Uncouth In Advertising?

The first brushback of the year in the Dodgers-Giants rivalry has been delivered - and it’s an ad campaign. The Dodgers have telephoned the Giants to express their displeasure with billboards in the Bay Area showing Matt Williams and Barry Bonds swinging bats above the confusing caption “Two Reasons to Hate the Dodgers” - claiming it will incite unruly crowd behavior at Candlestick Park as did a previous campaign that urged fans to boo L.A. manager Tommy Lasorda.

“You don’t need to be encouraging people to be doing something other than cheering for your own team,” said Dodger general manager Fred Claire. “Any campaign to put another team down is a poor campaign.”

Besides, it’s false advertising. Lasorda is a reason to hate the Dodgers. Barry Bonds is a reason to hate the Giants.

Send in the clown

So much for fan-friendly baseball players in the poststrike era. The Chicago White Sox are changing the time they take batting practice before home games from 4:35 to 5:25 - so fans, who aren’t allowed in Comiskey Park until 5:30, can watch their faves swat a few into the seats.

And now the Big Hurt is in a big snit.

“Players should’ve been asked before they made a move like this,” Frank Thomas sniffed. “It’s our profession. It’s not the Barnum & Bailey Circus.”

Thomas said the change disrupts his routine of batting practice followed by dinner, dressing for the game, studying videotapes and stretching.

“This is nothing minor. This is major,” he said. “It’s really going to affect my performance.”

Great moments in religion

Stefan Effenberg, not to be confused with the similarly named tennis player, is best known for getting kicked off Germany’s soccer team after making an obscene gesture to fans at last summer’s World Cup.

Now he’s been invited to preach at a German church. “I always knew Stefan Effenberg as an honest man who says what he thinks,” insisted Rev. Klaus Hurtz of the St. Francis Roman Catholic church in Moenchengladbach.

Effenberg, who is not Catholic, was invited by Hurtz and will speak about his relationship with God.

On a related note, the Vatican has denounced the playing of an Italian second-division soccer game on Good Friday, saying it “profaned” one of “the loftiest and most intense moments of the Catholic faith.”

Comparable to the anniversary of Italy winning the World Cup, we assume.

Future considerations

Patty Biggio, wife of Houston second baseman Craig Biggio, gave birth to a boy Tuesday, and as of Thursday morning, the couple had not decided what to call the child. As Dallas Morning News baseball writer Gerry Fraley noted, this is a baby to be named …

The last word …

“Big deal. Mike Tyson wanted to come out early, too.”

- Scouting guru Marty Blake, on Kentucky forward Rodrick Rhodes’ desire to pass up his senior year for the NBA draft