Cheap Seats

Norman Vincent Peale on a saddle

Twenty-six-year-old jockey Corey Nakatani certainly has a way of taking the positive out of a negative year.

Shaking his head with a sad smile as if trying to make sense of things that don’t necessarily balance out, he remarked:

“Except for all the bad things that kept happening, this has actually been a good year. My father passed away, my sister was murdered and I had surgery.

“But I’ve been winning.”

Hell Weekend for Deion

As usual, New York Mets fans gave Deion Sanders hell last weekend when his Cincinnati Reds visited the Mets at Shea Stadium.

They jeered and heckled at his every misstep, and loudly booed every time he came to the plate, although he insisted their cackles had nothing to do with him going 0 for 4 or misjudging fly balls.

“This is the house of pain,” Sanders said. “They’re all so frustrated with their own lives. That’s Satan, man. He lives here.

“It’s so negative, so much hurt in the air. To come out here and yell and curse, you have to wonder why they’re so upset with their own lives. They can’t be frustrated with me because I’ve got peace in my life.”

Too bad the same can’t be said for Reds manager Ray Knight. When Sanders’ error in the third inning Friday night led to four unearned runs for the Mets, Knight cringed.

When Sanders goofed again Saturday in left field, bobbling a foul ball that looked catchable and thus allowing Edgardo Alfonzo to continue his at-bat, Knight was so angry, he nearly said a naughty word.

“Dang,” Knight yelled to no one in particular as the Reds trudged into their clubhouse after dropping their second straight to the Mets in the four-game series, this time by 5-3.

“We’ve got to catch the flipping baseball.”

Or catch a little hell.

Today’s forecast: threatening

Nobody’s face shows storm clouds more vividly than Rafael Palmeiro’s. The Baltimore Oriole is a human weather system.

When he goes 0 for 20, as he did in May, you expect a thunder clap of discontent to accompany him into the batting cage. When he goes 20 games without a homer, as he did this season, you think bolts of lightning will erupt when he returns to the bench. When he slumps for a month, as he did in June (.206), he’s as depressed as a stalled low-pressure system.

His mood can drag down the spirits of a whole dugout, which was not lost on teammate Brady Anderson, who needled Palmeiro:

“You’re the only guy in baseball who can sulk your way to 130 RBIs.”

Chewing the fat

Seahawks lineman Sam Adams strolled off the practice field at Cheney last week swamped by kids demanding his autograph.

“Want me to sign your shirt or something, man,” Adams said to a youngster offering a Cortez Kennedy card. “That’s not me. That’s the big fat man.”

The last word …

“Everybody gets hit (with the baseball) at some point. I even got hit when I was managing the Yankees. True story. Got hit in the back pocket. Broke my cell phone. But that was good, because then George Steinbrenner couldn’t call me.”

- Buck Showalter, Arizona Diamondbacks manager speaking at youth baseball clinic

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo