Cheap Seats
Humor with a ring to it
The Detroit Tigers’ pitching staff was so bad last year that general manager Randy Smith’s wife said on their spring training answering machine:
“Leave a message if you have any pitching.”
An even-tempered Fighting Irish
For an intense guy with a quick temper, Lou Holtz took the ribbing pretty well.
The former Notre Dame coach smiled and laughed as a long line of friends, assistants and former players poked fun at him for nearly three hours Tuesday night in a benefit roast. It was his first appearance at Notre Dame since the season - Holtz’s 11th and his last - ended.
Nothing was sacred. Not even his record.
“Many times in print I’d read that Gerry Faust was the losingest coach at Notre Dame,” said Faust, Holtz’s predecessor. “Lou, being my friend, has taken that distinction away from me. But Lou, why did you have to take so long?”
With a 100-30-2 record, Holtz left with more victories than anyone but Knute Rockne, who had 105. But his 30 losses are also a record, topping Faust’s 26.
And his weekly sandbagging was enough to stop the floods in Minnesota.
Making waves on the radio
Love him or not, the Chicago media can’t leave new New Orleans coach Mike Ditka alone. Here’s the latest evidence:
“Four radio stations in Chicago have called expressing interest in whether they could carry Saints games,” said Johnny Andrews, general manager of WWL Radio in New Orleans. WWL holds broadcast rights to the Saints, set to begin their first season coached by Ditka.
There are no league rules prohibiting radio broadcasts of one team’s games into another team’s market, NFL spokesman Greg Aiello said. It would not be unprecedented, he said, although “it usually isn’t done because the interest isn’t there.”
A low point in Padres history
When the San Diego grounds-crew members raised the Padres’ N.L. Western Division championship banner, they raised it upside down.
Apparently, they were out of practice since the team last won the division in 1984.
Bumble-bee yellow journalism
Some Fresno State basketball fans are unhappy over the Fresno Bee’s coverage of charges of point-shaving in the school’s basketball program.
Thirteen fans have banded together and are calling themselves the “Fresno Citizens for Responsible Journalism.”
The group asks in radio ads that Bee subscribers put the paper on “Vacation Hold” from April 7-11.
And how many will actually do so? “Hundreds, easily,” said group founder Jerry Duncan.
The over-under line on cancellations is 700 readers
The last word …
“What if one of them had hit me in the head? You don’t think I would have owned Camden Yards?” - - Royals left fielder Bip Roberts, who had to dodge souvenir baseballs thrown on the field after a Cal Ripken Jr. home run in Baltimore.
, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo