Cheap Seats

He talked a good game, too

Tom Fitzgerald of the San Francisco Chronicle writes that Catfish Hunter, who died Thursday at 53, was quotable as well as likable.

On Reggie Jackson in 1977: “He’d give you the shirt off his back. Of course, he’d call a press conference to announce it.”

On whether he ever tasted one of Jackson’s Reggie Bars: “I unwrapped it, and it told me how good it was.”

Never listen to your brothers

Hunter said in 1987, on the occasion of his induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame: “My three brothers taught me how to throw strikes and thanks to them, I gave up 379 home runs in the big leagues.”

A couch potato’s dream

From the Gallery column of the San Diego Union-Tribune: “Just in time for football season and baseball postseason, La-Z-Boy, Inc. has introduced the first reclining chair with a built-in electric cooler.

“The chair, called the Oasis, features an armpad that flips up to reveal a cooling unit that can hold up to six 12-ounce cans.

In the other arm is a phone, suitable for ordering, say, pizza.”

We admit there are too many sports writers who really want to own one of these.

Ask the `Science Guy’

Bob Kravitz in the Rocky Mountain News, on Brian Griese: “They keep telling me about his quarterbacking bloodlines, which might mean something if they could name me another former quarterback’s son who has gone on to NFL fame and fortune… .

Kravitz is right. Scientists have yet to identify the quarterbacking gene.

Understanding the game

Michael Holley of the Boston Globe writing on New York Jets coach Bill Parcells:

“He knows what reporters are looking for. He knows the difference between a columnist, feature writer and beat reporter. And since he has wit, occasional bombast, and an understanding of this profession, he earns a reverence from the media.”

Plus, he’s big and onery and we’re afraid of him.

But what do you call them?

Again, Tom FitzGerald gives us a humurous baseball note: “Former World Series hero Joe Carter, broadcasting a Blue Jays game for CTV, identified a player as a `Dominican Republican.’ Now there’s a demographic group that doesn’t get a lot of attention.”