week in which Burress was fined $45,000 by the NFL for, among other things, verbally abusing an official, and one week after he was caught on camera cursing at Coughlin. It appears to be a growing problem, though it's one Giants management doesn't seem to want to discuss.

Asked about the Burress situation, GM Jerry Reese said only "There's nothing to say about Plax." And Coughlin first stood behind a short pre-game statement issued through the team's PR department, before adding that he's disappointed Burress has pushed him this far.

"I'm always disappointed," Coughlin said. "You're a member of the team. You've got to follow the regulations and rules of the team."

"I think he's learned that our team is counting on him," Toomer said. "Hopefully we'll put this whole situation behind us."

Don't bet on it. ...

It's worth noting, Eli Manning has steadfastly shown his support for Burress but the Sports Xchange points out the signal caller's all-out support appears to be wavering.

"It happens," he said. "We don't like it but we're going to move on and [Domenik] Hixon started for us and made some good plays. We want Plax out there, but we aren't going to make a big deal about it. We just go about our business."

Hixon only caught one pass as the starter at split end but blocked well on three occasions. ...

As New York Post staffer Paul Schwartz reported, Steelers coach Mike Tomlin won a key replay challenge early in the second quarter on what first was ruled a 1-yard touchdown run for Brandon Jacobs.

After checking out the replay, referee Bill Carollo determined Jacobs' elbow was down at the one-half yard line. On the next play, Jacobs was stopped for no gain by safety Ryan Clark and linebacker Larry Foote, as the offensive line got almost no push but Jacobs tried to reach out with his right arm to get the ball across the goal line. Coughlin challenged the call. He lost.

Jacobs thought he scored both times and wasn't happy with the officiating.

"I'm in all day long, every day, whatever you want to call it, I was in," Jacobs said. "I guess they couldn't get the right angle and ended up making the ruling stand. We were playing against 11 people and, what, 16 people, to be honest with you. We overcame the adversity and won the game. ..."

According to the Xchange, Manning knew he'd be penalized for delay of game when he called back-to-back timeouts in the fourth quarter.

"The play we had called just wasn't going to work," Manning explained. "I tried to audible to something, it was loud, it was too big of a play, not everybody on the same page. I thought it's better off taking the penalty and trying again on fourth and seven."

On the next play, Manning hit Toomer for 30 yards.

Manning wasn't sacked by the Steelers, who left the game stuck on 25 sacks for the season. He has been dropped only six times now in seven games, lending credence to his claim that the Giants' offensive line is the best in the league.

Kevin Boss caught four passes, bringing his season total to 10, but two of them have gone for TDs and Sunday he caught the game-winner, a 2-yard flip from Manning with 3:07 remaining in the game to provide the final score.

"I was so open I was afraid I'd stumble coming out of the pattern," he said.

For what it's worth, Pro Football Weekly advised readers on Monday that coaches don't mind if Boss doesn't catch that many passes if he continues to block the way he has the past few weeks. Boss sprung Jacobs on his longest run of the game against the 49ers and continues to get high marks for his improvement in this area.

DEPTH CHART AS OF WEDNESDAY AT 14:00 PT  

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Favre threw three more picks against the Chiefs -- all of them being of the forehead-slapping variety -- and is tied for the NFL-lead with 11 in seven games (San Francisco's J.T. O'Sullivan also has 11).

Kansas City's defense entered the game with just three interceptions all season.

Favre also had two more touchdown passes, including the game-winning 15-yarder to Laveranues Coles with 1:05 remaining, boosting his season total to 15 in that department.

Banks reminded readers that last year, when we were treated to all those stories about Favre's new-found focus on taking care of the football, he had just 15 interceptions to go with his 28 touchdown passes for Green Bay.

But we've seen this Favre before, and Banks suggests it's a primary reason the Packers felt driven to part ways with their living legend this summer in favor of Aaron Rodgers.

If you're scoring at home, both the Jets and Packers are 4-3 through seven games, but Rodgers' 12 touchdown passes and just four interceptions are the ratio you're looking for at quarterback. Not 15 to 11.

Banks went on to suggest the Jets must know by now that this is the deal they bargained for in August. New York's up one week and down the next, and its rollercoaster ride has pretty much mirrored Favre's uneven performances. ...

Other notes of interest. ... According to New York Daily News sports writer Rich Cimini, it was fitting that Leon Washington enjoyed the best game of his career with Herman Edwards on the opposite sideline.

In 2006, the Jets drafted Washington with the compensation pick they received from the Chiefs for signing Edwards.

"I guess it was a good trade this week," Washington said after Sunday's win.

Washington almost single-handedly saved the Jets from an embarrassing defeat, figuring prominently in all four touchdowns. Whenever something went wrong for the Jets, Washington made a momentum-changing play.

"That's kind of been my role since I got here -- small guy, (small) stature, big heart, spark player," Washington said.

His day:

 He gave the Jets a 7-0 lead with an 18-yard reception, a one-handed catch, on a screen from Favre. It was the Jets' first touchdown on an opening drive since Dec.2, 2007 against the Dolphins.

 Washington scored on a 60-yard run, the longest of his career, to make it 14-7.

 He set up the Jets' third touchdown, a 1-yard plunge by Thomas Jones, with a pivotal third-down catch.

 A 37-yard punt return, to the Chiefs' 46, set up the game-winning TD.

Washington's only hiccups were a dropped pass and a false-start penalty. Meanwhile, Cimini suggests that Jones (14 for 54 yards) was under-utilized, as coordinator Marty Schottenheimer decided to attack the league's worst run defense by passing.

Jesse Chatman got five touches, but he was placed on injured reserve Tuesday.

Chatman injured his left knee Sunday and left the locker room on crutches.

Chatman, who signed with the Jets as a free agent in March, missed the first four games after being suspended without pay for violating the league's steroids and related substances policy. Chatman said he tested for a diuretic -- "something I never even heard of" -- that could be used as a masking agent.

He had 8 yards on five carries, two receptions for 5 yards and five special teams tackles in three games.

Also placed on IR Tuesday was rookie quarterback Erik Ainge, who has an injured right foot. The Jets still have three quarterbacks on their roster with Favre, Kellen Clemens and Brett Ratliff. ...

Rookie tight end Dustin Keller made his first career start after Chris Baker was taken into the locker room before the game. Baker was listed as questionable with a back injury but wasn't able to play even though he was in uniform.

Baker said "something came up" Thursday in practice, but he still expected to play. But, in the pregame warmups, it became "too painful."

Teams are required to report injuries, but the Jets didn't note Baker's hip injury on the injury report; he was listed with an old back injury.

Without Baker and Bubba Franks (inactive/hip), the Jets were almost depleted at tight end. Guard Rob Turner serving as the No.2 tight end.

"It made it difficult" to run the ball, head coach Eric Mangini said. ...

Coles played well for a man coming off a concussion sustained at Oakland one week earlier. It was believed to be his third concussion in the last 22 months.

"As we talked about through the course of the week, we've been as thorough as we can possibly can be," Mangini said, defending the Jets' decision to have Coles play. "Even after he was cleared, we brought in another specialist to reconfirm it so we had another layer on this. It was an independent specialist to make sure any decision we're making about a player's safety is a good decision for the player and the organization."

As for the concussion issue, he said, "The organization does everything they possibly can from what I understand, and as a player, all I can do is listen to them. They deal with it all. I just take all the tests, and if they come back to me and say, 'OK, you're fine, you can play,' or then they say, 'You can't play,' that's the way we approach it. I don't think the doctors would lead me to believe I can play when I can't."

Added Mangini: "I think the touchdown with one minute left was a great indication of how he came through. ..."

Coles and Jerricho Cotchery both were both dealing with injury issues, yet they exhibited toughness as they made clutch plays throughout the game. Coles started with a drop, but he finished with seven catches for 64 yards.

Cotchery, playing with a bum shoulder, was the unsung hero, showing up with key grabs in the intermediate range.

Meanwhile, Pro Football Weekly suggests the importance of the Jets' trading back into the first round to grab Keller has been highlighted by the injuries the club has suffered at the tight end and wide receiver positions.

Sources close to the club tell PFW the rookie has carried himself with an air of confidence as far back as mini-camp and OTAs and has the full respect of his teammates and coaches.

DEPTH CHART AS OF WEDNESDAY AT 14:00 PT  

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McFadden was limited during practice, and there was some confusion as to his status going in, as a Raiders spokesman said he was probable but the official designation for the league was questionable.

"It was just one of those game-time decisions," McFadden said. "It wasn't as good as I thought it would be, so we just decided not to go. Getting out there, pushing off of it is hard, and you don't want to go halfway."

McFadden hasn't been the same since incurring the injury in Week 2, when he gained 164 yards against the Chiefs.

"We went through walk-through (Saturday), we felt like it was fine and ready to go," said interim head coach Tom Cable. "Then (McFadden) woke up this morning with a lot of soreness and stiffness. ... If he did play, we're just going to worsen the injury. So I made the decision to sit him."

McFadden injured his right big toe Sept. 14 in Kansas City when he ran for a season-high 164 yards and a touchdown. McFadden has run for 131 yards and no touchdowns in four games since.

The Raiders' offense has been limited without a healthy McFadden. The team had plans to use him at quarterback and wide receiver to create matchup problems for defenses.

"We could have used him," said quarterback JaMarcus Russell. "There were some plays in the plan that we had."

Cable wasn't blaming McFadden's absence for the Raiders' anemic performance.

"I'm not sure Darren McFadden or anyone else would have mattered," Cable said. "We just got whipped at the line of scrimmage in the first half."

Adding to the blocking issues, fullback Justin Griffith will need knee surgery and is out for the year. The Raiders signed fullback Jason Davis on Tuesday after placing Griffith on the injured reserve list.

Davis had been on the practice squad for the Chicago Bears before the Raiders signed him to help replace Griffith.

Griffith has a torn ACL, an injury he sustained a couple of plays before scoring on a 2-yard touchdown pass from Russell, with Cable saying it "gave way" on the touchdown.

With Oren O'Neal already lost for the season, Luke Lawton is the only true fullback on the roster. Michael Bush has the size of a fullback, but was less than thrilled when Lane Kiffin ran him out of that position occasionally during practice.

Cable said moving Bush to fullback may not be an option because of McFadden's on-going toe problems. ...

One last note on McFadden: The Xchange suggests the rookie was held out in Baltimore in order to make sure he'll be ready for action this week. Those interested will want to keep an eye out for Late-Breaking Update, however, as the week progresses. ...

Other notes of interest. ... Russell was able to make some big throws downfield on occasion in the second half against the Ravens totaling 192 of his 228 yards passing, including the 2-yard touchdown pass to Griffith.

Also included was a 60-yard rainbow to Chaz Schilens. He also had one interception and nearly had two others late in the game. Russell was sacked four times as the Raiders had their worst game of the season in terms of pass protection.