Only himself to blame
In a feature on University of Southern California football coach Pete Carroll that will be televised on HBO on Tuesday night, the Los Angeles Times reports Bryant Gumbel asks Trojans defensive end Shaun Cody about some goofy things the coach does.
Cody relates that Carroll had players soaring off a diving platform before the season “and he was the first to go.” Carroll says that at the time he said to himself, “There’s no way out of this. You dumb jerk.”
Carroll is quite the wit. He was the featured speaker at the Pasadena Quarterbacks Club luncheon and mentioned a high school coach who spoke earlier and said it wasn’t about the wins and losses.
“Well, at SC it is,” Carroll said.
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T.O. always did stand for Terrell’s Orbit.
Like it or not, many are getting pulled into it. The furor keeps rolling in the aftermath of the controversial “Monday Night Football” commercial involving Philadelphia receiver Terrell Owens and an actress from “Desperate Housewives.”
San Jose Mercury News columnist Ann Killion joked about the source of the outrage.
“It must be because Owens didn’t reach for his Viagra or Levitra before (Nicollette) Sheridan dropped her towel,” she wrote. “What an outrage that someone missed that kind of opportunity for cross-promotion!”
Owens, of course, has the best sense of his place in the cosmos and seemed unsurprised that he landed front and center in the newspapers.
“I always make the front page,” he told reporters.
Put it up in your back yard
An $87 million renovation of Iowa’s Kinnick Stadium includes the installation of a new scoreboard.
The old scoreboard, complete with giant replay screen and controls, is being auctioned off on eBay, the Cedar Rapids Gazette reported.
The minimum bid is $10,000. But before you start thinking about putting a scoreboard in the backyard, be advised that, according to the listing, the buyer has to dismantle and remove it.
An award you don’t want
Phil Mushnick of the New York Post reported recently that closed captioning on ABC informed viewers that Texas linebacker Derrick Johnson, a Dick Butkus Award finalist, “will certainly be considered for the ‘Butt Kiss Award.’ “
Manning the word processors
The naming of Eli Manning as the New York Giants’ starting quarterback was good news to headline writers in N.Y.
“Eli’s Comin’ ” was the main headline on the cover of Tuesday’s New York Post, and the same headline also ran in the New York Daily News.
“You Da Manning” was the headline on the back cover of the Post.
He was sloshed
Mike Downey of the Chicago Tribune, on Michael Phelps’ DUI bust: “I heard the cops tested him by seeing if he could swim a straight line.”
Watch what you say
Pete McEntegart of si.com, on the opening of the Charles Barkley Reading & Learning Center in Peoria, Ariz.: “The center is expected to perform important work in teaching youth to speak without thinking.”