Cheap Seats

Kiss and tell

Tiger Woods may be a great golfer. But he’s no star on the dance floor.

That’s the opinion of former girlfriend Dina Gravell, who says she was his regular date until they split two years ago.

Quoted in the tabloid Daily Mirror, Gravell said Woods went from best friend to boyfriend during their high school days.

“He loved to dance, but he looked so weird,” she told the Mirror. “He would get up on the dance floor with that big grin of his and prance about.

“He looked like a wild madman,” she said. “Everyone would laugh at him. A golfer he may be, a dancer he is not.”

Just not preschool teacher material

Last winter Anaheim Angels manager Terry Collins invited Marcel Lachemann to be his pitching coach. The same Marcel Lachemann who resigned last August as the Angels manager.

“He (Lachemann) called me and asked me what he should do,” said Chuck Finley, the veteran Angels pitcher. “He was worried what guys might think. “I said, ‘To hell with them. You’d be crazy not to come back.”’

Finley is glad Lachemann did come back. So is Collins. Maybe not as glad as Lachemann, though.

A year ago, Lachemann, now 56, was a pretty miserable guy. Of course he couldn’t admit it at the time.

“I could see it was killing him,” said Finley. “He had a hard time letting things go. Managing 25 guys is tough. Think of a woman who’s in charge of 25 preschoolers and it’s pretty similar.”

Speed III

On the way home from Atlanta recently, one of the Phillies’ team buses from the airport clipped the wing of their plane, breaking three windows and shattering glass all over the bus.

Assistant trainer Mark Andersen, broadcaster Richie Ashburn and first-base coach Brad Mills were in the danger zone, sitting in the seats where the wing ripped out the windows, but all three escaped unharmed.

Rex Hudler, who was in the middle of the bus, said: “I thought somebody shot us with a missile. There were a lot of lights flashing and I really thought somebody shot us. I didn’t know why somebody would want to shoot us, except for half the people around this region.”

Damn Yankees

Hall of Famer Yogi Berra continued his boycott of Yankee Stadium, which began in 1985 after New York Yankees owner George Steinbrenner fired him as manager. Berra skipped last weekend’s Old Timers Day in the Bronx despite a plea to attend from fellow Yankees great Whitey Ford.

“I wish Yogi would come out here,” Ford said. “I played golf with him a couple of weeks ago, and I said, ‘Yogi, you’ve got to be there this year. Forget Steinbrenner, he’s just an owner. The guys want to see you there.’ “‘Well,’ Yogi responded, ‘I’ll be out there as soon as they get a new owner. It’s just hard feelings.”’

The last word …

“Somebody’s got to make the outs.”

- Jose Canseco, after striking out eight times over two games, including five in one game.

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo