Cheap Seats
Blue mooning in Kentucky
Here’s what Kentucky fans saying about their beloved basketball team’s new uniforms: they aren’t true blue.
The Wildcats wore their new denim - denim? - uniforms against Arkansas on Sunday and fans promptly flooded call-in shows and the Internet with their reviews. CBS commentator Billy Packer apparently lit the fuse by noting that it looked more like North Carolina powder blue than royal blue.
Naturally, the criticism didn’t sit well with Kentucky coach Rick Pitino.
“Billy Packer’s creating nonsense out there, and I’m not going to listen to it,” Pitino told a caller to his “Big Blue Line” show. “We took a towel of Carolina blue and put it next to it, and our color is so much darker than Carolina powder blue it’s not even close.”
That’s funny. We put Rick Pitino next to Dean Smith and it wasn’t close, either.
At least it wasn’t figgy pudding
Marge Schott’s legendary frugality - OK, her cheapness surfaced again during the Christmas season.
The Cincinnati Reds owner gave candy to her employees, explaining that she could not afford bonuses.
It turned out the candies being distributed were samples from the Leaf-Donruss Company, a company that also prints and distributes baseball cards.
Not only was Schott handing out free samples as gifts, staff members discovered that the candy was not exactly fresh. With the candy came coupons inviting consumers to “Win a free trip to the 1991 Grammys.”
A budding Terrorist?
The great imposter, Ron Weaver - who used the alias Ron McKelvey to play football at the University of Texas - may return to the state to resume his playing career with the Houston Terror of the Arena League.
“I have no problem with coming back to Texas,” Weaver told KRIV-TV. “I don’t want the team to get any bad press. I just want to play football.”
Weaver, you’ll recall, had just finished his seventh year of college football before his name-change scam was uncovered.
“If he’s a good enough player, he’s eligible here,” said Terror coach John Paul Young. “He was wondering if the people would throw stones at him if he came back to Texas and I assured him all is forgiven. He would be welcomed with open arms.”
Does this make the Arena league the football equivalent to the witness protection program?
From our outdoors department …
Doug Stange offered this recipe recently in Catfish magazine for an unbeatable sour bait:
“Scale and fillet a carp. Cut the fillets into 1-by-2-inch strips and place in a glass jar. Add two teaspoons of beer or wine. Screw on lid, but not too tight - gas, you know - and bury jar about six inches deep (direct sunlight breaks down the bait). Your bait should be ready in five or six days … or a year or two.”
Stange suggests sour baits be carried in leak-proof bags because, “An accident in your car tends to decrease the vehicle’s value by about 100 percent.”
Seems like a waste of beer just to make a carp stink.
The last word …
“If catching two passes in self-defense makes Larry Brown the Super Bowl MVP, I’m F. Scott Fitzgerald.” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist Bruce Keidan
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo