5-year-old battling Leukemia sacks Northern Illinois quarterback (VIDEO)

Zach Dacy, a 5-year-old who is battling Leukemia, was recently invited to attend a Northern Illinois football practice.

His parents, Joe and Jen, are NIU alums and Joe had contacted the school over the summer to see about attending a Huskies game. His email made the rounds and the athletic department made arrangements for the Dacy family to come to the Eastern Illinois game and take in a practice the week before.

Little Zach is a huge football fan. He roots for the Green Bay Packers and says Clay Matthews and Aaron Rodgers — both of whom he got to meet last year— are his favorite players.

At the end of NIU practice last week, NIU coach Rod Carey set up a special surprise for Zach. He was going to get a chance to meet the 4-0 team and sack quarterback Jordan Lynch.

The offensive and defensive lines got set up and the blond-maned Zach looked like a miniature Matthews before getting into his stance. He made a few moves, zig-zagged his way through a couple of blockers before sacking Lynch in the pocket  For once, the team didn't mind seeing their QB take some lumps and hoisted a smiling Zach up in the air.

A small gesture with a big reward.

Robinson Cano called deadbeat dad by son's mom

New York Yankees free agent Robinson Cano is embroiled in a child-support battle with the mother of his young son, who is hoping to drive up his relatively low $600-a-month payments to $25,000.

The All-Star second baseman, who made $15 million this past season, is often late with payments that go toward raising his 3-year-old son, Robinson Miguel Cano Castro, the child’s  Dominican mom, Jackelin Castro, told ESPN.

The 30-year-old Cano insists he’s paying the agreed-upon amount. But Castro says the payments are inconsistent.

Castro says payments for May and June were made on July 2, and July and August payments were made on Aug. 15.

“It’s like a crumb because I [have] to chase after that money,” Castro told ESPN’s “Outside the Lines.”

Cano hopes to receive long-term contract offers in the $300 million range as a free agent next season. And, even though $600 is a lot of money in the Dominican Republic — where the average yearly salary is $2,370 — but it's hardly comparable to Cano's salary. Castro’s supporters believe the child deserves more.

Castro’s lawyer, Wendy Diaz, said Cano should be paying closer to $25,000 a month.

“I believe the money he gives to his son, when he does, is not enough to feed the dogs of Robinson Cano’s house,” said Diaz.

Castro did not sign the deal, according to the report, but Cano has been making the payments. “The intention of him and his advisers was somewhat to intimidate me,” Castro said.

“His living circumstances, financially, socially and culturally, are very, very far from what the child’s experiencing and gets,” Castro.

Cano said he’s giving plenty to his kid beyond the monthly stipend.

“I have gone above and beyond to care for my child, including an agreed-upon monthly stipend, a house, a car, insurance, school and other essentials for the baby and his mother, as well as many other things including toys and clothing,” Cano said in a prepared statement.

Whenever an innocent child is involved — common sense sometimes trumps contracts.

Cardinals players get kick out of Matt Adams 'scamper' to first base (VIDEO)

Matt Adams' Cardinals teammates had a good laugh after watching the first baseman handle a routine grounder closer to second and 'scamper' towards first to beat the batter.

Scamper might not be the best word to describe the 260-pound Adams' running style. Lumbering seems more apropos for Adams' jog as pitcher Adam Wainwright got caught "spectating."

Either way, the Cardinals' dugout got a kick out of mimicking his 10-yard gallop during the 9-1 romp over the Pirates.

Chris Canty to Justin Tuck: Punch opponents not teammates

Justin Tuck recently vowed that he would punch any teammate who turns on Tom Coughlin or causes any locker-room trouble because of the Giants’ 0-4 start. But former Giants defensive tackle Chris Canty thinks Tuck should worry about punching somebody else, first.

"Justin needs to worry about punching opposing offenses in the mouth," Canty, the new Ravens defensive tackle, said on NFL Network on Wednesday night. 'The way you show that you have your coach’s back is by going out there on that football field and performing."

"I’m sure Tuck is defending his coach. Tom Coughlin is an excellent coach, he’s a great man, so obviously as a player, you want to have his back. But you’ve got to show that on the field. That’s got to be taken care of on the field."

Canty also weighed in on Antrel Rolle’s comments that some in the Giants locker room don’t believe the team can rebound from its 0-4 start.

"There are guys in that locker room that probably lack the confidence that they can win football games," Canty said. "But as we know confidence comes from demonstrated performance. They just have to go out there and win a football game to show themselves that they can overcome the adversity in that game and be successful as a team."

Soccer star Pepe gets gash on face stapled shut on pitch (GIF)

Real Madrid defender Pepe got his face busted open during a Champions League match today. He then got the gash on his face stapled closed right there on the pitch.

The soccer star opened a gash near his left eye during a head-to-head collision with Daniel Braaten of Copenhagen in a Champions League match on Wednesday night. With blood seeping from the cut as he lay on the grass at the Bernabeu, the defender was attended to by a team trainer.

Madrid held a slim 1-0 lead by way of Cristiano Ronaldo at the time of the Pepe-Braaten clash in the 38th minute of the first half. Rather than remove Pepe from the game for stitches, a trainer merely closed the wound closed with what else... a stapler.

Luckily, those eight years at Kinkos U didn't go to waste.

Here's the bloody proof.

Celtics' Brandon Bass learns to swim at age 28 (VIDEO)

It takes a lot courage to learn how to swim but it might take even more brass when your first breast stroke is at age 28 with a pool full of children splish-splashing around.

Brandon Bass, the 6-foot-8, 260-pound Boston Celtics power forward could go coast-to-coast on the hardwood but when it came to lapping a pool — he was the dunk. Ironically, a Bass who hated the water.

This week, Bass conquered a lifelong fear and climbed into the shallow end of a city pool with 10 children from the Boys & Girls Club of Boston to take their first swimming lesson. He has vowed to continue taking plunges until he is confident enough to swim on his own.

"My son’s the first one in the family to learn how to swim," says Bass, who is now in his third season with the Celtics.

"If you threw me out in the ocean, I would drown."

"I’m nervous, because I don’t know how to float," he told  the Boston Globe,  "I can’t tread water."

Bass hopes his desire to learn swimming well into adulthood will encourage more young and old people to learn the ability. And from the cheers and encouragement of the kids in his class  — it's sounds like he's already done so.

Growing up in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, there was no place for Bass to learn to swim and he remembers a tragic drowning of young neighbor his own age back then.

He feels that as the man of the house he needs to learn to swim. He says he believes other parents should learn, too, and encourage their children.

"Even if you don’t want to swim," he said. "It’s important to learn in case you need to."

Way to go Brandon.

A-Rod tells MLB panel he was tricked into taking illegal drugs: Report

Alex Rodriguez said the only dope being taken was himself after claiming he was tricked into taking steroids by Biogenesis proprietor Anthony Bosch.

A-Rod —who is fighting a 211-game suspension by Major League Baseball — claims Bosch duped him into using the banned supplements at Tuesday's arbitration hearing.

According to the N.Y. Daily News, a source with knowledge of Rodriguez’s ongoing hearings in Manhattan, said the embattled Yankee and his lawyers have presented a case based partly on the idea that Rodriguez believed the substances he procured from the Biogenesis anti-aging clinic were innocent legal supplements.

That defense conflicts with the version told by Bosch — the founder and head honcho of the now-shuttered facility — who spent part of Monday and almost all of Tuesday testifying before the three-person panel that will decide on the appropriateness of the 211-game doping ban MLB commissioner Bud Selig imposed upon Rodriguez in August.

Bosch, who is cooperating with MLB, has spent much of that time validating a vast trove of Biogenesis documents as well as his own electronic communications with Rodriguez. The league believes the evidence reflects a deep dealer-source relationship. If the Biogenesis products were legitimate, MLB argues, why were they so expensive and why were the transactions so secretive?

Attorneys for Rodriguez will likely begin their cross-examination of Bosch on Wednesday, attacking his credibility during the closed-door hearing as they have for several months now — pointing out that MLB’s investigators paid Bosch for his evidence and offered to drop him from a lawsuit if he cooperated with their probe. They may also point out that Bosch is the subject of federal and state criminal investigations in Florida, and that he was fined $5,000 by the Florida Department of Health for holding himself out as a doctor.

By claiming that he was given banned drugs when he thought he was getting legal supplements, Rodriguez is tearing a page from the playbook that guided other tainted athletes. Barry Bonds told a grand jury in 2003 that he thought the creams he got from his BALCO-affiliated trainer, Greg Anderson, were something like flaxseed oil. Roger Clemens claimed he thought the intramuscular injections he got from his trainer, Brian McNamee, were shots of vitamin B-12 and lidocaine.

That sort of alibi got Clemens into trouble when he couldn’t explain why the injections took place during furtive visits to supply closets and an upper East Side apartment, and why he needed an unauthorized strength coach to give him shots instead of a team doctor.

Such claims have met minimal success in courtrooms, but they sometimes work in the confidential confines of a sport’s drug program. Olympic sports have the highest standard of what is loosely termed "strict liability," where an athlete is almost always held responsible for substances found in his or her specimen regardless of intent.

A-Rod's post-season hearing is expected to continue through this week but can't continue next week due to scheduling conflicts. They may pick up once again later this month or in November if necessary.