Notes: Players scramble for Super Bowl tickets

FOXBORO, Mass. --Tom Brady's usual to-do list -- study game plan, lift weights, buckle chinstrap -- has a new item.

Distribute Super Bowl tickets.

"It is hard. You only get a certain amount," the New England Patriots quarterback said. "It is hard to say, 'You can come to the game and you can't come to the game.' I have definitely been dealing with all of that."

The team allows each player to buy 15 tickets to the game Feb. 6 against Philadelphia. Brady doesn't expect to be done giving them out to family members and friends until next week.

"I'm their best contact. Everyone I know calls and says, 'Can you get me tickets or hotels?"' Brady said. "It is definitely the biggest headache of this."

Wide receiver Bethel Johnson had an easier time this year than last year when the Super Bowl was played in Houston. He's from Texas and said he's finished figuring out who is getting tickets to this year's game in Jacksonville, Fla.

"I did it myself," he said. "I don't have money to pay personal assistants to help me organize all this."

Punter Josh Miller didn't have much trouble distributing tickets for last Sunday's AFC title game in Pittsburgh, where he played the last eight seasons. Many of his friends have season tickets. For the Super Bowl, he turned the ticket duties over to his wife.

"People say it's a pain but it's a welcome pain," Miller said. "My wife takes care of it. She's like in 'Willy Wonka.' An Oompa Loompa, the little orange people. Without them, they wouldn't have Willie Wonka's chocolate."

Return Man

Is Bethel Johnson the next Desmond Howard?

Howard's 99-yard kickoff return for a touchdown was the final scoring play in the Green Bay Packers' 35-21 win over New England in the 1997 Super Bowl. Now the Patriots have a speedster who can make the same kind of play.