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The crying game
Nobody likes being a homecoming opponent, but it may be worse yet to be the going-away present. It didn’t take long for Jeff Reinert to get the message when his Scenic West-champion Utah Valley men were the guests last Saturday for Rolly Williams’ last home game as basketball coach at North Idaho College - won by the Cardinals in an emotional 110-77 romp.
“I knew we were in trouble during the pregame ceremony when Rolly started crying,” Reinert said, “and I started crying and I looked at the officials and they were crying.”
Can the WLAF repair this appliance?
The exportation of the old Bear they called “Fridge” - William Perry - to merry olde England certainly amused Chicago Tribune columnist Bernie Lincicome, who called Perry’s signing with the London Monarchs of the World League of American Football “a marriage made in the waxworks.”
Noted Lincicome, “These days Perry would be considered underfed by the blobs on the Cowboys offensive line. Every team has an elephant back now. The Bears use Jim Flanigan without creating the least bit of the hysteria that enveloped Perry and with better results.
“What the Fridge was as a diversion, a wide load out of the backfield, Ironhead Heyward is as a vocation.
“That’s the way it is for pioneers. One decade you are a fat phenomenon and the next you can put on somebody else’s pants two legs at a time.
“Luckily for Perry there is someplace where cellulite is still a sideshow, as, no doubt, the Duchess of York could attest.”
Meet Hal, the lo-Cal Ripken
Baseball gets Foxified come June 1, when the network begins airing what Fox Sports vice president Tracy Dolgin marketingly calls “the National Present-time.”
Just how the games come off remains to be seen. But we like the sound of Fox’s promotional campaign featuring more than 40 major leaguers who agreed - for free - to do offbeat personality spoofs similar to what ESPN has done with its “SportsCenter” spots.
Baltimore’s Cal Ripken Jr. recently was in Santa Monica, Calif., to play “Hal Ripken,” Cal’s twin brother who lives in a trailer park and sits around drinking beer. “Hal” talks about how he’s the forgotten Ripken - he actually helped Cal set the consecutive-game record by playing for him when he wanted to skip a few games.
Hal watches video of Cal’s career. Cal strikes out.
“That was him,” says Hal.
Cal hits a home run.
“That was me,” says Hal.
Does Darryl Strawberry introduce his other brother Darryl?
Hanging the Sox out to dry
White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf said the original plan was to share new Comiskey Park with the Bears, but the plan was nixed by Bears owner Mike McCaskey, who said he’d share a stadium only with the Cubs.
“Bears and Cubs (fans) have a natural affinity for each other,” McCaskey told Reinsdorf.
Like fleas and ticks?
The last word …
“Don’t tell me who is carrying the Olympic torch. Just tell me Andre Rison’s girlfriend isn’t.”
- Gary Shelton in the St. Petersburg (Fla.) Times
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo