– Exposing a fraud: Edward Paula of Wrightsville Beach, N.C., found his way into the Charlotte Hornets` locker room at the Charlotte Coliseum and tried to put on the uniform of Rickey Green. ”If you want to win this ballgame, you`ll let me stay. I`m the only one who can shut down Mark Price,” Paula told guards.
Officer H.P. Hollifield of the Charlotte police was summoned. ”He first told me he was Rickey Green,” Hollifield said after leading the intruder away in handcuffs. ”Then he told me he was Jerry Lewis.”
True to his prediction, Paula`s absence allowed Price to score 20 points in a 110-91 Cleveland win.
Charlotte`s Kelly Tripucka at first was worried about the visitor, until the intruder went to Green`s locker and started changing. ”I just wanted to make sure he didn`t have a gun,” Tripucka said. ”When he had his pants off, I could see he was unarmed.”
– Can he eat hot dogs? Pedro Guerrero has earned the respect of St. Louis Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog: ”You know, ballplayers like to go out and have a few beers after the game,” Herzog said. ”But Pete`s like Babe Ruth. I`ve never seen a hangover bother him. Best guy with a hangover I`ve ever managed.”
– Crown him: Fifita Uliuli Tonga, better known to professional wrestling fans as ”King Haku,” was charged with a misdemeanor for a bar fight in Gates, N.Y., that began when a woman refused his request to ”bow to the king.”
– Come here often? After winning their 10th straight road game, the Houston Astros were returning home to the Astrodome, and manager Art Howe was trying to think of ways to simulate road conditions at home. ”I`ve asked my players to meet their wives at a bar someplace,” Howe said.
– All punched out: At one point in the major league All-Star balloting, San Diego Padres third baseman Tim Flannery was a surprising sixth. Well, surprising to most people. Not to Flannery. ”You don`t know how many nights of sleep I`ve missed by staying up late and punching ballots,” he said.
– Hey, you`re the boss: After being pinch-hit for, Boston`s Edgar Romero-yes, Edgar Romero-began yelling at Red Sox manager Joe Morgan and threw a Gatorade bucket onto the field. After the game, Romero demanded to be traded. ”What am I going to do?” wondered General Manager Lou Gorman. ”Wheel and deal and make a deal for a backup infielder who`s hitting .230? Those kind of trades aren`t easy to make, you know.”
– Hands across the sea: A soccer club from Pont Main, France, ended a goodwill visit to the English town of Harlaxton, without its rooster mascot. Local residents shot it. Villagers declared that the bird, named Claude, was a health risk and ordered post office worker Richard Eldred to blast it with a 12-gauge shotgun. ”He didn`t even have time to squawk at me in French,”
Eldred said. ”I didn`t like to kill it-perhaps it would have been appropriate to guillotine it instead.”
– Injury report: Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Brian Fisher was injured while playing miniature golf. He was leaning on a club when it snapped, leaving him with a 13-inch gash in his left arm. . . . California Angels reliever Greg Minton was sidelined with a strain in his right rib cage suffered when he was pulling on his uniform pants before a game. . . . Toronto Blue Jays reliever David Wells put his hand through a bathroom window in a sleepwalking incident, cutting the thumb on his pitching hand and requiring five stitches. . . . Boston Red Sox slugger Mike Greenwell missed a game after getting hit by a golf cart inside Toronto`s SkyDome.
– Let him play: A newspaper columnist ran a contest seeking the most creative way for Notre Dame to hold down the score in its game against Southern Methodist. The winner was a reader who recommended the Irish bring Gerry Faust back.
– Tell it to the judge: ABC offered viewers a chance to phone in their votes for the best plays seen in 20 seasons of Monday Night Football. The best catch, according to the phone-in balloting, was by Lewis Bennett, a replacement player in 1987 with the New York Giants. He won with 66 percent of the votes. Bennett received the news in jail, where he was being held on $200,000 bail, accused in the stabbing death of his wife.
– Not in Oakland it isn`t: A reporter mentioned to Oakland outfielder Dave Henderson that the A`s were a smart team. ”I don`t see any Stanford guys running around here,” Henderson replied. ”Look at Terry Steinbach. He thinks hockey is a sport.”
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– Welcome to the club: George Steinbrenner was watching a New York Yankees game on TV from his home in Tampa when catcher Bob Geren collided with a bat boy while chasing a popup. Steinbrenner reportedly called and had the bat boy fired.
– Ditka`s replacement? The New Orleans Saints came up with a secret weapon to beat Buffalo late in the season: A pregame speech by Larry ”Bud” Melman of
”Late Night with David Letterman” fame. Melman was staying at the same hotel as the Saints. Coach Jim Mora invited Melman, whose real name is Calvert DeForest, to say a few words at the team`s pregame meal. ”I told them, `Give `em hell but don`t hurt Jim Kelly,` ” said Melman, who met Kelly when the Bills` QB was a guest on the show. Several Saints said the speech was better than any Mora has given in the last four years.
– Wanna bet? Pete Rose was quoted in the March 27, 1989, issue of Sports Illustrated as saying, ”If I were a betting man, I`d be willing to bet you I never bet on baseball.”
– Ready for Prime Time: Atlanta Falcon defensive back Deion Sanders had a less-than-golden day in a 45-3 loss to the 49ers: He was beaten by Jerry Rice on a TD pass, was hit with two personal fouls, and headed out of bounds rather than be hit on a punt return. He also was showered with boos by the Candlestick Park crowd. Still, Neon Deion was undaunted. ”Those guys have got to get up and go to work in the morning about 6 o`clock,” he said. ”I have the day off tomorrow, and I might just go to the bank and count my money.”
– A real whiz kid: Milwaukee Brewers manager Tom Trebelhorn didn`t want pitcher Chuck Crim to face Toronto`s Nelson Liriano, but he didn`t want to take him out of the game. Solution? He moved Crim to first base while Tony Fossas came in to face Liriano. Then Crim came back to the mound and got the final two outs. ”The best way to sum it up,” Trebelhorn said, ”is that Chuck Crim relieved himself in front of 40,000 people at the SkyDome.”
– On the road: In one night, the Walhalla High School basketball team from Spartanburg, S.C., lost its 23d game of the season-and its team bus. While the Razorbacks dropped lost 87-66 to Chapman, the team`s chartered bus was repossessed because the charter company failed to meet loan payments. ”With a minute left in the game, I called a time out and told the boys they could go ahead and stall, because the bus had been stolen, and we were going to be here for a while,” Walhalla coach Tes Vitaris said.
– Welcome, suckers: Toronto`s SkyDome-you remember, the place with the runaway golf carts-may be one of baseball`s showplaces, but you pay for what you get. And then some. It`s the home of $3.50 beers, $27 parking spaces and $6.50 hot dogs. ”What do you say to the family?” wondered former Detroit Tiger Pat Sheridan. ” `Hey kids, what do you want to do-go to a ballgame or go to Europe?` ”
– Finders keepers: A preseason National Invitation Tournament game between Nevada-Las Vegas and Loyola Marymount was halted for several minutes in the first half after a bomb threat was announced in the Thomas & Mack Arena in Las Vegas. An announcer asked spectators to check under and around their seats for any suspicious packages.
– Colorful quotes: From New York Yankees outfielder Mel Hall, after he had lost a fly ball in the sun: ”If I was white, I`d be red.”
– Fun at the old ballpark: White Sox first baseman Steve Lyons found a way to keep himself busy during lulls in the action: He played tic-tac-toe in the dirt with opposing first basemen. During a match with California`s Wally Joyner, Lyons found himself hopelessly blocked, so he did what any great competitor would do: He went out of turn, drew two quick X`s and scrawled, ”I cheat,” in the dirt.
– Halftime show: Zimbabwe soccer officials banned four players for life after they urinated on the field as part of a witchcraft rite. With their team trailing 1-0, the four players urinated in front of several thousand spectators before the second-half kickoff. A soccer official said that in line with beliefs in traditonal superstitions and ”juju” or witchcraft, the players` action was intended to change the fortunes of their side. Kind of like a rally cap in baseball.
– Get him a calculator: From Detroit Pistons coach Chuck Daly after a preseason victory: ”I thought our guard play was exceptional, particularly off the backboards. Vinnie Johnson had 9 rebounds, Isiah Thomas had 7. They had 18 between them.” Do they let him negotiate contracts?
– Mickey who? Near the end of the season, slugger Pedro Guerrero and broadcaster Don Drysdale were robbed only a few days apart in Houston after a couple of women slipped Mickey Finns in their drinks at a bar. After hearing the story, Toronto outfielder George Bell, a friend of Guerrero, said: ”I`ve heard of Don Drysdale,” he said. ”But who`s this Mickey Finn?” Blue Jays broadcaster Buck Martinez told him: ”September callup.”
– And one`s a comedian: Bob Golic, the Los Angeles Raiders` stocky and shaggy-haired nose tackle, isn`t convinced that the Philadelphia Eagles` Mike Golic, who is 6 foot 5 and sports a crewcut, is really his brother. ”The police left him with us when he was real little,” Bob said. ”That`s why he`s a little taller than I am. He wears that Marine Corps hairdo just so Dad likes him better.”
– Pull the plug: Then there was this exchange between New York Mets broadcasters Ralph Kiner and Tim McCarver. McCarver: ”I know this sounds hard to believe, Ralph, but Kevin Elster`s not playing tonight. He injured himself watching television.” Kiner: ”He must have been watching wrestling.”
– Listen up: Minnesota North Stars coach Pierre Page has a lot of Yogi Berra in him. Asked to describe his team`s turnaround early this season, Page said: ”We`re not where we should be, we`re not where we`re going to be, we`re not where we ought to be. Thank God, we`re not where we used to be.”
– Fan appreciation: Milwaukee Brewers closer Dan Plesac was booed after he blew a game with the first two-gopherball day of his career. He really enjoyed it, too. ”If those fans think they can hit my 93-mile-an-hour fastball, they`re welcome to try,” Plesac said. ”That way I wouldn`t blow any saves.”