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Circus Margas

Reds owner Marge Schott is known for her bright ideas, so perhaps this should come as no surprise. She says she recently went to the circus and liked what she saw. “These guys are up on the trapeze and running around. Our guys run and go, ‘Ugh!,”’ Schott said, clutching her hamstring in mock agony. “I want to find out what these circus people do and have our players do the same thing. Maybe baseball should study that. Instead of doctors, we need to find out how these circus people do things.”

She’s got the freak show covered. Guessing her weight is another matter.

He’ll bring the snake oil

Tommy Morrison, the former heavyweight pretender who twice tested positive for HIV and was barred from fighting, raised some eyebrows during a bizarre live “chat” session with subscribers to ESPNET SportsZone last week.

Among them: He predicted the virus would disappear by “magic,” that he would fight again in eight months and that Mike Tyson’s pay-per-view bouts “have ruined boxing.” He also told on-line questioners he was in a “serious relationship” with two women.

Newsday’s Steve Zipay provides the full quote: “I believe this virus is going to disappear from my body. I believe that in about eight months, I’ll return to the ring. I believe it’s going to puzzle a lot of people. I believe I know how I got it and believe I know how to get it to disappear. How? Magic.”

There’s only one thing Magic knows how to make disappear, and his initials are Cedric Ceballos.

Triple-trouble

Orlando guard Anthony Bowie angered Detroit coach Doug Collins when he called for a timeout with 2.7 seconds left in the Magic’s 113-91 victory over the Pistons - just so he would have a chance for the first triple-double of his mediocre playing career.

Collins retaliated by pulling his team from the floor, cheapening Bowie’s feat by giving him his 10th assist.

Detroit Free Press columnist Charlie Vincent sympathized with Collins, but would have preferred a more violent remedy. “Instead of having my players stand passively on the sideline, I would have had somebody knock Bowie into the second row as soon as he touched the ball and see if he could get an assist from there,” Vincent wrote.

“If Bill Laimbeer, Rick Mahorn, Isiah Thomas or Dennis Rodman had been in a Pistons uniform at the end of that game, Bowie would not have been standing a nanosecond after he touched the basketball.”

With those guys on the roster, Bowie might not have made it out of pregame introductions.

Just in case

Terry Mulholland, who has a $350,000 base salary with the Philadelphia Phillies, had it typed into his contract that he’ll receive $100,000 for winning the Cy Young Award and $50,000 for taking World Series MVP.

That’s like Jose Offerman insisting upon a Gold Glove clause.

The last word …

“God blessed this man with a shield of righteousness and a sword of truth second to none. When Mike casts his bread upon the water, he doesn’t get back soggy bread.”

- Don King on Mike Tyson, straight face not included

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo