October 2010 Archives

Highlights of the week ahead in sports, both here and afar:

MONDAY

MLB: World Series Game 5: San Francisco at Texas, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Memo to Texas fans: Wearing glasses with facepaint is lame. Especially one game from elimination.
Meanwhile ...
The Washington Post's Thomas Boswell points out that the Rangers' Cliff Lee had a 1.26 ERA in eight post-season games over the last two years coming into this World Series. After Game 1, it was up to 11.57. All a blur. "Put that in your MIT baseball simulation formula, make the computer whir through a million permutations and tell me how that changes your seam-head view of who's going to win this Series," Boswell wrote. After refusing to bring back Lee for Sunday's Game 4 - in 227 major league career starts, Lee has never pitched on three day's rest -- Texas manager Ron Washington has him for this one -- and perhaps the last one of the Rangers season, back up against Giants ace Tim Lincecum, who might be able to wrap up the series MVP award with another sharp effort.

NBA: Clippers vs. San Antonio, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Just in case Spurs guard Tony Parker comes to town in hopes of finding a new place to house himself and his TV-star wife whose name escapes us at the moment, Donald T. Sterling has some pertinent information to pass on. Among the latest parcels of ads he's bought to support the local newspaper economy -- this one being an "announcement" that "appears as a matter of record only" -- the Clippers owner sends the message that his corporation has $550 million in credit toward the acquisition of property. In three states. Spread out amongst five banks. So, are we supposed to be a) impressed, b) depressed or c) pressed to call for him to now cash in the Clippers and just focus his attention on buying run-down housing projects while pretending to care about who he picks to live in them?

NFL: Houston at Indianapolis, 5:30 p.m., ESPN:

Peyton Manning heaved it for 433 yards and three touchdowns against the Texans in the season opener -- but Houston won, 34-24, giving it a shot at a rare season sweep over Indy. The importance of Houston's win means holding the tiebreaker advantage over the Colts, and standing 5-2 when it's all done. Middle linebacker Brian Cushing, who missed that opening win because of a four-game suspension, will be wearing the sideline audio device in his helmet and making line calls. Good luck with that against Manning.

TUESDAY

NBA: Lakers vs. Memphis, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

Any unusual reaction this time to O.J. Mayo when he's introduced before the game? Meanwhile, Pau Gasol's brother, Marc, has had an ankle problem and might not be up to kicking it tonight.

Documentary: "Marion Jones: Press Pause," 5 p.m., ESPN:

The John Singleton-directed work shows how the former track star is trying to come back as a long-distance good-doer based on redeeming her past PED usage and lying about it to federal investigators. "She's the toughest woman I've ever been around," says former Daily News sports columnists Ron Rapoport in the piece, who doesn't believe that it was the "bad men" in her life that steered her toward the BALCO suppliers. "She knew exactly what she was up to. She was in control."

Series: "E:60," 4 p.m., ESPN:

The premise for Lisa Salters' story is that the Lakers' Pau Gasol "is the NBA's least known -- but perhaps it's most intriguing -- superstar.: So they spend some time together in his native Barcelona, playing the piano, visiting the opera, reliving the days he thought he'd be a doctor. Interviews with Kobe Bryant, Phil Jackson, Kevin Durant and close friend Rafael Nadal also try to confirm that not only is Gasol a Renaissance Man, but he hasn't gone soft.

WEDNESDAY

MLB: World Series Game 6: Texas at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Who thought there'd be a chance for ball retrevals in McCovey Cove in November this year?

NBA: Lakers at Sacramento, 7:30 p.m., Channel 9, ESPN:

A day after a small margin of Californians pick a new (and possibly old) governor to sit in charge in Sacramento, the real Kings of the state capitol have their own agenda. DeMarcus Cousins has a shot at giving the Kings back-to-back Rookies of the Year, following Tyreke Evans. Start the campaign now.

NBA: Clippers vs. Oklahoma City, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

The first official L.A. revisit of Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook and the rest of the Thunder, who are a respectable 14-to-1 odds to win the NBA title. Play the Clippers every night, and it goes to 1-to-5.

NHL: Ducks vs. Tampa Bay, Honda Center, 7 p.m,. FSW:

Did you know: The Ducks have a Ladies Ducks team? Last week, high-school senior Alison Pankowski (right) committed to Princeton next fall and will compete in the ECAC and the Ivy League for the Tigers' women's team. She's been with Lady Ducks since age 8. This comes after high school junior Kaliya Johnson, another Lady Duck since 8, made an early committment to play for Boston College in 2012.

THURSDAY

College basketball: UCLA vs. Westmont College, Pauley Pavilion, 7:30 p.m., BruinTV.com:

This one against the little school from Santa Barbara counts in the standings?

MLB: World Series Game 7: Texas at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Thanks to the game-winning RBI by Atlanta's Brian McCann at the '10 All Star Game in Anaheim, the Giants have the right to play this last one at home. If it gets this far.

NHL: Kings vs. Tampa Bay, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

Lightning strike twice: Thursday in Anaheim, today in downtown L.A., and, with the best record in the Eastern Conference, going up against the best, so far, in the West.

Horse racing: Hollywood Park Autumn Meet, 7 p.m.:

Four days after the close of the Oak Tree meet at Hollywood Park, they're back in business for a 31-day meet (through Dec. 19) with a night event in Inglewood. Just in time for early-bird betting on the Breeders' Cup.

FRIDAY

NHL: Ducks vs. Pittsburgh, Honda Center, 7 p.m., KDOC:

When Sidney Crosby comes to town, the measuring sticks come out. "On our last road trip, judging from some of the other coaches' comments and some of the other media going in, we're still playing games where the other team is using it as a measuring stick," said Pittsburgh coach and former Kings player Dan Bylsma. "Nashville ... St. Louis used those words before the game and in the media. Tampa Bay, their coach said it before that game. That's why the pace and intensity of those games were really high and really good hockey games." Pace yourselves, Duckies. This will have to do as your Winter Classic. The Pens skip the Kings and move over to play Phoenix before going home in their only trip to this time zone all season.

Horse racing: Breeders' Cup Day 1, 1 p.m., ESPN2:

It's warm-up day, with the first six races of the weekend going off: The $500,000 Marathon (1:10 p.m.), $1 million Juvenile Fillies Turf (1:50 p.m.), $1 million Filly & Mare Sprint (2:30 p.m.), $2 million Filly & Mare Turf (3:10 p.m.), $2 million Juvenile Fillies (3:50 p.m.), and $2 million Ladies' Classic (4:30 p.m.).

NBA: Lakers vs. Toronto, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

Kids today must think the Raptors were named after a group of rappers instead of dinosaurs. Which are about as extinct around Toronto these days as Chris Bosh.

NBA: Clippers at Denver, 7:30 p.m., Prime, ESPN:

No guarantee Carmelo Anthony will still be satisfied with his status on George Karl's squad this deep into the season.

SATURDAY

Horse racing: Breeders Cup Day 2, 10:30 a.m., Channel 7; 12:30 p.m., ESPN:

On the BreedersCup.com website, it says: "With every gallop, her legend grows. With every race, she stays perfect. And with every incredible victory, she transcends the sport of racing." With every adjective, Zenyatta's chances to repeat in the $5 million Classic seem to be all the more suffocating. If it's our last chance to give a hand to Zenyatta, the horse that stands 17.2 hands tall, we can deal with it. But the fact that because of ABC's college football commitment, the great race of the day is delegated to ESPN -- the $5 million Classic, at 3:45 p.m. -- is missing something big here. Zenyatta's attempt to reclaim the Classic and finish 20-for-20 makes for as compelling TV as you can muster on a pigskin Saturday. ABC has the first three: The $1 million Juvenile Turf (10:50 a.m.), $2 million Sprint (11:30 a.m.) and $1 million Turf Sprint (12:15 p.m.). Switching to ESPN, the $2 million Juvenile (12:55 p.m.), $2 million Mile (1:40 p.m.), $1 million Dirt Mile (2:20 p.m.) and $3 million Turf (3 p.m.) lead into the Classic.

College football: UCLA vs. Oregon State, Rose Bowl, 4 p.m., Versus:

In a crazy game on Halloween a year ago in Corvallis, the Bruins came back from a 19-3 fourth-quarter deficit to tie it up with 2:06 left, only to see them Rodgers kids come back to haunt them.

College football: USC vs. Arizona State, Coliseum, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Not counting a victory they had to vacate in the '05 season, the Trojans have a 10-year winning streak against the Sun Devils, outscoring them 360-174. And including a 50-0 win at ASU in '88, USC has gone 15-4 in the last 19 meetings. Last year? A mere 14-9 triumph.

College football: Texas Christian at Utah, 12:30 p.m., CBS College Sports:

The BCS' No. 3 team plays the No. 5 team, both undefeated. On a network that's now offering a free preview with a bunch of cable systems. Otherwise, it's on DirecTV Channel 613, Dish's Channel 152 and a couple of other cable companies that we're not even sure where to find 'em.

NHL: Kings vs. Nashville, Staples Center, 7 p.m., Channel 13:

A new Kings' TV deal sticks this one over on the network that's more popular on this night for showing back-to-back reruns of "House," "That '70s Show" and "The Unit."

NBA: Clippers at Utah, 6 p.m., FSW:

Someone fill in Blake Griffin about how the locals in Salt Lake City really think they're high and mighty.

College basketball: USC vs. Point Loma Nazarene, Galen Center, 2 p.m., USCTrojans.com:

We understand the little Christian school in San Diego has a great nursing program.

SUNDAY

NBA: Lakers vs. Portland, Staples Center, 6:30 p.m., FSW:

You bring $24.95 to Staples Center an hour before tipoff, and Jeanie Buss will scribble her name into copies of her new book, "Laker Girl: From Pickfair to Playboy to the Purple and Gold," possibly dotting the "i" in her first name with a tiny heart. The book publishers say this is "the never-before-told story of the Buss family and of one woman's rise to the top in a man's world. It is also a behind-the-scenes journal of the 2009-10 Lakers season, a year in which the franchise captured its 16th world championship." Phil Jackson has written the forward. But will he someday write the final chapter?

NHL: Ducks vs. Nashville, Honda Center, 5 p.m., Prime:

It's on the schedule. It must be played.

NFL: Dallas at Green Bay, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4:

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said after watching his team lose to Jacksonville: "I'm dumbfounded that we are 1-7. I thought we had one of the top competitive teams in the NFL. I'm very, very sorry to our fans." Uh, Jer, you're only 1-6. Maybe he's already figured this one is done. And maybe he should check with his accountants on what he actually spent to build Cowboys Stadium for the upcoming Super Bowl.

NFL: Indianapolis at Philadelphia or Kansas City at Oakland, 1 p.m., Channel 2:

The Raiders failed to sell out last week's game. What makes you think this one will matter to them?

Running: New York City Marathon, 6 a.m., UniversalSports.com; 11 a.m., Channel 4:

It definitely beats a six-hour "Jersey Shore" Labor Day marathon on MTV. According to the official website, this year's group of "celebrity" runners include "Today" show weatherman Al Roker, chef Bobby Flay, CBS "Survivor" star Ethan Zohn, Howard Stern sidekick Robin Quivers and Subway sandwich guy Jared Fogle.

MLS playoffs: Western Conference semifinal Game 2: Galaxy vs. Seattle, Home Depot Center, 6 p.m., ESPN2:

The Galaxy saw how much noise that 36,000 can make in Seattle. Can 27,000 in Carson duplicate that? And pardon our MLS ignorance, but why are the Colorado Rapids and San Jose Earthquakes, who finished fifth and sixth in the Western Conference, playing in the Eastern Conference playoffs?

UPDATE: The full Q-and-A is in today's editions (linked here).

If the truth can set Marion Jones free, she's about to find out.

A sample of the Q-and-A that will appear in Sunday's newspaper and on our website:

Q: How have you been able to juggle all the family duties?

Jones: My family is doing great. The three kids - they're 7, 3 and 16 months - I mean, life is definitely busy enough as a mom and a professional athlete and now as a writer. It's an exciting time for my husband, too. Oba has a book, 'Secrets of A Champion' that has been printed and will come out soon. I really have a lot of positive things in my life and really feel blessed.

Q: In the book you wrote about a trip you took while in prison, on the so-called 'ConAir,' flown out to San Francisco to testify in a hearing. Part of the trip was a bus ride through Palmdale, where you grew up, on the way to a prison stop in San Bernardino. Have you had any chances recently to stop by any of your old homes so see how things are going?

Jones: Palmdale was where I went to elementary school, and obviously I didn't get to see much of it on that trip. That really wasn't very enjoyable. I'd love to get back more to Thousand Oaks and Rio Mesa on a family vacation, but that would be tough.

That all seems so far away right now.

Q: There's so much written in the book about the other women prisoners that you encounter at Carswell (right), giving their names, their stories, how you wanted to teach classes to help them better themselves. You've said you want to do more now to improve the conditions of women's prisons. There's an attitude that the people in prison are there to be punished so the conditions don't need to be all the supportive. From your experiences, how can you help change that?

Jones: I'm so glad you asked about that. I'm really passionate at this point about the idea of prison reform. You know how people think, 'They did the crime, let 'em do the hardest time.' OK, yeah, you've broken a law, you serve your time. But then they are released, and living amongst you, and you haven't given the tools or resources to be better people, through educations or work skills, so they can provide for their families. Some of these women are in the institutions, and all they're doing is wasting their time, doing nothing constructive. They'll just revert to the same lifestyle because they don't know anything else. It's very sad.

I was blessed to be a college graduate and have the ability to see that they can do more if they're given the proper resources, to be part of the community again.I'm doing a lot of research now about how we pour more resources into the federal system. I mean, this may seem like it doesn't affect you. 'No one in my family will ever end up in prison.' But you never know, it could be your neighbor or your son's girlfriend or someone you work with. You've got to have a vested interest in this as a member of society.

Q: So from any of your research, what do you think you can do to make a difference?

Jones: I'm in the process of looking for organizations that I can partner with, get their stories out there, share my experience, use my voice. When I was in prison, some of the women there talked to me and shared their stories with the hope that, because I have a voice on the outside, people will want to hear what I have to say.

Too many times, you'll hear, 'Aw, there's just prostitutes or drug-heads or the bottom rung of our society in there.' Before you jump to a conclusion and make any ignorant or rash comment, take a break - remember, that's what I'm trying to get out there - find out what you can about the situation and make a smarter response. I'll do whatever I can do to talk about awareness and change.

Spoiler alert: USC has yet to sell out all its available Coliseum seats -- capacity is 93,607 -- for Saturday night's nationally-televised, prime-time contest featuring a squad everyone without a computer believes is the bestest college football team in the country.

And, surprisingly, it's not the reduced-to-spoiler Trojans.

Another point to shred upon lightly: For the third time in four home games, the San Diego Chargers have failed to sell out their local 71,294-seat concrete-fancy facility, resulting in a local TV blackout -- which includes the L.A. market.

And one more bloody thing: They've exported/banished another NFL game to London this weekend, yet our version of bangers and mush -- the faltering 49ers and beleaguered Broncos -- will likely play before a capacity of 90,000 at the new Wembley Stadium since the last three American football games in England have been played to sellouts, even before the league pimped out uber-model Marissa Miller as this year's game spokesbabe.

As the NFL postures about putting one of its field operations back in the greater Southern California area, does any of this factor into the fractured equation?

Are we supposed to believe that a league more deft at lifting our wallets than one of Charlie Sheen's paid-for companions would prioritize sending one of the existing struggling franchises across the pond for season-long international exposure before it puts one back near the fountains of the Echo Park paddle-boat wading pool?

Maybe the NFL's ability to flex its power out here is more like comparing a P90X workout with one done with a Shake Weight. But isn't the strength of the league, outside of its TV muscle, having as many expanding rear ends in those end-zone seats as possible?

And if there remain lingering hints that L.A. isn't ready to recommit -- along with S.D.'s ongoing situation seen as a poor reflection of the state economy's rebound -- what would compel the NFL to put anything here on any kind of pseudo-fast track?

== Know any Giants fans out there who could turn our used Manny dreadlock wigs into fake beards?

== That Dave Anderson? The most marginal major leaguer who Lasorda once used as a decoy in the on-deck circle before sending Gibson up to hit in the bottom of the ninth in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series? He's the third-base coach of the American League champion Texas Rangers?

== The Guinness Book of World Records recognizes the "world's largest Halloween gathering" as 508 costumed folk who attended a party at a Blooming, Ind., bar last year.

A rep from the company has been called in for Sunday's NFL game at New Orleans' 80,000 seat Superdome, thinking there's a chance the record will be broken there.

Doesn't the 175,000 dressed up as hillbillies and bobbing for lugnuts on the infield at Talladega for Sunday's NASCAR harvest festival count for something?

In an interview this week with Broadcasting & Cable magazine (linked here), UFC visionary/president Dana White flexed his plan to have a 24/7 channel dedicated to the MMA scene within the next two years.

Already seeing how popular it has become, not just on pay-per-view, but with regular shows on Versus and Spike TV, White said: "A lot of people don't realize we are in a half a billion homes around the world. You know all the things we've been through in the United States, but this sport travels well. Cricket will never be big here and the NFL will never be big around the world. But we are all human beings and fighting is in our DNA.

"We get it and we like it. So we are working on a couple moves now and should be in a billion homes around the world in the next couple months."

White's implication is that UFC, whose contract with Spike TV is up next year, will be a more consistent product on a non-cable channel, with Fox's and NBC's names dropped as the main enabler as a Saturday night event.

"I don't disagree with that," White says. "We're in the middle of this stuff, we can't talk about it, but it's all common sense."

We're really not sure what common sense has to do with anything UFC related, except that attempt by CBS to do what amounted to a minor-league version of MMA with Gus Johnson inhailing his microphone didn't play well to that network-savvy audience base.

And, apparently, after reading this, HBO won't soon be in the MMA business.

With last Saturday's heavyweight triumph by Cain Velasquez over Brock Lesnar, a Mexican-American, inroads into the Mexican audience could be seized upon.

"Cain winning the title and holding the title is a big deal for the Latino market," White tells SI.com. The L.A. Times' Lance Pugmire also wrote that Velasquez's win give the UFC "footing in its quest to widen an audience too often stereotyped in the U.S. as a group of white, 20-something beer drinkers."

Thursday, Versus announced it will expand its UFC partnership to include four more UFC-run World Extreme Cagefighting events live in 2011. The WEC was created to showcase lower weight-division fightersr. Versus has two more live WEC events this year on Nov. 11 and Dec. 16.

"We have a great relationship with the Versus network, and we look forward to working with them to give UFC fans even more free fights in 2011," White said in the press release.

No one should be blindsided by White thinking UFC could operate its own network, and probably sell it to any cable or dish system. Perhaps the Arts & Entertainment Channel could merge with MMA for the Mixed Martial Arts & Entertainment Channel.

That might bloody up the competiton.

Meanwhile, with all due respect to today's media column (linked here), we have more notes before we tap out:

== A clip from Sunday's episode of CBS' "60 Minutes," where Bob Simon talks to Zenyatta jockey Mike Smith about her chances of being known as the greatest horse of all time if she can repeat in the Breeders' Cup Classic on Nov. 6:

== Barry Tompkins, Petros Papadakis and Rebecca Haarlow are on the Fox Sports Network broadcast of UCLA-Arizona on Saturday at the Rose Bowl (FSW, 12:30 p.m.) The 5 p.m. USC-Arizona game with Brent Musburger, Kirk Herbstreit and Erin Andrews goes to 79 percent of the country on ABC; the other 21 percent get Ohio State-Minnesota.

== The Onion's take (linked here) on how a "nation" is "disappointed" by a "great World Series matchup," which includes this fake quote by a fan named Paul Rockwell of Uniontown, Pa.: "The worst thing about this World Series is that with the outstanding ability of the Giants and Rangers to hit, run, and field, and with no real asshole to root against, it just feels like a celebration of baseball. And that sucks. Do you know why that sucks? Because I'm a horrible, shallow person, and while I like to think of myself as a fan, I only get off on storylines and personalities completely unrelated to the game itself."

== The L.A. NFL TV lineup this weekend:

Sunday:
= 10 a.m., Channel 11: Green Bay at N.Y. Giants (with Kenny Albert, Darryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa, instead of Carolina-St. Louis and Washington-Detroit).

= 10 a.m., Channel 2: Jacksonville at Dallas (with Jim Nantz and Phil Simms. CBS has Denver-San Francisco from Wembley, England with Greg Gumbel and Dan Dierdorf in this window, as well as Miami-Cincinnati and Buffalo-Kansas City.)

= 1 p.m., Channel 11: Minnesota at New England (with Thom Brennaman and Troy Aikman, instead of Tampa Bay-Arizona and Seattle-Oakland.

= 1 p.m., Channel 2: Tennessee at San Diego (with Ian Eagle and Dan Fouts)

= 5:20 p.m., Channel 4: Pittsburgh at New Orleans (with Al Michaels, Cris Collinsworth and Andrea Kremer ... with a Guiness Book of World Records rep reportedly on hand to validate it as the largest Halloween gathering in human history).

Monday:

= 5:30 p.m., ESPN: Houston at Indianapolis (with Mike Tirico, Ron Jaworski and Jon Gruden).

The Chargers' blackout, in addition to those that will happen Sunday in Detroit and Oakland, mean there will be 13 blackouts in the first eight weeks this NFL season. Cincinnati avoided a blackout this Sunday by delivering after getting a 24-hour extension. There were 22 total blackouts last season.

== Part of ESPN's dolling-up its coverage of the Miami Heat's first home game tonight (against Orlando, we've been allowed to reveal) - Hannah Storm will host special "SportsCenter" segments throughout the day, throwing it to reporter Rachel Nichols when appropriate, Magic Johnson will do an exclusive interview with Heat president (and his former Lakers coach) Pat Riley for the pregame show (at 4 p.m.) and NBA Finals A-team Mike Breen, Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy will call it, with reporter Doris Burke.

Oh, and in the second game of the TV doubleheader, the Lakers play their first road game, in Phoenix, a rematch of last season's Western Conference final, and the assignment goes to Dan Shulman, Hubie Brown and Lisa Salters.

== With ESPN.com pushing its "Heat Index" barometer, taking the temperature of the Miami Heat every screen refresh, FoxSports.com has started its own "Heat or 3Peat" season-long comparison of LeBron James' new team again the Lakers' pursuit to win its third NBA title in a row. Billy Witz, the former Daily News staff writer, will follow the Lakers (on FoxSportsWest.com) while Bill Reiter has been assigned to the Heat (through FoxSportsFlorida.com).

"Neither reporter is writing game stories. That's not what this is about," explained FoxSports.com Editor-in-Chief Rick Jaffe. "We're looking for them to write what amounts to a book chronicling the inner-workings of each team over the season's eight months, with each story filed being the latest chapter."

Witz is also going to be incorporated in Fox Sports Radio programming (on 570-AM) and on the Lakers' pre and post-game shows on FSW. Witz's latest piece on Ron Artest raffling off his championship ring (linked here).

As for Reiter's bio: The last four years as the sports enterprise reporter for The Kansas City Star, a reporter for The Des Moines Register and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, has written for the St. Louis Post Dispatch, The Washington Times and The (London) Express and, according to Fox sources, he once interviewed former President Bill Clinton at a urinal.

== If you're looking for one, big comprensive, researched and typo-free preview of the NBA TV season, go to SI.com's Richard Deitsch (linked here).

== The NBA's "League Pass" announced a "Three-Point Play" bundle for out-of-market games available on TV, the Internet and mobile phones, with a free preview ending Tuesday. The entire NBA League Pass goes for $179 if purchased by Tuesday. The online app (which includes a live DVR function) is $109 with the mobile pass going for $44.

AND FINALLY:

== What could Phoenix Suns star Steve Nash possibly have in common with Opie Taylor? The Sundance Channel's documentary series, "Iconoclasts," that airs Saturday (9 p.m.) puts Nash with film maker Ron Howard to talk it out.

Some excerpts:

Nash, on going to the basketball route: "I had one scholarship offer -- Santa Clara. So I went to Santa Clara and tried to make the most of it and had a great experience. But not really until after my sophomore year were people starting to warm to the idea that I would be a pro basketball player even though I felt all along that I was going to do it... There are not a lot of 6-2 white point guards from Canada in the NBA so I can ynderstand why a lot of people thought that was a misguiding pursuit, but I felt like maybe it was time there was one."

Howard, on how sports worked for him as a child actor: "When I would get off early from the 'Andy Griffith Show,' I lived about a mile from a gym in Burbank. It was this important equalizing for me because there was a lot of teasing ... I'd always have to get into fights when I'd go back to public school from having been on the set. Sports was an equalizer. It played a really important role in my life."

Flash ahead to Season 3, Episode 6 of "Happy Days" -- "After being embarrassed at Arnold's in front of his date by a couple of hoods named Frankie and Rocko, Richie turns to the Fonz for advice, and soon decides that he wants to learn jujutsu to defend and stand up for himself... "

It's the circle of TV life.

== AND REALLY, FINALLY:

== We made note of Edward R. Murrow Award winner Lance Orozco from Cal Lutheran's KCLU a few weeks ago (linked here). But it was nothing like the attention he got from David Letterman. And Matt Damon:

Credit: ESPN Films
Marion Jones, left, and John Singleton walk outside the walls of Carswell Federal Prison during a recent visit to the place Jones spent six months.

John Singleton remembers being in front of the TV set nearly three years ago, with his 16-year-old daughter Justice sitting nearby, watching Marion Jones try not to cry.

He couldn't figure out what kind of justice had just been served.

"It had such an emotional impact with all that was going on," the famed director said Thursday afternoon from his post-production offices in Santa Monica. "Why this woman? Why was she doing jail time? Why not other people who have perjured themselves in the past?

"I felt so sad for what she was going through."

Jones, the former Olympic gold-medal track and field star out of Thousand Oaks High, was holding a press conference outside a court room in White Plains, N.Y., having just been told she'd have to serve the maximum sentence of six years in a federal prison, 800 hours of community service and two years probation for lying to federal investigators who had questioned her in the BALCO investigation.

The scene is included in the documentary Singleton said took nearly a year and a half to put together for of ESPN's "30 for 30" series. "Marion Jones: Press Pause" debuts Tuesday, coincidentally a week after the release of Jones' new book, "On The Right Track," which chronicles not just her prison experience but how she wants to change her life coming out on the other side of it.

Singleton didn't need help getting up to speed on Jones' story.

Track and field has always been part of the DNA for the 42-year-old South L.A. native. He ran 330-meter hurdles for the Pasadena Blair High track team in the mid-'80s, an experience that incorporated into the character that Omar Epps played in the 1995 film, "Higher Learning." That was four years after Singleton's Oscar-nominated director role for "Boyz In The Hood."

While Singleton said he didn't even think of running track when he attended USC's film school, he says he's always had an eye on the sport, which often isn't featured on the silver screen.

Credit: ESPN
Chris Fowler, Lee Corso and Kirk Herbstreit are on the ESPN "College GameDay" set during a visit outside the Coliseum before the USC-Ohio State game in Sept., 2008.

"Some crew members can go back to the hotel and take a nap, depending on game traffic," the Southern California native said. "But as long as you keep moving, keep grinding, the end comes and then you realize you haven't slept in a day and that's when you start to really shut down."

Goff's responsibility to get the "GameDay" outdoor facility up and functional starts Thursday morning, having to orchestrate a crew of about 85 to have everything in place by Thursday night for this morning's live segments on "SportsCenter."

Because "GameDay" starts an hour earlier this year - the 6-to-7 a.m. PDT segment runs on ESPNU, while the 7-to-9 a.m. block is on ESPN - the lead-in set-up time "has impacted us tremendously . . . everything is backed up exponentially," said Goff, who flew in a half-day earlier to prepare for Friday's preproduction.

Thousands of amped USC and Oregon fans will be sandwiched into the area between the back of the stage and the Coliseum entrance on Saturday morning, some of them lined up late Friday night to gain mosh pit access and heckle studio desk crew members Erin Andrews, Desmond Howard, Chris Fowler, Kirk Herbstreit and Lee Corso -- all of whom have a 3 a.m. cast call on Saturday. Herbstreit and Andrews later join Brent Musburger for the 5 p.m. game telecast on ABC

A new "GameDay" element includes assembling a "fan cam" up on a cable that stretches 500 feet and swivels around to capture the atmosphere. Fans also have access to a face- and body-painting booth, a DJ music booth and a mobile video game truck.

"Even though was have a great infrastructure in getting all this done, what I enjoy most about this is flying by the seat of our pants," said Goff, who didn't know until last Sunday morning that the crew would be coming to L.A. this weekend after having spent last Saturday in Missouri.

Nor did any of them really take into consideration there could be rain in the forecast for this Saturday morning.

"We're rain-or-shine people," she said. "As long as there's no lightning, or we got rain going sideways, then we wont' need a Plan B."

So Plan B for this Saturday? Last weekend, when thunder came up in Missouri, they were going to use the Home Depot Bus as a indoor set. But then they realized that was one big metal structure waiting to get hit by a lightning bolt.

"We don't have any lightning in the forcast, so we'll stay with the set and keep the talent as comfortable as long as we can," she said.

Goff and the rest of the crew, meanwhile, will have to fend for themselves. Until they "go vapor" sometime early Sunday morning, then wait to find out where they'll be headed next week.

CNBC Sports Business reporter Darren Rovell combs through the responses received (linked here) after asking, in light of the Kirk Gibson auction of his bat, helmet and uniform, whatever happened to the ball.

Of the 250-plus emails, and 31 people who claimed to have it or know where it is, the most convincing evidence with video and a photograph leads to Ed Moran, who says his uncle Carlos got it, and they have this blogspot with some interesting evidence (linked here).

Rovell also seems to have found someone taking ownership of the red breaklights that you can see in the video beyond the right-field pavilion, in the parking lot, that show a stream of cars leaving early.

"I don't have the ball, however, I was the 'poor sucker' in the parking lot! I was 14 years old at the time and my dad made me and my brothers leave early to catch a flight back home to Salt Lake," writes someone named Tommy Allen. "Needless to say, I didn't talk to my dad for a long time. Of course we joke about it now, but it still hurts when I read articles like yours. Thanks for bringing back the pain!"

What's being called the inaugural World Record Summit -- action sports, mixed with those tried-and-true elements of music and celebrity -- has been set for April 17, 2011 at the Home Depot Center in Carson, it was announced today.

The event (linked here), a product of AEG, will be a two-hour pay-per-view show with a lineup of athletes that hasn't been announced yet, but "promises to be a who's who of the action sports world," according to a press release from WRS.

On the official company website, there's also the promise that this "first-of-its-kind event represents the dawn of a new era in action sports and entertainment for fans around the world. Let the insanity begin."

We're almost insane enough to think people will be interested in attending this event at the HDC, which saw its venue eliminated from the recent X-Games production last September for the first time.

This channel called the World Fishing Network has a show called "Hookin' Up With Mariko Izumi," and it starts its third season on Monday at 4:30 p.m.

"With her rod, reel and bikini packed, Mariko Izumi is once again traveling the globe in pursuit of fishy adventures," says the WFN press release, which also refers to her as "the world's sexiest angler."

Her 2010-2011 travel dossier: Boca Grande, Fla.; Ocean City, Maryland, Toronto, Lake Powell, Ariz., St. Thomas in the Virgin Islands, Cabo San Lucas in Mexico; Langara Island in British Columbia, Canada, Atlanta and Denver.

The Nov. 15 episode, for example, takes her to her hometown of Toronto in celebrating Canada Day and fishing for salmon with her dad and best friend.

Launched in December 2005, WFN is in about 20 million homes. Maybe after this blog post, it'll be 20 million and one.

More info: www.wfn.tv/hookinup.

Your winning lottery numbers last night: 1-3-6. Except with that, you currently stand 0-1, with 0-for-82 on the horizon.

If viewership to TNT's NBA regular-season doubleheader proved anything Tuesday night, it was that curiosity in villians may still be a better draw than the celebration of conquering heroes.

The network's coverage of the Miami Heat-Boston Celtics game did a 4.6 rating -- more than 7.4 million viewers in 5.3 million homes -- making it the most-watched regular-season game in cable TV history (ahead of the Lakers-Bulls game on Feb. 2, 1996).

Meanwhile, the Lakers' opener at home against Houston as they begin their back-to-back NBA title defense had a more rational 2.4 rating -- 3.7 million viewers in 2.8 million homes. It was also shown with a post-10:30 p.m. EDT tipoff.

The combined numbers -- 3.5 rating, nearly 5.5 million viewers and 4 million homes -- are the biggest NBA opening night doubleheader in Turner's 27 years.

In the markets of interest, the two games fared best in Boston (17.1), Miami (15.5) and Cleveland (10.6) instead of L.A. (9.7) and Houston (7.4).

TNT's data comes from Nielsen Media Research Live + Same Day data stream.

The Kings have figured out a way to have five games carried on Fox-owned KCOP Channel 13 this season, securing all 82 regular-season games on TV this season.

KCOP has been a TV partner of the Angels' games for the last several season.

"Along with our partners at Fox, we have been working toward the goal of televising all 82 Kings games this season to our fans locally and this announcement helps fulfill that goal," said Luc Robitaille, the Kings' president of business operations.

The games added to Channel 13 that were previously not televised:

Saturday, Nov. 6 vs. Nashville at Staples Center
Saturday, Nov. 18 at Nashville
Wednesday, Dec. 29 at Phoenix
Wednesday, Feb. 2 at Edmonton
Wednesday, March 9 at Detroit

Bob Miller and Jim Fox will call the games, Steven Dorfman will produce and Mike Hassan will direct. For the home game on November 6, reporters Patrick O'Neal and Heidi Androl will also be included as if it was a regular FSW broadcast.

On that Saturday, in that TV window, FSW has a USC-Oregon State game at the Coliseum and Prime Ticket has the Clippers game in Utah.

FSW/Prime Ticket carry 70 games this season, with the other seven (including Monday's game at Minnesota) slotted as national broadcasts or on Ducks' alternate home network KDOC.

TNT's Charles Barkley on LeBron James New Nike Commercial from Turner Sports on Vimeo.

Also on TNT's NBA opening-night coverage, former Cavs coach Mike Brown said:

"I did not watch ('The Decision') but my young son did. I was a little surprised that he did leave. But again it is his choice. I think that people have more of problem about how he went about it instead of the actual leaving. As a former head coach, I agree with that. Everyone has a right to leave if they want to just like we (coaches) have a right to cut someone if we want to. But from the outside looking in, it could have been handled better."

In addition to the bat, helmet and uniform that Kirk Gibson wore when swatted the 1988 World Series Game 1 homer for the Dodgers, which we wrote about recently (linked here), the 1,400-lot SCP Auction (www.scpauctions.com) that begins at 10 a.m. today and runs through Nov. 13 also has the following Dodgers, Angels and interesting-related things:

== A 1985 Pete Rose autographed black Mizuno "corked" game-used bat. Before the season, Rose had a box of about 30 black Mizuno bats specially made for him, ordered lighter than usual (32 ounces). As he neared the all-time hits record, the bats were labeled PR4192. One of them was found to have been corked and is accompanied by "X-ray" evidence. Minimum bid: $5,000. Item 979.

== The bat Babe Ruth used to hit his 702nd career homer in 1934, signed by Ruth and Lou Gehrig. Minimum bid: $25,000. Item 860.

== Bob Gibson's 1968 Sporting News NL Pitcher of the Year Award. Minimum bid: $1,500. Item 966. Also his '66 Rawlings Gold Glove Award ($2,500).

== The bat Stan Musial used in 1958 to get his 2,999th career hit, signed. Minimum bid: $5,000. Item 950.

== Thurman Munson's pilot's license signed on July 17, 1979, two weeks before he died. Minimum bid: $1,000. Item 910.

== A 1922-24 Ty Cobb game-used bat. Minimum bid: $20,000. Item 705. Also, a 1923-25 Cobb game-used bat. Minimum bid: $10,000. Item 710.

Former USC star receiver R. Jay Soward was one of the former college players who ex-agent Josh Luchs outed as receiving cash payments from him in a Sports Illustrated expose that came out a couple of weeks ago.

On tonight's episode of HBO's "Real Sports," Soward, who played at USC from '96-'99, is interviewed by Bernie Goldberg as part of Goldberg's Q-and-A with Luchs.

Goldberg: "Do you suppose Josh Luchs is the only sports agent around .... see you're smiling already, so I think you know where I'm going with this."

Soward: "Yeah."

Goldberg: " ... .that was paying college kids while they were playing?"

Soward: "Not at all. Not at all. I mean people are probably doing it everywhere. Somebody's probably taking some money right now. You know, we should do a statistic on that. Every five minutes a college kid is taking money from an agent."

Soward, who was a first-round draft pick by Jacksonville in 2000, talks about living as a cash-strapped college student who could not make ends meet based on NCAA rules and regulations:

Soward: "Funny story, me and my roommates, we had - some pizza guy just happened to be lost. And one of my roommates went up to the car and started talking to him. And I went around and I took the pizza."

Goldberg: "You took the pizza to be wiseasses or ..."

Soward: "We took the pizza cause we were hungry."

Goldberg: "So Josh Luchs comes along and says, 'I got money.' You say?"

Soward: "Let me have some. I could really use it right now. Let's show R. Jay a little bit of love."

During an interview recently with KSPN-AM (710)'s Steve Mason and John Ireland, Soward admitted to taking money from Luchs and explained his precament of being without money, especially during the football offseason, and no little family means of having any financial support. Soward said he took the money but only spent it on clothes and food, and that his father, who worked for a grocery store wearhouse, had no idea he was doing this.

A new, redeptive book from Marion Jones, the former Olympic track and field star out of Thousand Oaks High, comes out today called "On the Right Track: From Olympic Downfall to Finding Forgiveness and the Strength to Overcome and Succeed" ($25, Howard Books, 214 pages, linked here).

It's got all the ingredients for the network AM faux news shows of the TV world -- a fall from grace, forgiveness, empathy, a life lesson. All that can be compressed in a four-minute interview.

Read the book instead. It'll take a couple hours. Only then can you really figure out what Jones is up to with this new chapter in her life.

"I should be clear about why I'm writing this book," she says on page 24. "If you picked it up looking for salacious details about doping and drug scandals, I guess you should put it back on the shelf. This is my story, and my story is about my mistakes, how I came to grips with them, the consequencs of my actions and how I made meaning from all of it.

"My story is different from the one you read in magazines, newspaper, tabloids or watch on a sports cable channel. My story is about confronting your mistakes, taking responsiblilty, picking yourself up, moving forward and doing what you were uniquely created by God to do."

The book, suggested by the publishers to be filed under religion/Christian life, also has this endorsement from Jones' idol, Jackie Joyner-Kersee: "Marion's story is a powerful, poginant reminder to us all that being true to yourself provides the power required to achieve sucess, endure profound failure and be successful again."

The timing of the book comes with another ESPN "30 for 30" documentary on her life story from John Singleton that debuts on Tuesday, Nov. 2, called "Press Pause." Former Daily News columnist Ron Rapoport, who wrote the book on Jones called "See How She Runs" in 2000 (linked here) is one of several journalists included in the doc to move the story along and add their insights.

== More:

== An Associated Press story on Jones from Monday (linked here)
== A "Good Morning America" book excerpt (linked here)
== She's signing copies of it today in New Jersey (linked here)

Highlights of the week ahead in sports, both here and afar:

MONDAY

NHL: Kings at Minnesota, Versus, 5 p.m.:

Oh, how wild it will be at Staples Center tonight when Justin Bieber takes the stage. Not quite as Minnesota wild it will be for the Kings, who know better and are out of town.

NFL: N.Y. Giants at Dallas, 5:30 p.m, ESPN:

About those 1-4 Cowboys: Going to 1-5 would be giant stupid. Not even the Rangers in the World Series can make the Cowboys stay under the radar. Tony Romo, by the way, is listed in the top three as one of the "most overrated players in the NFL" from a Sports Illustrated poll taken among the players.

TUESDAY

NBA: Lakers vs. Houston, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., TNT:

How about, this year, instead of giving out championship rings, Lakers owner Jerry Buss starts handing out some of his trophy girlfriends? Kobe, can't touch that. D-Fish, sorry. Lamar, no thanks. Sasha, not now. But thanks for asking.

Documentary, "Fernando Nation," ESPN, 5 p.m.:

The latest "30 For 30" film focuses on how the city of L.A., especially those from the Latino population that may have boycotted Chavez Ravine for the way their ancestors were unceremoniously displaced from their homes on that land in the 1950s, rallied around this kid from Etchohuaquila for a magic moment in time. "He still matters to a generation of Mexican Americans," says Estella Lopez, a former producer with ABC News who helps tell the story. " He's our first hero."

NHL: Ducks at Dallas, 6 p.m., Prime:

Put a sheet of ice out at Cowboys Stadium, and we'd be compelled to consider watching.

WEDNESDAY

MLB: World Series Game 1: Texas at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

We have every reason to believe Josh Hamilton stayed sober after that ALCS celebration party last Friday, meaning the Rangers should be in decent shape to start their first World Series. With Cliff Lee on the mound again, ready to pitch three times if necessary, Texas isn't to be messed with at this stage of the game. Now, get thee to the Wharf on time. Last weekend, Texas pitcher C.J. Wilson, the Newport Beach native out of Loyola Marymount, quickly tweeted a challenge to the Giants' wild-eyed closer Brian Wilson: "See your beard soon mr wilson." Wilson answered: "Sounds delicious. We'll be coming."

NBA: Clippers vs. Portland, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Blake Griffin starts his NBA Rookie of the Year campaign. Again.

NHL: Kings at Chicago, 5:30 p.m., FSW:

Congrats to Jeremy Roenick, the former Blackhawks and Kings star who retired as a member of the Sharks last year, inducted into the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame last week. With 513 goals and 703 assists for 1,216 points in 1,363 games, he ranks third in career goals and points among U.S.-born players. Meanwhile, the defending Stanley Cup champ Chicagoland team is still raising Kane.

Series: "Friday Night Lights," DirecTV 101, 9 p.m.:

The final season arrives early again on the satellite-dish system, before it lands on NBC after the first of the year.

THURSDAY

MLB: World Series Game 2: Texas at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Name the inning, players involved and manager ejected in this game where fans get upset the most and can't believe there isn't a replay system in place.

NHL: Kings at Dallas, 5:30 p.m., FSW:

How many fans of the Stars will bail out to go watch the Rangers on a big-screen somewhere?

FRIDAY

NBA: Lakers at Phoenix, 7:30 p.m., Channel 9:

Jim Halpert made a reference to Steve Nash in last week's episode of "The Office." Dwight Schrute didn't get it. What a surprise. It has nothing really to with the video clip above, but it's what we found after a Google video search of "Steve Nash" and "office."

NBA: Clippers at Golden State, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Not an exhibition. But as close to one as you can get.

NHL: Ducks vs. New Jersey, Honda Center, 7 p.m, FSW:

The Devils start their only So Cal tour with a trip to Disneyland.

SATURDAY

College football: USC vs. Oregon, Coliseum, 5 p.m., Channel 7:

Everybody's No. 1 team -- except by the BCS computers (linked here) -- these Ducks from Oregon dive-bomb into the Coliseum against a Trojan squad feeling much better about their disposition, taking a week off after squashing Cal. And this tweet just in from ESPN's Joe Schad: "Oregon has beaten one team ranked in Top 25 at time of meeting; Boise St. has beaten two such opponents." With USC back in the AP Top 25, this can actually do a lot for Duck diplomacy. Get that chip off your shoulder, Chip Kelly.

College football: UCLA vs. Arizona, Rose Bowl, 12:30 p.m., FSW:

The Bruins, now without QB Kevin Price, can only hope that Wildcats QB Nick Foles, the Pac-10's passing leader, really is out for the two-to-three weeks that the team says because of a sprained knee. At the very leads, UCLA won't be expecting a 47-point beatdown.

NHL: Kings vs. New Jersey, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

This is the first of five in a row at home for the Kings, who aren't on the road again until the middle of November. Get healthy.

NHL: Ducks at San Jose, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Only one Ducks team allowed to play in Southern California per day. And did you know:
The Sharks' HP Pavilion still refuses to take recycled HP printers.

MLB: World Series Game 3: San Francisco at Texas, 3:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Y'all know they don't play baseball games in Texas in late October, right? This is supposed to be the early-bird special-adapted time for the earlier World Series game. Not a day game. Not really a night game. A game of shadows. The Rangers may even start Nolan Ryan in this one.

SUNDAY

NFL: Minnesota at New England, 1 p.m., Channel 11:

On Halloween, Randy Moss returns with the Vikings and could be the Patriots' worst nightmare.

NBA: Clippers vs. Dallas, Staples Center, 12:30 p.m., Prime; Lakers vs. Golden State, Staples Center, 6:30 p.m., FSW:

It's that always scary scenario where four teams try to squeeze two games into the downtown office supply store on one day, a few hours apart. The Warriors could always show up for the matinee and claim they didn't know.

NFL: Tennessee at San Diego, 1 p.m., Channel 2:

You'd rather watch this than the Vikings-Pats over on Channel 11? It may not be possible, if KCBS makes you watch San Francisco vs. Denver from Wembley Stadium in the 10 a.m. hole.

NFL: Green Bay at N.Y. Jets, 10 a.m., Channel 11:

Sorry, still distracted from that Raider beatdown over the Broncos last Sunday.

NFL: Pittsburgh at New Orleans, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4:

Troy Polamalu's costume plans include wearing a James Harrison disguise.

MLB: World Series Game 4: San Francisco at Texas, 5 p.m., Channel 11:

The wild hogs of the MLB aren't frightened about going up against the NFL? Their bacon will be achin' when the ratings come up. The Cowboys have a home game (against Jacksonville, in the early window), so at least there's no local conflicts.

MLS playoffs: Galaxy at Seattle, 5 p.m., ESPN2:

Now that the Supporters' Shield has been secured -- and someone will explain that to us someday -- the playoffs start with your local kickball team traveling to play the Sounders FC. A second game is Nov. 7. Then, like "The "Price Is Right," they add up all the numbers and determine who goes to the showcase showdown.

Horse racing: Oak Tree at Hollywood Park, 1 p.m.:

The final day of racing for the meeting, with a sweatshirt giveaway and the Las Palmas Handicap. Starting next week, we move everything to ... nowhere. The Hollywood Park Fall Meeting starts Thursday night, Nov. 4.

Brett Favre says he's letting the NFL handle this -- and now admits that while he did leave some voice messages, he didn't include lewd pictures of his junk (linked here).

Deanna Favre says she's handling this "through faith."

"Saturday Night Live," whose's network, NBC, carries tonight's Minnesota-Green Bay game, is handling this through parody (although be sure to note: Jason Sudeikis is throwing lefthanded):

As a followup to today's column (linked here):

The working title that Cruz Angeles had for his quickly-recruited ESPN "30 for 30" project was "The Bull and the Sleeping Giant."

Fernando Valenzuela was the former. Fernando, "El Toro." The other was the Mexican-American population of L.A.

But that hardly conveyed what he wanted to do: Tell the story of Valenzuela, but also revisit and rejoice in "Fernandomania" one more time, in the way he brought a somewhat fragmented city under one magical umbrella.

Angeles, a Brooklyn-based movie maker who grew up in South Central L.A. continues to stress a bit even today that his documentary, "Fernando National," which debuts Tuesday at 5 p.m. on ESPN (it repeats at 8 pm. on ESPN2 and at 9 p.m. on ESPN Classic), could have had more about how Valenzuela was taught the screwball (from teammate Bobby Castillo, after it was originally suggested by scout Mike Brito that he learn the split-finger fastball). Or why Fernando looked to the sky before delivering his pitch ("he said it was because he was in kind of a trance for a second, visualizing his target," said Angeles).

Those can be seen as major exclusions. So is the fact that, after a 50-day player strike, baseball needed so much to get in the fans' good graces that when it started the second half of the season with the postponed All-Star game, Fernando, still just a rookie, was named the National League's starting pitcher. Think of how Stephen Strasburg might have fit into that scenario.

But in the grand scheme of things -- trying to document how Valenzuela made an impact on a culture and a city upon his arrival with a flury in 1981 -- Angeles need not worry that Los Angeles will forget that part of it. We get enough screwball comedies on TV enough every season.

Starting and ending with Valenzuela's connection to the controversial Mexican-American family displacements around Chavez Ravine between 1952 and '58, the stuff in between will make your goosebumps rise again. Angeles was able to achieve both his goals.

Fernando's story isn't that tough to mess up, actually. The key is getting him to cooperate, which he did. And to speak on camera. In both Spanish and, for the first time many may hear it, in English.

"We only had five months," said Angeles, who estimates they shot about 30 hours of material, and had another 60 hours of archived material to go through to cut down to about 50 minutes. Thank goodness most of the ESPN "30 for 30" projects end up for sale on DVD with the director's additional cuts.

Angeles was approached by ESPN for any ideas he might have for this documentary project, and he had already done some initial legwork in getting Valenzuela to agree to do something about his life. So he pitched it. And they're weren't initially sold.

"In a way, Fernando's story has already been told through baseball history -- it's what Joe DiMaggio did for the Italians, or Sandy Koufax for the Jewish community ... aside from what Jackie Robinson did," said Angeles. "But there was much more context to put Fernando's story into.

That would be the history of the 170-acre land under Dodger Stadium, which bulldozed three communities of 300 families, most of whom had already moved away by the time the city council of L.A. and the county board of supervisors had given Walter O'Malley the spot to build the park. Those who remained had to be forcibly taken away, with the TV cameras rolling and the photographers snapping pictures.

That Valenzuela arrived in L.A., Angeles found out, wasn't so much by accident. O'Malley wanted a "Mexican Sandy Koufax" to bring back the local Mexican-American fans to the stadium, even though many boycotted the Dodgers, blaming them for what happened.

A key clip in the documentary is from then-general manager Al Campanis -- infamously fired in 1987 when he made racial-heavy comments about African-Americans lacking "the necessities" of becoming a big-league manager.

"Mr. O'Malley, he would say, 'Al, do you think it's possible that we might get a good Mexican player? there are a lot of Hispanic-speaking people here and it would be a help to have somebody of their own playing on our ballclub."

Yes, "Hispanic-speaking" was the term he used. It reminds us of how then-Dodgers broadcaster Jerry Doggett would refer to the "Latin-speaking" fans who jammed Dodger Stadium during the 1981 season to see Fernando pitch.

Angeles taps into people like United Farm Workers of America co-founder Dolores Huerta, author and poet Luis Rodriguez, former boxing champ Oscar de la Hoya, former L.A. Opinion managing editor J. Gerardo Lopez , former ABC producer Estella Lopez and actor Ray Lara to provide the Chicano context. Interestingly, Dodgers Hall of Fame broadcaster Jaime Jarrin, who was Fernando's main translator at the time, wasn't interviewed.

Several people identified only as "Dodger fans" are also on camera -- it turns out that Paul Haddad was used because of his vast collection of Vin Scully audio tape -- and a lot from Dodgers team historian Mark Langill also move the story along. Accounts from discovering scout and former reliever Castillo are among the most humorous, as well as from Valenzuela's agent, Dick Moss, who came up the need for a $1 million contract when Valenzuela (who made $32,500 his first year and $350,000 his second) reached arbitration because it was a nice round number.

"But you can't put into words what he meant -- no one else will wear No. 34 as a Dodger," says Langill.

Think of that as you see Steve Garvey's No. 6 (even if it was to Joe Torre) or Mike Piazza's No. 31 recently reissued.

"We need long-term heroes for our culture," said Angeles. "This is a city founded by 44 Mexicans, and still today, we are treated like illegal immigrants. It's a long history that we need to take ownership of.

"Fernando is the most American story you can find. We love the underdog. And with him, he represents how hard work and a Protestant ethic can achieve the American dream. He was very modest. He didn't want to be in the limelight. But everyone has an emotional attachment to his story, and it still brings an emotional reaction. The people living in L.A. need that context."

== More:
== What it means just for Fernando to smile at you (linked here)
== An MLB.com review (linked here)
== Valenzuela's stats on BaseballReference.com (linked here)

From the Latino Baseball History Project
The nine Pena brothers, with their father, back row in the Orioles jersey, who played for the East L.A. Carmelita Chorizero. Latino History Baseball Project spokesman Terry Cannon says he believes six of the Penas are still living. This was the photo that appeared of them in "Ripley's Believe it or Not."

For as much history as he made on the mound at Chavez Ravine, he seems to be saying that he really couldn't speak to what happened more than a half-century ago when a generation of Mexican-American citizens before him, living in that rugged 170-acre terrain north of downtown where Dodger Stadium still stands, were displaced, some in very disturbing ways.

In Spanish, Fernando answers the question. In English, there are the subtitles. But there's probably something lost in translation.

"That really took me by surprise," admitted Cruz Angeles, pictured left with Valenzuela, the independent filmmaker who directs "Fernando Nation," which debuts Tuesday as part of ESPN's "30 for 30" series.

Angeles asks Valenzuela if he knew the story about how some of those 300 families, once promised in the early 1950s first shot at returning to a new housing project on that land, not only didn't get it, but some were forcibly evicted so the stadium could be built after the land was then promised to Walter O'Malley.

"I don't think he knew any real details about it," Angeles said of Valenzuela, who seems to imply that no one from the Dodgers organization ever told him. "I tried to tell him a little more about it, but really didn't have much time to explain it all."

Instead, Angeles shows it. He invests about five minutes of the 50-minute documentary using the stock black-and-white footage of the sheriffs coming in, dragging some off their porches as their children watched. It's a horribly regrettable moment, with blame to go around.

But it's an incredibly poignant teaching moment for the documentary - Angeles deftly circles back to it at the end, to marvel at how remarkable a feat it was that Valenzuela's Cinderella story united all cultures of the city on the same spot where historians still may misrepresent how those Mexican-American families were sacrificed for the good of a baseball team.

There's some truth in all those stories you hear. And if you put your ear to the ground, there's an even deeper, richer Hispanic cultural in Southern California, with baseball as a contextual starting point.

Carmelita Chorizeros manager Manual "Shorty" Perez, left, about to receive a championship trophy from Saul Toledo, center. At right is Carmelita founder/owner Mario Lopez, Sr., who also played shortstop at one time. The Chorizeros are said to have won 19 city championships.

Sunday in Alhambra, Richard Santillan, co-author of the upcoming book, "Mexican American Baseball in Los Angeles," is hosting a party to thank many of the former amateur and semi-pro players for their help. Two or three of the famous Pena brothers may attend - at one point, there were nine Pena brothers playing for the East L.A. Carmelita Chorizeros, drawing the attention of "Ripley's Believe It Or Not."

Al Padilla, who played baseball at Roosevelt High and later for Ornelas Market, could be at Santillian's gathering. He donated his glove to the Latino Baseball History Project. He went on to be a football coach of some renown -- the first Latino football coach at a junior college in the state of California, at East L.A. College.

Starting Nov. 1 at the Cal State San Bernardino Library, the Project will host a "Legends of Mexican American Baseball" display. The focus is on Jim "Chayo" Rodriguez, founder and coach of a famed Inland Empire fast-pitch softball team called the Chicanos from 1973-'90.

The group recently got city approval for a plaque at East L.A.'s Belvedere Park, honoring Manuel "Shorty" Perez, who managed the Chorizeros, the so-called "New York Yankees of barrio baseball," from 1947 until his death in 1981.

Also this past week, the organization mourned the passing of Saul Toledo, an important figure both as a player and a writer of the history of Mexican-American baseball in the city.

"I guess the timeliness of all this, in connection with the Fernando documentary, is that a lot of people in Los Angeles think that Mexican baseball in the City of the Angels began with Fernando," says Terry Cannon, the executive director of the Baseball Reliquary and a committee member of the Latino Baseball History Project.

"In fact, there was an incredibly rich Mexican American baseball culture throughout Southern California. They drew crowds in the hundreds and even thousands to ball fields on Sunday afternoons from the post-World War II era through the 1970s.

"We are trying to reclaim and reinvigorate that history."

Cannon says that, in recording the oral history for the Latino Baseball Project with the last families that were evicted just before construction of Dodger Stadium, it was revealed to him that those who moved out when the first notices were sent "were paid a pittance for their property in return for the promise that they would get the first crack at the new public housing development -- which ever happened).

"A few of the families fought the evictions and stayed put for many years. One of those is the family you see being dragged out of their home in the famous television footage."

Cannon adds, however, that the Nava family, which the Project interviewed, "were eventually paid around $100,000 for their property -- not by the city, but by O'Malley. O'Malley did not like the ongoing television coverage of the families being dragged out and staying outside their property in tents. He knew this would be very upsetting to Mexican Americans throughout Los Angeles, and as a smart businessman, he knew this would eventually be a core part of his patronage.

"So he did what was right, which was to give the remaining families a decent payoff on their property. Of course, I'm sure this didn't make all those families who left back in the early '50s very happy, considering they were paid almost nothing for their property at the time."

From the Ry Cooder song, "3rd Base, Dodger Stadium":

Mister, you're a baseball man, as anyone can plainly see.
The straightest game in this great land. Take a little tip from me.
I work here nights, parking cars, underneath the moon and stars.
The same ones that we all knew back in 1952.
And if you want to know where a local boy like me is coming from:
3rd base, Dodger Stadium.

Back around the 76 ball, Johnny Greeneyes had his shoeshine stall.
In the middle of the 1st base line, got my first kiss, Florencia was kind.
Now, if the dozer hadn't taken my yard, you'd see the tree with our initials carved.
So many moments in my memory. Sure was fun, 'cause the game was free.
It was free.

Valenzuela's transcending place in L.A. history will never be denied. You could argue that he's Baseball Hall of Fame worthy for that legacy, both on and off the field.

This documentary definitely brings that out, pointing out that it wasn't until Valenzuela's arrival that many disillusioned Mexican-American citizens felt compelled to return to Dodger Stadium.

"We were a sleeping giant until Fernando came along," says Angeles, born in Mexico City and raised in the South Central L.A. but hardly looking old enough to have any first-hand remembrances of Valenzuela's 1981 rookie season that ended with a Cy Young Award - much of it facilitated by teammate and East L.A. native Bobby Castillo, once part of the Chicano protest movement in his teens.

Sleeping, maybe. But now's as good a time as any to reawaken the Hispanic baseball narrative that also laid the groundwork for Fernando's arrival.

There's plenty more where thaty came from:

== The Latino Baseball History Project (linked here)

== Ben Sakoguchi's "Orange Crate Label Series: The Unauthorized History of Baseball," all of which focus on the theme of Latinos in baseball and was inspired by the Latino Baseball History Project (linked here).

== The L.A. Times obituary on Saul Toledo (linked here)

== How the Carmelita Chorizeros helped make chorizo part of the L.A. food fair (linked here)

== A 2006 L.A. Times story by David Wharton on the Chorizeros (linked here)

== The background of "Fernando Nation" (linked here)

== A "Fernando Nation" documentary premier story from Jim Smiley at Los Angeles Examiner.com (linked here) and from Roberto Baly at VinScullyIsMyHomeboy.com (linked here), who also has info about Fernando appearing at a grocery store in Huntington Park today, and Fernando's pending induction into the Latino Baseball Hall of Fame.

In Sunday's Daily News, we'll explore the latest in how the NFL will or won't return to Los Angeles.

There are the usual suspects -- the Vikings, Chargers, Jaguars -- who are using L.A. as leverage for getting a new stadium built for them in their hometowns. That's just part of the process. And we have a couple of potential stadiums in Southern California waiting to start construction.

And just because an existing team moves to L.A. to set up a new home office doesn't mean it has to keep its old name.

Although, the Los Angeles Jaguars really wouldn't be so bad. There's a built-in automotive sponsorship waiting to happen.

Considering that the Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore and became the Ravens, nevermore are we stuck with the nickname attached to the thatch basket on our porch.
With that, we humbly suggest a rebranding of the next team that relocates here from this Top 10 list:

== Los Angeles Cannabis: With the smoke from Prop 19 hanging over us, vote for this one. Don't wait to climb on the bandwagon - get on the "Canna-bus." All games start at 4:20 p.m. Go, Green Machine.

== Los Angeles Recyclers: Another shade of green. It would fit the situation, since we're inheriting a used team and making it new again. Unlike the old Saints' fans, you'd bring your own shopping bags to wear over your head when they go bad. Maybe there's a hybrid name even better?

== Los Angeles Key Grips: An homage to the movie industry. We could also get behind the Best Boys, Stunt Riggers or CGI. In that vein, a spin off some identifiable TV show name would be considered: Los Angeles NCIS or Los Angeles Law & Order. And then there's the Nip/Tuckers. Or the Los Angeles Baywatchers, because it's never too old to see David Hasselhoff flipping a coin, and Pamela Anderson bending over to pick it up.

== Los Angeles Aftershocks: The scoreboard will have the down, distance and Richter-scale reading of the seismic tackle.

== Los Angeles Aristocrats: Please, keep the joke alive.

== Los Angeles Luchadors: The perfect alliteration for a connection to the Hispanic fan base, and perhaps the most unique mascot in the league.

== Los Angeles Shredders: Kid-friendly, without stooping to resurrect some dinosaur.

== Los Angeles Chicken 'N' Waffles: The only thing better than In 'N' Out.

== Los Angeles Karma: Bad karma if you don't consider it.

== Los Angeles Road Ragers: Back in 1998, fresh after the Rams and Raiders departure, the NFL told L.A. it wouldn't get another team again unless it built a new stadium. Downtown L.A., Carson and Ontario volunteered right away. We were disappointed that the San Fernando Valley couldn't step up. Especially after we came up with a nickname at the time -- The Los Angeles Road Rage. We float this again, adding the "rs" to the end, since everyone seems to love a rager.

Robert Castillo, the Angels production manager and creator of the Rally Monkey, was let go from the team in 2007. He hasn't had any work since.

As a result, he's selling his 2002 World Series ring through a ring dealer (linked here). The asking price is $19,995.

Castillo told CNBC that the ring is the "only item I own of value," and he's on "the brink of total financial ruin."

The ring is made of 10-Karat gold with diamonds and rubies and comes in its original wood presentation box. The ring weighs 46 grams and is a size 12.

More on Castillo's story (linked here).

It's out of the question ...

Magic Johnson means business, with a Midas touch that appears to be hands free of any prestidigitation.

But then -- poof -- things start to disappear from his portfolio. And we shouldn't be alarmed?

Is he cash-poor? Does he have a time-sensative itch to scratch? Are his meds being monitored?

Knowing that Magic always provides great theatre -- with ownership of local movie houses to profit from it -- why would he in turn be giving us the business when we’re inquiring about what his next business venture could be?

You don't just divest yourself from two of the most stimulating, recession-proof operations -- a lump of the Lakers, and a stable of Starbucks franchises -- because $100 mil is great walkin-around money.

So, what's up his sleeve?

He's going to be the new point-man in the NFL coming to L.A.? Why not. It's good long-term local business scheme.

He going to play a little defense and steal the Dodgers from the McCourts? Why not. It's a business long-shot worth stepping behind the 3-point line and waiting for the pass.

He's going to fight through the smokescreen and be part of the group buying his hometown Detroit Pistons? Why not. It'd be a good family business idea.

Then there's Plan ZZZZ: Could Magic buy out Donald T. Sterling and anchor the Clippers with a tethered rope around his statue sitting outside Staples Center?

No possible way. Why? Because the Better Business Bureau would be better to block it.

== Sasha Vujacic couldn't have waited for the Lakers' opening night ceremony on Tuesday to slip Maria Sharapova a nice engagement ring?

== The Dodgers can afford to just let Larry Bowa blow out of town?

== Remember that day -- April 13, 2006 -- when Dodgers manager Grady Little put backup outfielder Cody Ross into the starting lineup, and he responded with a three-run homer with a go-ahead grand slam at Pittsburgh for 7 RBIs? And then he was released four days later because new GM Ned Colletti thought he needed an extra backup infielder?

== Use your head here: Is the NFL’s message now about eliminating violent hits slanted toward the concept that it's OK to tear up someone's ACL as long as you aren't inflicting pain with the crown of the helmet? After all, we've two knees, but only one brain, eh?

== If you've dumped Brett Favre from your Fantasy Football team, who might he be dropping and picking up for his personal fantasy squad at this point in the season?

== What would compel Roger Goodell to consider suspending Favre this weekend, for his final game in Green Bay, and thus ending his consecutive-game playing streak for something that isn't injury-related, is hardly legal-related, and at the end of the day, far more stupid-flirtation-related? Why not just let Deanna Favre dish out the dangerous-hit punishment?

An ESPN The Magazine subscriber has issued the ultimate surrender. He's making the cancellation walk of shame.

Don Ohlmeyer, the ESPN.com ombudsman for the network, relayed a letter in his latest column (linked here) that explains how Shane N. from Oakley, Calif. (we're not sure if Shane is a guy or girl, or whether Oakley is the place where they make the sunglasses that players like to put on the bill of their baseball caps) is bailing out because of the latest "Body" issue, which he calls "your SKIN issue." Shane says that because he has "young kids in our house and if I wanted them to see soft-core porn, I would have bought Playgirl or Playboy." (Again, this is no help in detecting gender of authorship. Not that it matters. But it kinda does.)

"You have sunk to a brand new low in journalism when you have to rely on sex or a naked human body to sell your mag," Shane continued. "Maybe you ought to fire your writers because it's obvious that you no longer have confidence in them, and therefore I have no further need of you."

Easy there, big guy. Or girl.

Donny, he/she has teeded it up for you. How do you defend the good name of ESPN here?

Ohlmeyer quotes Gary Belsky, editor in chief of ESPN The Magazine, as saying it's clear they're targeting 18-to-34 males with this, and we know "some fans may find the contents inappropriate or otherwise objectionable. That's why we spend considerable time weighing the purpose, relevance and ramifications of every image and story in the issue, among a diverse group of senior staff members that includes people of various backgrounds, faiths, ethnicities and sexual orientations, as well as parents with young children. More importantly, though, we see the body issue as conforming to our broader mission of providing readers a unique perspective on sports, in this case a celebration and exploration of the athletic form."

A fair explanation. And considering the results, a fair assessment. It really does cross a lot of lines, but mostly in good taste.

Now Don chimes in:

"The photographs did not strike me as salacious or lascivious. But that's just one man's opinion ... Perhaps ESPN should have sent an advisory to subscribers notifying them that the next issue would contain material some may deem objectionable. Because of similar concerns, for example, Sports Illustrated allows reticent subscribers to skip its annual swimsuit issue and extend their subscription by an extra week."

That wasn't even considered in this case? It's a pretty well-known marketing move on SI's part, and a cautionary tale. ESPN should have known better. But then, the more hate mail it receives -- male or female -- the more it can gauge as to whether it's achieving its goal of selling magazines and competing head-to-head with SI.

If readers drop it -- for whatever reason -- then there's a problem.

Ohlmeyer adds that the 2009 "Body Issue" with Serena Williams on the cover postednewsstand sales that "were 73 percent higher than the magazine's average circulation of 2.2 million, and sales for the 2010 edition were up 22 percent over last year. While such statistics and ESPN's business goals matter little to those that were offended, all readers ultimately retain the ultimate voting right -- either maintain or cancel the subscription."

We also have the right to run more photos from the magazine (which we previewed last week, linked here). So take that SI women in the swimsuit issue who think they can get away with painting their bikinis onto their ... thing parts.

By the way, the current ESPN The Magazine issue previews the NBA and transforms stars of the league into Marvel Superheroes. Maybe the kids will like this one better.

Be sure to scroll down to the bottom of Ohlmeyer's piece on a discussion about why things like the Brett Favre texting incident becomes a full-blown story on ESPN, as well as a discussion on perceived biased interviews. There's really some good stuff there beyond the fluff at the top.

As usual with ESPN.

After today's media column (linked here), which digs more into this 1964 Chris Schenkel book we've come across and the atomic-bomb nature of the NFL ratings nationally and in L.A., we lurch forward with more non-subscription-based info:

== Former NFL quasiagent Josh Luchs, who still loves to name names after the expose on him in Sports Illustrated, continues his media tour with Bernie Goldberg on the next episode of HBO's "Real Sports" (Tuesday, 10 p.m.). HBO says that "Luchs' headline-grabbing account has reignited the debate over whether to protect student-athletes from preying agents, or simply permit college players to share in the revenues they help generate."

A story far more interesting will be John Frankel reconnecting with George and Coby Karl, as the Denver Nuggets coach continues to recover from throat cancer and returns to the bench, with the former Lakers guard, and his son, not far away.

== Your NFL weekend for L.A.:

= Sunday, Channel 2, 10 a.m.: Pittsburgh at Miami (with Greg Gumbel and Dan Dierdorf, instead of the other CBS games of Cincinnati-Atlanta, Buffalo-Baltimore, Jacksonville-Kansas City and Cleveland-New Orleans)
= Sunday, Channel 11, 10 a.m.: Washington at Chicago (with Thom Brennaman, subbing for Joe Buck, and Troy Aikman, instead of the other Fox games of Philadelphia-Tennessee, San Francisco-Carolina and St. Louis-Tampa Bay).
= Sunday, Channel 2, 1 p.m.: New England at San Diego (with Jim Nantz and Phil Simms, instead of Oakland-Denver. Fox's offering in this window that won't be shown: Arizona-Seattle, without the Leinart-Carroll reunion)
= Sunday, Channel 4, 5:15 p.m.: Minnesota at Green Bay (with Al Michaels, Cris Collinsworth and Andrea Kremer)
= Monday, ESPN, 5:30 p.m.: N.Y. Giants at Dallas (with Mike Tirico, Ron Jaworski and John Gruden).

== Because it still matters to someone: KSPN-AM (710) officially named Mike Thompson, left, who was last seen in these parts running XTRA Sports 1150 when the Dodgers were part of the station in the late '90s, as the new program director. The station is undergoing a lot of management change, including releasing general manager Chris Berry, the resignation of previous program director Larry Gifford and the departure of assistant program director and on-air host Brian Long, who is the program director at the ESPN affiliate in Seattle, also called ESPN710.

Thompson had been the GM and PD at WEAE-AM, an ESPN station at Pittsburgh and has also been in sports radion in Atlanta, Dallas and New York, as well as creating content for the ESPN branded channels on Sirius and XM Satellite Radio.

== The Fox Sports Media group has added the blog network Yardbarker to its possession. Based in San Francisco, Yardbarker, with 7.5 million average monthly users (and 15 million men 18-to-34), will supposedly keep doing what it's doing, while getting Fox support. Fox operates FoxSports.com, Scout.com and WhatIfSports.com. Yardbarker actually came about, according to the company statement, when "hundreds of independent sports publishers who 'hung out' on the site to promote their content" kinda of bonded as "an informal affiliation of sites with like-minded audiences."

== The ninth boxing stallment of HBO's "24/7" launches with four episodes focused on Manny Pacquiao and Antonio Margarito as they prepare for their Nov. 13 fight in Dallas. Episode One (Saturday, 10:30 p.m.) focuses on Pacquiao after he won a congress seat in the Phillippines, while Margarito opens his camp in Oxnard.

== ESPN "SportsCenter" wraps up a three-part series on how the city of Cleveland is dealing with the denial, anger, depression and possible acceptance of LeBron James leaving Cleveland and going to Miami this past off season, because this is a story that can't be beaten enough.

The series, which started on Wednesday with a poll showing fans' attitude toward James after the ESPN coverage of "The Decision," will be combined on the "Outside the Lines" episodes airing today (noon) and Sunday (6 a.m.).

We're trying to figure out what stage we're at with this ESPN advertiser-friendly, ad-naseum coverage: Fatigued, amused, indifferent or compelled to watch only to see how many more angles can be carved from the aftermath of "The Decision."

AND FINALLY:

== We do enjoy us the return of "Mayne Street" on ESPN.com. Even at three minutes a pop. We'd like to give you the video here, but ESPN seems to have their encoded technology on the fritz.

You could have heard the term "fornicating horses" used by the "new" head of ESPN operations, who was none-too-pleased by Kenny Mayne's report about "Smarty Jones Gone Wild."

"You thought that was funny," the odd-looking producer says.

"It was," says Mayne.

"No it wasn't."

"Yes it was."

"No it wasn't."

"I know you are but ... what am I?" Mayne finally gives.

"This isn't your fault. For far too long, ESPN has let you think you're funny. And that ends today."

Not really. It's up on the website for as long as they'll keep "the half-assed comedy" around (linked here). Check it out. Stuart Scott calls Manny Ramirez a transvestite, after he thinks he's delivering a new catch phrase written by an intern.

It's funny, 'cause it probably really happened.

And as to why ESPN has made available this photo of Mayne in jail, we're not sure. Maybe he's visiting Jay Mariotti in an upcoming episode....

During a live chat today with NFL commissioner Roger Goodell on NFL.com (linked here), a Los Angeles resident asked:

"Do you think Magic (Johnson) can accomplish his goal of bringing football back to LA? Is there any chance the Chargers could move. I as a chargers fan would love it."

Goodell's response:

"We worked with Magic Johnson as one of the potential ownership groups who was interested in bringing a team back to LA in the '90s. He's passionate about the NFL and certainly understands the L.A. market. However, without a new CBA, it is highly unlikely we could finance a new stadium that would be required."

CBA? Does that mean Goodwell would rather have Magic work on getting the Contential Basketball Association on board first? California Board of Accountancy? The Commercial Brokers Association? The California Bluegrass Association? A cost-benefits analysis? The Commercial Bank of Africa? They all exist under the initials CBA, no matter what kind of collective bargaining agreement you're trying to push.

The latest coffee-table sized production from Sports Illustrated, "The Covers" ($29.95, Time Home Entertainment, 208 pages, linked here) is a giant reminder about the impact the magazine's display covers have had over the last 50-plus years, setting a creative standard in sports photography and marketing that others have tried to imitate with various degrees of success.

Showing the covers in chronological order - starting with Aug. 16, 1954 - through 2009, it's also a way to measure a sports franchise's worth.

Through a tally taken last May, the Lakers have made 64 covers (second to the New York Yankees' 70), but we remember at least one or two more during their NBA title repeat run against the Celtics in June. The Dodgers (40), UCLA basketball (24), USC football (21) and the Los Angeles Rams (12) are the others in double digits.

UCLA also has the edge over USC, 29-27, in colleges making the cover, with Bill Walton appearing a college-record eight times in a Bruins uniform.

The book also answers a question we've had for years: Why was the Dodgers' Johnny Podres, who actually had a losing record, named 1955 Sportsman of the Year? Simply for beating the Yankees in Game 7 of the World Series?

The magazine's Jan. 2, 1956 issue had planned to honor horseman Bill Woodward Jr., and he posed for a cover shot with his wife, Ann, his prized thoroughbred Nashua, who won the Preakness and Belmont, and jockey Eddie Arcaro.

But the weekend before the magazine was to come out, Ann accidentally shot and killed her husband.

"SI managing editor Sid James hastily shipped to the engraver a head shot of Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher Johnny Podres," writer Alexander Wolff explains in the book. "The picture was lame, and so was the choice of Sportsman of the Year . . . But Podres had the inestimable advantage of not being dead."

Robert Cremer somehow pounded out a new story (linked here) about Podres, which is actually pretty good.

But, in this case, as one man dies, the SI cover jinx is born.

Podres, it should be noted, didn't die until January of '08.

"The Covers" is the latest in some giant-sized SI staff-project books that includes "The Football Book" in 2005 and revised in '09 (linked here), "The Baseball Book" from 2006 (linked here), "The Basketball Book" from 2007 (linked here), "The College Football Book" from 2008 (linked here), "The Golf Book" from 2009 (linked here) and "The Hockey Book" from Sept., '10 (linked here),

An hour-long documentary called "Out: The Glenn Burke Story," looking back at the life and career of the one-time Dodgers center fielder, will air commercial free on Comcast SportsNet Bay Area on Wednesday, November 10 at 8 p.m., the network announced today.

CSN Bay Area is available on DirecTV Channel 696 and Dish Network Channel 419.

Burke, once called "the next Willie Mays" by a coach early in his career, was the Dodgers starting center fielder in the 1977 World Series, but then traded suddenly to Oakland the next year for A's center fielder Billy North. By 1980, he was out of the game, and many of his teammates by then knew of the reason -- his homosexuality, which some believe is what led to his premature career derailment.

He came out in a 1982 Inside Sports magazine story, but turned to drugs and ended up in prision, diagnosed with AIDS in '94. He died 15 years ago.

Former Dodgers Reggie Smith (in the video above), Davey Lopes, Dusty Baker, Rick Monday, Manny Mota and Billy Bean are interviewed.

So is former A's teammate Claudell Washington, who recalled a story of when manager Billy Martin introduced him to his new teammates in spring training: "He was introducing all the players and then he got to Glenn and said, 'Oh, by the way, this is Glenn Burke and he's a faggot.'"

What others have to say in the doc:

== Lopes, on Burke traded to the A's: "You don't break up, disrupt a team going as well as it was going to make changes. I didn't feel it was going to make us a better ball club. Billy North was not going to make us, at that time, any better of a ballclub. Probably not the real reason why things happened."

== Baker, on the rumors: "I think the Dodgers knew; I think that's why they traded Glenn."

== Smith, on the suspicions: "I certainly didn't want to accuse him of that, because one thing's for sure - at that time period, it was a kiss of death for a ballplayer. He would've been excused from the game, so to say."

== From Vincent Trahan, a Berkeley High School classmate, on the Dodgers' suspicions: "Al Campanis and Walter O'Malley had called him into the office and offered him $75,000 to get married. And Glenn, being his comic self, said, 'I guess you mean to a woman?'"

== Lyle Spencer, the MLB.com writer who covered the Dodgers for the Herald Examiner: "I was shocked that he was traded... I walked into the clubhouse...and guys were visibly distraught over the trade, and that told me that my sense of how important he was to them internally was accurate. I even remember a few players crying when they found out about it at their lockers, which is stunning."

"Out: The Glenn Burke Story" is produced by Doug Harris ('Bounce: The Don Barksdale Story'') and Sean Maddison , who produces San Jose Sharks hockey on Comcast SportsNet.

Also:

== More info on the documentary (linked here).

== Burke's autobiography "Out at Home" (lined here)

== On Burke credited for starting the "high five" on Outsports.com (linked here)

== His stats on his brief four-year big-league career Baseball. Reference.com (linked here)

According to current NFL data, NFL games account for the nine most-watched programs on television since the season kicked off on Sept. 9, according to The Nielsen Company.

We'll make a wager that gambling and fantasy leagues have a lot of drive for those numbers.

Closer to home, NFL games have accounted for 13 of the top 20 telecasts in Los Angeles.

The data (with ranking, show, date, network, rating, share and total L.A. households):
1. "Dancing With the Stars" Sept. 20 on ABC / 15.7 / 24 / 889,000
2. NFL: Dallas-Minnesota Oct. 17 on Fox / 14.3 / 30 / 810,000
3. "Dancing With the Stars" Sept. 27 on ABC / 14.3 / 22 / 809,000
4. NFL: Minnesota-New Orleans Sept. 9 on NBC / 14.3 / 26 / 808,000
5. NFL: Dallas-Washington Sept. 12 on NBC / 14.0 / 25 / 790,000
6. NFL: Minnesota-N.Y. Jets Oct. 11 on ESPN / 13.6 / 22 / 773,000
7. "Dancing With the Stars" Oct. 4 on ABC / 13.4 / 21 / 760,000
8. "Dancing With the Stars" Oct. 11 on ABC / 12.9 / 19 / 731,000
9. NFL: N.Y. Jets-Miami Sept 26 on NBC / 12.7 / 23 / 720,000
10. NFL: Washington-Philadelphia Oct. 3 on Fox / 12.1 / 27 / 685,000
11. NFL: Indianapolis-Washington Oct. 17 on NBC / 11.9 / 20 / 672,000
12. NFL: Houston-Washington Sept. 19 on CBS / 11.8 / 27 / 668,000
13. "Dancing With the Stars" results Sept. 21 on ABC / 11.8 / 19 / 667,000
14. "Dancing With the Stars" results Oct. 12 on ABC / 11.7 / 18 / 661,000
15. NFL: New England-N.Y. Jets Sept 19 on CBS / 11.6 / 27/ 654,000
16. NFL: Chicago-N.Y. Giants Oct. 3 on NBC / 11.4 / 21 / 646,000
17. NFL: Philadelphia-San Francisco Oct. 10 on NBC / 11.3 / 20 / 639,000
18. "Dancing With the Stars" results Sept. 28 on ABC / 11.3 / 19 / 639,000
19. NFL: N.Y. Giants-Indianapolis Sept. 19 on NBC / 11.3 / 22 / 638,000
20. NFL: San Diego-Kansas City Sept. 13 on ESPN / 11.2 / 18 / 634,000

By the way, NFL games have provided eight of the top 20 programs for Los Angeles during the 2009-10 broadcast season (from September to May).

The list that L.A. generated for that period (with ranking, event and rating):
1. Super Bowl 44: 39.4
2. Super Bowl 44 postgame: 32.3
3. Academy Awards: 29.8
4. Super Bowl 44 kickoff: 27.1
5. NFC championship (New Orleans/Minnesota): 26.6
6. AFC championship (N.Y. Jets/Indianapolis): 21.2
7. AFC playoff game (San Diego/N.Y. Jets): 20.3
8. NFC playoff game (Dallas/Minnesota): 18.5
9. Grammy Awards: 18.4
10. "Undercover Boss" (post Super Bowl 44): 18.4
11. Winter Olympics opening ceremony: 17.7
12. Oscars Red Carpet show: 17.2
13. "Dancing With the Stars": 17.1
14. NBA playoffs (Lakers/Phoenix): 17.0
15. "American Idol": 16.9
16. NBA playoffs (Lakers/Phoenix): 16.6
17. NFC wildcard game (Green Bay/Arizona): 16.5
18. "Barbara Walters Special": 16.3
19. BCS championship (Texas/Alabama): 16.0
20. "American Idol": 16.0

Circling back for a second on the pending auction for the bat, uniform and helmet used by Kirk Gibson when he hit his game-winning home run in Game 1 of the 1988 World Series:

The owner of the ball that Gibson floated into the Dodger Stadium right-field pavilion may never come forward.

Gibson said Tuesday that "a young lady" sent him a photo claiming the ball hit her "in the inner thigh, kind of high on her skirt, so to day. ... She was all black and blue. But I've never, ever seen the ball." Somewhere, the picture is with his belongings saved in the warehouse in Michigan.

Aside from the near-impossible way to verify if that was the actual ball -- they've already tried freezing the NBC TV video from the coverage and digitizing faces of those in the pavilion -- you'd need all kinds of witnesses to step up as well.

For all we know, the ball is stowed away by some history-conscious fan, in a safe place, to be displayed at some day to come.

Tommy Lasorda, for one, would like to see it.

"I never saw the ball," the former Dodgers manager admitted Tuesday. "My eyes were on (Oakland right fielder Jose) Canseco going back, going back and then his back was against the wall. That's when I knew it was gone."

== More from Tuesday's press conference at the Dodger blog VinScullyIsMyHomeboy.com

There's a whole, cool story behind the black-and-yellow pine-tarred Worth Tennessee Thumper bat that Kirk Gibson used to hit the most dramatic home run in Los Angeles Dodgers history 22 years ago. Pull up a chair, he can tell you all about it.

What's it worth to you?

Actually, the real story here is: Why isn't it in a display case in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown? Or at the Sports Museum of Los Angeles? Or somewhere at Dodger Stadium?

And why, if anyone with credit card was so inclined, could it be bought next week at auction, stuck into someone else's own secure humidor, and perhaps never shown to anyone without some kind of written consent form?

This bat, as Gibson points out, has a blue "x" on the knob, below the black "23," meaning it "was a reject." The 34 ½-inch bat was too light when it came to him from the factory, maybe only 30 or 31 ounces, so he set it aside. "So I basically had it sitting there all year."

Until now, it's been sitting it in a safe, in a warehouse near his home in Michigan.

He only used that bat during the 1988 playoffs because "I started getting tired," he says. "I had no legs at all, so I didn't want to be swinging any big lumber." By Game 1 of the 1988 World Series, both his knees were shot. He needed something much lighter.

Now, you can assume that Gibson, recently hired as the full-time manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks, doesn't need the money he'll receive in return from this highest-bidder-gets-a-piece-of-history exercise. But he won't say.

"That's not an appropriate question," he told a reporter on a conference call Tuesday. "I don't know what that has to do with anything."

The bat has red ink marks on the barrel, smudges from the special red-labeled balls he fouled off early in the count. It has extra tar on the handle, to make "the balance feel better." The deep nicks in the backside of the barrel, "that's from me hitting my cleats . . . at the beginning of the at-bat, they weren't very deep. Then as the at-bat progressed, I kept hitting it harder and harder."

The spot on the sweet part of the bat where he met the ball that would float into the right field pavilion as the tail lights were heading out of the parking lot and win Game 1 in the most improbable fashion "is actually chipped out of there. There is a little nick where I hit it."

Of the bat as a whole, Gibson says it "so much character . . . it's like a painting. It's like a story and it will tell you the whole thing."

The character of the bat isn't what's in question here. It's seems to be more about the character of Gibson, who is putting this, plus the batting helmet he wore, and the tar-smudged, never-washed white Dodgers jersey top out there for someone to buy. Plus a gray road uniform from that World Series.

The opening bids for the five items add up to $85,000. SCP Auctions CEO David Kolher projects about a half-million dollars will come from it. The profits go to Gibson.

"I'd like to see (the items) in the Hall of Fame," said former Dodgers manager Tommy Lasorda, himself a Hall member, "but if he can help a charity more, there's nothing wrong with that."

True, in this same auction from Oct. 27 to Nov. 13 on SCPAuctions.com, also up for bid are Gibson's 1988 N.L. regular-season MVP Award and his replica '88 World Series trophy, with the proceeds going to his foundation. That will fund scholarships for the two high schools in Michigan that his mother and late father used to teach. The combined minimum bids for those two items are $30,000, expected to fetch in excess of $100,000.

Don't confuse those two charity-based hawked items with the other five 1988 World Series pieces.

Since we may never see the ball that Gibson hit for what's been called the biggest sports moment in Los Angeles history - the owner of it has never surfaced, and it would be nearly impossible to verify its authenticity without the holograms used on today's equipment - why wouldn't these treasures be placed somewhere to be marveled at by the public?

"I'm really at peace with what I'm doing," Gibson explained, implying that he's done listening to what other people think he should do with it.

He said that while his relationship with the media and fans has been touchy in the past, "it's much improved, and I'm going to continue to improve it," he said, knowing that as the Diamondbacks manager, that's probably a requirement.

"To add another group to that is the collectors. It's a huge environment. I think just as I realized that fans and media are a huge part of the game, the collectors, the people who display it, have museums, really cherish these things on a different level than I do. It's an important part of our game, keeping our game healthy."

Kohler, who has one of the greatest collections of Lakers memorabilia at his Orange County home, says it's more common these days for buyers of this kind of stuff to display it. For the public? Or in their own homes, with added security.

Yet there's no guarantee that whomever buys these items will put them on display, but Gibson says he's "hopeful" that happens.

Gary Cypres, the curator and megacollector who owns the Sports Museum of Los Angeles, agreed that they were "great pieces, and I'd love to own them," as he looked at the rooms of Dodger memorabilia in his personal treasure trove. But estimating a $200,000 fetch for the uniform, for example, "that's a lot," he said, noting that there's much more of an emotional tie to these items.

Having possession of them this long has actually given Gibson what he calls a "phobia," with his fearing they'll be destroyed in a fire. Yet, he's hung onto them. The bat, Gibson admits, was once requested by the Hall of Fame, but it never got there.

How it was that they weren't conveniently picked up by a locker room kid, or a team official, or someone else in the meyhem of that moment on Oct. 15, 1988, Gibson doesn't seem to be surprised.

"Well, they were mine," he said, adding that owner Peter O'Malley also gave him a giant LeRoy Neiman lithograph of that moment and allowed players to keep their jerseys and, presumably, other items.

At least we know where the bat is. For the time being. But for the rest of time, Gibson will handle it his way. He says he also has many items from his days with the Detroit Tigers - more equipment from the 1984 World Series - that he will sell off as well. Maybe for his foundation. Maybe not.

"I have my reasons," he said. "Let's leave it at that, OK?"

Sure. Fine. Whatever.

The bat alone, item No. 1198, has a opening bid of $25,000, with expectations that it could go for more than $200,000. So a price has just officially been set on a priceless archive of Los Angeles history.

Everyone in L.A. will remember where they were when Gibson hit the home run. Will they remember where they were when swatches of the event were parceled off to the highest bidder?

Heinz Kluetmeier/Sports Illustrated

Considering how much people say Kirk Gibson's 1988 Game 1 World Series homer was so much like the movie "The Natural," it's natural to assume that his bat, helmet and uniform would have been donated to the Baseball Hall of Fame at some point.

Gibson, apparently, kept the items. And now he's ready to sell.

A news conference Tuesday at the Sports Museum of L.A. will display the items and announce an auction for them taking place Oct. 27-Nov. 13.

SCP Auctions Inc., owned by famed collector David Kohler, will handle the sale of those items, as well as Gibson's World Series trophy and 1984 World Series MVP trophy. Gibson, the current manager of the Arizona Diamondbacks, will explain what he's doing via videotape. Tommy Lasorda is scheduled to be in attendance as well.

As for the ball that Gibson hit into the right-field pavilion, its whereabouts remain a mystery (linked here).

As for a ticket stub from the game, maybe not so tough to find (linked here):

Pepperdine guard Keion Bell (6-foot-3) wins the slam dunk contest by jumping over seven people (three teamates, four spectators) over the weekend at the Malibu campus, which held a Midnight Madness event over the weekend:

-- Steve Rosenberg

Highlights of the week ahead in sports, both here and afar:

MONDAY

MLB: ALCS Game 3: Texas at N.Y. Yankees, 5 p.m., TBS:

As the series shifts back to New York, this would be the perfect time for the Yankees to have Roger Clemens throw out the honorary first pitch -- then hand the ball to Andy Pettitte, standing behind him near the mound. Awkward? It's a moment that might make George Steinbrenner roll over in his monument. Unfortunately for the Yankees, the Rangers' Cliff Lee will cause more problems. He comes back into play after some ALDS Game 5 rest. Lee, two stops ago as a member of the Phillies, dominated the Yankees in last year's World Series. In Game 1 at Yankee Stadium, he was the first starting pitcher to throw a complete game without giving up an earned run against the Yankees in opening game of a postseason series, striking out 10. Lee came back to win Game 5. All Pettitte did was win Game 3 and decisive Game 6 winner. The beauty of all this scenario: In the offseason, Lee is a free agent. Again. And the Yankees desperately want him. "I don't think I'm going to have to do much recruiting," said current Yankees ace CC Sabathia. "He knows what it's like over here. I've talked to him a bunch." Meaning, by 2011, Lee will have been employed by five teams in less than three years, and possibly have been to two World Series in between.

NFL: Tennessee at Jacksonville, 5:30 p.m., ESPN:

Those Jags off in Jacksonville are still among the first teams mentioned when there's talk of moving someone to L.A., especially after having seven of their eight home games blacked out last season for failing to sell out before the 72-hour deadline. On Friday, they still hadn't sold the last 2,000 tickets for this one against their division rival. Somehow, they disappeared over the weekend, now the game's on. And the Jags squad will tumble for you.

TUESDAY

MLB: NLCS Game 3: Philadelphia at San Francisco, 1 p.m., Channel 11:

Who's the bigger boob, the one who thinks it's been chilly in Philly for the first two games of the series, or the one who think's it'll warm up once you hit the sunshine of San Francisco in autumn. Cole Hammels, the second "H" in the H20 Phillies' rotation, might be even colder standing on the mound with all those warmed-up Giants fans so excited just to be there and having an excuse to not work. He'll have plenty of support.

MLB: ALCS Game 4: Texas at N.Y. Yankees, 5 p.m., TBS:

The Yankees have so much faith in A.J. Burnett, they'll let him pitch tonight, only because it's a seven-game series, and they need to give Sabathia another day to rest up. The Rangers' Tommy Hunter is supposed to be the other pitcher in this non-marquee matchup.

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Utah at Anaheim Honda Center, 7 p.m., Channel 9:

As long as the Ducks are out of town again, let's try to sell the O.C. on NBA basketball again with a game that has no meaning in the grand scheme of things, but will induce a good number of people to actualy buy tickets. Why not just rent "Orange County" on Netflix and call it even.

NBA exhibition: Clippers vs. Sacramento, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m. Prime:

In all honesty, the Lakers should be performing their layup lines here, and the Clips should be in Anaheim. If you really want to make things fair.

Golf: PGA Grand Slam of Golf, 1 p.m., TNT:

You've got a reunion of the four guys who won the four Grand Slam events this year. Except, Masters champ Phil Mickelson said his psoriatic arthritis is flaring up, so Ernie Els will replace him. And British Open champ Louis Oosthuizen says he can't make it because he trashed ligaments on the outside of his left ankle, so David Toms is replacing him. U.S. Open champ Graeme McDowell of Northern Ireland, and PGA Championship Martin Kaymer of Germany say they'll be there. Where is there? The Port Royal Golf Course in Bermuda. Oh, and Ernie Johnson, who has called this event for many years on TNT, won't be there, either. He's doing the ALCS. The final go-round is Wednesday from 3-6 p.m.

WEDNESDAY

NHL: Kings vs. Carolina, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

It took the Hurricanes until December 7 to win their first road game last season. They lost their first 13 away games. Then they opened this season stopping Minnesota 4-3. In Helsinki. Hollywood may look just as good.

NHL: Ducks at Columbus, 4 p.m., Prime:

Columbus' day was over weeks ago.

MLB: ALCS Game 5: Texas at N.Y. Yankees, 1 p.m., TBS:

C.C. Sabathia was 8-3 in day games this year with a 2.67 ERA, and is 44-26 lifetime in the sun (3.20). He's also 11-2 in Yankee Stadium this season.

MLB: NLCS Game 4: Philadelphia at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Joe Blanton still pitches for the Phillies, but doesn't fit into the team's new marketing plan. He may not even make this start if Halladay has a say and the Phillies are desperate.

THURSDAY

College football: UCLA at Oregon, 6 p.m., ESPN:

In preparation for the nation's No. 2 team in new BCS rankings, Bruins head coach Rick Neuheisel has suspended kick returner Josh Smith (second in the conference in kickoff return yardage with 383 yards and sixth in yards per return with 27.4), and F-back Morrell Presley, a key part of the Pistol offense, for tonight's game before a failed drug test. That's it? What's the big dealio. It's not like they used a handicap placard or anything. Whatever confusing uniforms the Ducks of Oregon wear tonight will be enough to mess with the Bruins' heads in this nationally-televised battle. But then, that's what they said about UCLA going to Texas.

NHL: Kings at Phoenix, 7 p.m., FSW:

The city of Glendale, Ariz., says it finally reached a deal with investor Matt Hulsizer that will pave the way for him to buy the team and keep it anchored in the desert. Glendale set a Dec. 31 deadline to find a buyer or else the NHL would listen to offers to move the team, with Winnipeg widely seen as a front-runner to get its franchise back. And no one wants to be making roadies to Winnipeg again. Hulsizer is being asked to pay $165 million, apparently after having misplaced his discount coupon.

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Golden State in San Diego, 7 p.m., Channel 9:

The Warriors will feeling like the Globetrotters' version of the Washington Generals by the time this week is over.

NHL: Ducks at Philadelphia, 4 p.m., Prime:

The chances that the Ducks can pull their record up to .500 after this one?

MLB: NLCS Game 5: Philadelphia at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

It could be a rematch of Game 1. For fun.

FRIDAY

MLB: ALCS Game 6: N.Y. Yankees at Texas, 5 p.m., TBS:

Back in Texas on a high-school football Friday, prepare to see some empty saddles.

NCAA women's soccer: UCLA vs. USC, Coliseum, 7 p.m.:

They're promoting this as a chance for the Women of Troy to break an attendance record by playing their rivals at the cavernous Coliseum. They say they need more than 15,000. And the first 2,500 get a free scarf. Someone better bring a table soccer game for halftime.

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Golden State at Ontario, 7 p.m., Channel 9, ESPN:

They've been to London, Barcelona, and now, the Ontario that's not in Canada. At least this marks the final Lakers' final practice game. Barnes, you know the Triangle by now?

SATURDAY

Mixed martial arts: UFC 121, Honda Center, 5:20 p.m.

In the fourth UFC event ever held in Anaheim (after Nos. 59, 63 and 76), the headline bout is current "baddest man on the planet," heavyweight champ Brock Lesnar, taking on unbeaten challenger Cain Velasquez. Former champ Tito Ortiz is on the undercard. Forrest Griffin? Dang, the top-ranked light-heavyweight is still hurt, and they tell us he's not expected to come back from a shoulder injury until early next year, when he'll likely take on UFC middleweight champ Rich Frankin in UFC 126. That said, pick up Griffin's new-ish book, "Be Ready When the Sh*t Goes Down: A Survival Guide to the Apocalypse" (linked here). You'll laugh. You'll laugh. You'll laugh some more.

NHL: Kings at Colorado, 5 p.m., FSW:

The game will not be shown on the Staples Center jumboscreen. The joint is booked for a Shakira concert.

NHL: Ducks at Detroit, 4 p.m., KDOC:

The Red Wings already have a 4-0 win over the Ducks, back on opening night. They really have to meet again so soon?

MLB: NLCS Game 6: San Francisco at Philadelphia, 12:30 p.m., Channel 11:

Giants' scheduled starter, Jonathan Sanchez, already has beaten Roy Halladay and Cole Hammels in matchups during the regular season.

MLB: ALCS Game 7: N.Y. Yankees at Texas, 5 p.m., TBS:

Look up the performances of Jeter, Posada and Riviera in Game 7s over the years. This deep into the series, if it does go this far, can't be friendly for the Rangers.

College basketball exhibition: USC men's Cardinal and Gold game, Galen Center, 12:30 p.m.:

It beats shirts vs. skins.

SUNDAY

MLB: NLCS Game 7: San Francisco at Philadelphia, 4:30 p.m., Channel 11:

If the series gets this far, Giants reliever Brian Wilson will be in position to be the series MVP.

MLS: Galaxy vs. FC Dallas, Home Depot Center, 5 p.m., FSW:

Your Galaxy, a runner-up last year for the coveted Supporters' Shield, can still clinch it with a win in this regular-season finale. A loss here, combined with a Real Salt Lake win or tie against Colorado on Saturday, means the Galaxy would fall to second in the Western Conference and have to play Dallas again in the playoff opener. "We are bummed out," Landon Donovan said after the Galaxy's 3-1 loss to Colorado on Saturday, "but we still control our own destiny and next week means everything."

NFL: New England at San Diego, 1:15 p.m., Channel 2:

You'd think a Tom Brady sighting would help the Chargers sell this one out. If not, CBS always at Oakland at Denver in this time slot to fall back on.

NFL: Minnesota at Green Bay, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4:

Maybe there'll be some new evidence about Brett Favre texting Faith Hill, as played by Jayne Lynch.

Just stumbled upon these late one night during a parallel search, but the more you watch, you become fascinated not with the two latch-key kids who have nothing better to do with their time until mom comes home, but the spectators in the background who must be shouting things like, "Watch out for the hot tub!" or "Dude, you almost hit that sprinkler head!" or "When can we get a drink out of the garden hose?"

They're the ones with the cellphones up capturing this non-sanctioned bout from all angles.

Also read the comments below in each one after they're done to read the crowd's scoring of the fights. Even more hilarious than the fights themselves.

Until we find new ones, here are the silliest of the 25 or more already posted:

The Associated Press

IRVING, Texas -- The Dallas Cowboys have promoted former reality TV show winner Jesse Holley to the active roster, added after the team released offensive lineman Robert Brewster.

Holley, a wide receiver out of the University of North Carolina, was the winner of a show hosted by former Cowboys receiver Michael Irvin that guaranteed the winner a spot in Cowboys' training camp in 2009. Holley spent all of last season and the first month of this season on the practice squad. He could be active Sunday against Minnesota to play on special teams.

Brewster was a third-round pick last year who missed all of last season on the physically unable to perform list. He started a preseason game and saw action in one regular-season game.

We again extend our thanks again to all of those, especially in Dodgerblogville, who've sounded off on the fan-ownership concept we tried to layout this week (linked here).

As the third installment of the responses, we visit three of the most-visited Dodger fan sites, trusted voices who've probably seen and heard it all already:

== Rob McMillin, editor of 6-4-2 blog (linked here):

I have always been of the belief that MLB wouldn't allow a Green Bay Packers scenario because of a proscription on public ownership; the real reason is that business is good,

MLB doesn't want an undifferentiated mass of people it largely doesn't know running a team, and there will be no shortage of buyers available should the Dodgers end up on the auction block.

The itch to pander, which is always a bad idea, is doubly bad in baseball because unlike football, the draft is important but not for picking out college or high school stars (who may or may not turn into pro stars), but for eventually recognizing, through attrition, those who may become stars.

== Howard Cole, editor of BaseballSavvy.com (linked here):

Well, I'd love to see Dennis Gilbert get the Dodgers, but if it's going to be a large group of Los Angeles citizens, I'd just as soon buy the club myself. I figure, if the team is worth $800 million, I can round up 100,000 of my closest friends, who'll each chip in 8,000 bucks. I'd be managing partner, of course.

My first act of business, with fanfare, would be the removal of "Don't Stop Believin" from the stadium play list. Next, parking fees reduced to $10, Eric Collins goes to the Clippers, Mike Scioscia replaces Don Mattingly, and Sandy Koufax gets his statue at long last.

In honor of $150,000-a-year hair stylists, and as a final tribute to Dennis Mannion, Fantastic Sams kiosks ring the Reserve Level.

== Jon Weisman, from ESPNLosAngeles.com Dodger Thoughts (linked here):

I give all due credit to Tom Hoffarth of the Daily News for raising the topic of community ownership of the Dodgers and giving it a realistic appraisal. It has generated a lot of online conversation.

Having said that, can I tell you just how much I hate this idea? I don't just mean that it's unrealistic, which it is, as pretty much everyone concedes. I mean it is really, really unappealing to me.

Don't construe my response as an endorsement of anyone named McCourt as owner - far from it. But fan ownership to me is completely not the answer in my mind. It is the fire that has the potential to make the frying pan look comfy.

Has everyone gotten amnesia about what it's like when a group of Dodger fans talk about what's best for the team? Opinions, to eschew a coarser term, are like snowflakes - none are the same. Now imagine millions of them at once. The cacophony of disagreement would be deafening. And yet somehow, a person or persons hired by the fans to run the team would somehow transcend all of this and make everyone happy? I'm not buying that for a second. Yes, they would put the Dodgers' interests over swimming pools, but the thrill would end there.

The last thing I want to do is make this a political discussion, but as an example, we do gather as a community and choose someone to run something rather near and dear to us - it's called the city of Los Angeles. And as we can say, some things would get solved, but it's not like all our problems go away.

Given the impatience of most of the fan base in Los Angeles, the instability for the Dodgers in almost every aspect of the organization would probably be like nothing we've ever seen before (which is saying something in this era). In my mind, community ownership would essentially turn the Dodgers into a political football - a sport I have no interest seeing the team play.

The best hope for the Dodgers is for a responsible ownership to come in and support a responsible front office. That in itself is much easier said than done, but whatever happens, if we have stuff to complain about, at least we'd be complaining at them, not at each other. On the upside, we could end up with something like the Lakers, whom I think are fine to consider a role model in this respect - not perfect, but much better than what a few million co-owners would achieve.

My vision of community ownership brings to mind the final moments of "The Graduate," with Ben and Elaine on the bus, having finally gotten together, and saddled with those gloomy "Now what?" expressions on their faces. And even so, I give Ben and Elaine more hope than I'd give the fans who own the Los Angeles Dodgers.

The John Schulian anthology of the great John Lardner (pictured left) is something we highlighted in today's media column (linked here) as best we could -- we were almost inspired to call Lardner the "Cezanne of sportswriter" but thought better of it.

We couldn't pull it off like Lardner. Or Red Smith. Or Jim Murray. We realize our limitations, and we got it out of our system years ago. We think.

We've also come to realize that Schulian (pictured right, and linked here), who also did a marvelous book in '05 called "Twilight of the Long-Ball Gods" (linked here), may have some time and distance away from the daily grind of the sportswriting game, but he knows what he reads is quality, for-the-ages stuff, and what goes to the side of the media exit ramp as litter.

"It would be an odd fit if he were writing today," said Schulian of Lardner, who died in 1960 a month before his 48th birthday, as dying young seemed to run in his family. "He was so unque. Todays sportswriters, the columnists, they'reall pounding their chests and rending their garments and howling at the of their lunge every day. 'This football program is terrible, that general manager has to be fired, trade this guy, trade that guy.' And the next day they contradict themselves

"The artistry has gone out of column writing. There's little if any premium placed on being a wordsmith, on being an entertainer, on surprising people. The columnist all seem to follow the lead of sports-talk radio and that to my way of thinking is a fool's mission. That's just people passing on gossip and getting upset that Tim Wallach wasn't named the Dodgers manager. And then you ask: Have you ever seen Wallach manage one game? Did you go to Albuquerque and watch him to see his genius? No, they're just running off at the mouth because it's something to stir up the natives."

Putting Lardner up against today's writers reveals that.

"What I see almost is manipulative work: You beat up a guy in print and then write a weeper," said Schulian. "Then you submit it and get an award."

The beauty of having not just access to Schulian's book, but also the quickness of the Internet and websites such as Powells.com and Abebooks.com to track down lost copies of "The World of John Lardner," "Strong Cigars and Lovely Women," "It Beats Working" and "White Hopes and Others," gives much more depth and context to Lardner's work.

You sample the jar of candy, and you want more. And before you know it, it's Christmas on your doorstep.

The one I'll indulge in briefly was called "Thoughts on Radio-Televese" from 1959 New Yorker Magazine, found in "The World of John Lardner," as Lardner writes about how those who do interviews on TV or radio seem, at that time, to be butchering the language -- stuff that today might not even be caught in anyone's audio filter.

"Perhaps the most startling aspect of radio-televese is its power to more freely in time, space, and syntax, traposing past and future, beginnings and endings, subjects and objects. This phrase of the language has sometimes been called backward English, and sometimes, with a bow to the game of billiards, reverse English. ...

"It is occasionally argued in defense of broadcasters (though they need and ask for no defense) that they speak unorthodoxly because they must speak under pressure, hasily, spontaneously -- that their eccentricities are unintentional. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Their language is proud and deliberate. The spirit that has created it is the spirit of ambition Posterity would have liked it. In times to come, our forebears will be grateful."

And to think, Rick Monday was only 14 years old when this was written.

"Floyd Caves Herman, known as Babe, did not always catch fly balls on the top of his head, but he could do it in a pinch. He never tripled into a triple play, but he once doubled into a double play, which is the next best thing. For seven long years, from 1926 through 1932, he was the spirit of Brooklyn baseball. He spent the best part of his life upholding the mighty tradition that anything can happen at Ebbets Field, the mother temple of daffiness in the national game.

"Mr. Herman shook his head. 'How could they?' he said with simple dignity."

"Today's player won't let you see a side of them that the players did during the era when Lardner wrote," said Schulian, whose book, "The John Lardner Reader," is out point of focus in today's media column (linked here).

"Players today are so walled off and make enough money where they can live in a parallel universe. This money has fed their paranoia. You do have all the TMZs of the world and Entertainment Tonight and kids running around with iPhones looking to catch players in compromising sitautions. And it's clearly not too hard to do,. But there's not even any charm to these athletes. What charm is there shooting yourself in the leg?"

But among the writers today who Schulian does admire -- he makes the call that award-winning Joe Posnanski (and that's actually a releatively recent photo of him, pretending to be an old-time writer) whose recent profile on Vin Scully (linked here) was one of the best we've read in a long while, is one his favorites.

Now, you make the call.

Posnanski's current SI.com cover story on the 32 great sports calls of all time could have been an easy rehash read (linked here). These lists have been done for years, updated, reconfigured. But what Posnanski does here is taking it, again, to another level.

"Is the CALL great or is the MOMENT great? And does it even matter?" Posnanski asks.

"In the end, I think there is something ineffable about the greatest calls, something that -- when taken out of the moment -- might not seem so magical. Is "Havlicek steals the ball!" really so brilliant a four-word sentence? Is 'There are no flags on the field!' such a fascinating insight? Is 'The Giants win the pennant!' shouted again and again brilliant craftsmanship?

"I think it's the moment, the unrepeatable moment, that makes those calls breathtaking and chilling and wonderful. It is the singular dalliance between elation of the voice and wonderment of the moment and power of the words. Was Verne Lundquist's 'Yes!' ever so powerful as when Christian Laettner hit the shot that beat Kentucky?

"One short and familiar word -- the word you long to hear when you propose marriage, the word Marv Albert says with such authority when shots dropped -- was infused with something hard to describe when Lundquist said it. But it's still just a word. Does saying 'Yes!' really constitute one of the greatest calls in sports history?

"In a word: Yes."

Spoiler alert: Both Scully's call of Kirk Gibson's 1988 World Series Game 1 homer for NBC, and Jack Buck's call of it for CBS Radio, tied for No. 5 all time. Scully also has football call that made the Top 10, and another Dodgers' call that was a No. 17, another call about an ex-Dodger that was No. 19.

And he was probably short changed.

We'll let you investigate the rest...

Meanwhile:

== We're already thinking that the mainstream media's coverage of the TIger Woods' affair, going back to using TMZ photos from his car crash outside his home on Thanksgiving night, was setting the tone for future sports journalistic endeavors.

From that, we think the Brett Favre-Jenn Sturger saga, which was don't even feel like touching for various reasons, is more an outgrowth of the Woods' mess, but there are those who see it more as another starting point for today's information gathers, writes Eric Deggans of the Indiana Unversity National Sports Journalism Center (linked here).

We also direct you to the piece that Dan LeBatard did for TheBigLead.com (linked here), and that Richard Sandomir did for the New York Times (linked here), where he quotes ESPN's Vince Doria senior VP and director of news: "To me, that was a public acknowledgment that it had reached a point where the NFL considered the impact. Reaction of that sort lifts a story to where you can report it."
Can, or want?

== The MLB playoffs -- the ALCS starts tonight on TNT, while Fox has the NLCS starting Saturday -- wormed only two for-sure day games out of the first eight, with two more that could happen if either series gets to a sixth game. Monday's third game of the ALCS, as well as Games 2 and possibly 7 of the NLDS will go up against the NFL.

Fox reconnects Joe Buck with Tim McCarver on the NLDS, starting in Philadelphia on Saturday at 4:30 p.m. The pregame will include Chris Rose with Eric Karros and former Phillies reliever and current MLB Network analyst Mitch Williams for the first two contests.

TBS has Ernie Johnson Jr. with Ron Darling and John Smoltz, plus Craig Sager roaming around for the ALCS. By now, Smoltz must have figured that no playoff-bound team needed his services.

== More on Mel Kiper Jr., and what he does or doesn't do with his draft reporting on ESPN: The Sports Business Daily points out that the SI.com report makes it clear that this isn't the first time a mainstream media outlet has questioned Kiper's ties to agent Gary Wichard.

Wichard, who reportedly is the focus of a current NCAA and NFLPA investigation, was linked to Kiper in an April profile on Kiper in The Washington Post, but Kiper denied that he overhyped Wichard clients.

Going back to 1996, the Denver Rocky Mountain News published a profile of Kiper by Joel Buchbaum, the late Pro Football Weekly draft analyst.

"Let's put it this way, there are certain players who Mel seems a little high on, and very often, they'll belong to certain agents," Buchsbaum wrote, adding that Wichard was one of those agents. Kiper insisted that even though he and Wichard had been friends for 15 years, "if I don't like a player, I don't care who his agent is.''

== And for those still wondering: Lakers radio play-by-play man Spero Dedes was a late call doing CBS' Kansas City-Indianapolis with Dan Dierdorf was because studio anchor James Brown was unable to work because of illness, and Greg Gumbel was called back to New York to host the pregame show.

Dedes said he arrived with the Lakers on Friday afternoon from Barcelona after an 11-hour flight and got the call from CBS a few hours later, finding himself back on a plane headed to Indianapolis from L.A. on Saturday at 6 a.m.

With the Lakers' regular season coming up, Dedes' NFL gamecalls will probably be curbed unless he's able to work it into his schedule, as he was during the first five weeks of the season.

== Your L.A. NFL TV lineup for this weekend:

Sunday:

= 10 a.m., Channel 2: San Diego at St. Louis (with Don Criqui and Steve Beuerlein, which, on the CBS ranked games in this window, would seem pretty low after Baltimore-New England with Nantz and Simms, Kansas City-Houston with Gus Johnson and Steve Tasker, Miami-Green Bay with Ian Eagle and Dan Fouts or Cleveland-Pittsburgh with Kevin Harlan and Solomon Wilcots).

= 10 a.m., Channel 11: Atlanta at Philadelphia (with Kenny Albert, Darryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa, over Detroit-N.Y. Giants with Dick Stockton and Charles Davis; Seattle-Chicago with Chris Myers and Brian Billick or New Orleans-Tampa Bay with Sam Rosen and Tim Ryan)

= 1 p.m., Channel 11: Dallas at Minnesota (with Thom Brennaman and Troy Aikman; CBS also has two games in this window: N.Y. Jets-Denver with Greg Gumbel and Dan Dierdorf, and Oakland-San Francisco with Bill Macatee and Rich Gannon).

= 5:20 p.m, Channel 4: Indianapolis at Washington (with Al Michaels, Cris Collinsworth and Andrea Kremer)

Monday:

= 5:30 p.m., ESPN: Tennessee at Jacksonville (with Mike Tirico, John Gruden and Ron Jaworski).

== Barry Thompkins and Petros Papadakis have the USC-Cal game for Prime Ticket on Saturday at 12:30 p.m., again likely blacked out by those who have the Dish Network. Those folks can always tune into KSPN-AM (710) and hear Pete Arbogast refer to Trojans tailback Allen Bradford as "LenDale White" has he has the last couple of weeks. Going back to the USC-Washington game, Arbogast not only miscalled Bradford as White, but the ballcarrier was actually Stanley Havili.

== For ESPN2's coverage of Minnesota at Purdue (Saturday, 9 a.m.) Brian Griese will work with his dad, Bob Griese, as the analysts for Dave Pasch. Too bad it isn't Michigan against Purdue. ESPN has Carter Blackburn, Brock Huard and Mike Bellotti for Oregon State-Washington at 7:15 p.m. Saturday, right after Brent Musburger and Kirk Herbstreit call No. 1 Ohio State at Wisconsin (4 p.m., ESPN instead of ABC).

AND FINALLY:

== An Associated Press story about poor TV Azteca reporter Inez Sainz saying she didn't want to venture into NFL locker rooms anytime soon actually was listed as the No. 3 headline on ESPN.com's front page for a long while Thursday (linked here).

They had a news conference near Universal Studios to allow her to admit: "I'm not going into the locker rooms anymore. It's not a good place right now for me. I don't want to be in there. ... I need to wait one month to work again because I don't want to be the focus. I'm not looking for that kind of publicity. It affects my career and development in the States."

The AP story also noted she was wearing "a black-white-and-lime green sequined mini skirt and white blouse" on Thursday.

Coochie-coochie.

Top Rank, meanwhile, is looking for some publicity. It sent out a release that "international sports reporter" Sainz will host daily behind-the-scenes features for the international broadcast team during the week leading up to the Manny Pacquiao-Antonio Margarito world super welterweight title pay-per-view fight in Dallas on Nov. 13.

The release says Sainz "will utilize her vast experience interviewing sports personalities from around the globe in producing fresh and insightful reports" that will be available online as well as fed to TV outlets via satellite. Top Rank president Todd duBoef is quoted: "Inés will be a valuable addition in providing sports fans unique stories on the fighters and the event during fight week and the fight broadcast itself that we have never had before. Inasmuch as she is bilingual and has the experience of covering major sporting events worldwide and has interviewed the top athletes in those events, she will help enhance our coverage of Pacquiao vs. Margarito and attract a wider audience to the sport of boxing. Top Rank feels very fortunate to have her for this event."

Inasmuch as Top Rank didn't want to, it also sent an attached photo with the release, used here.

Well played, Inez. From the photo, we're not clear: Is that your working outfit, or is this before you're headed out for your 5-year high-school reunion?

To follow up more on this (linked here), we have a little more of that:

== Terry Cannon, director of the Baseball Reliquary:

While it's a fun idea to think about (who wouldn't want to open up their stocking on Christmas Day and find a few shares of stock in the local baseball team?), there's no possible way MLB would allow public ownership of a franchise. The idea would not even be considered by MLB's Commissioner and Executive Committee, who would view public ownership as not being "in the best interests of baseball."

The Major League Constitution clearly defines the Commissioner as having the authority to take any action he deems necessary "in the best interests of baseball," which gives him sovereign power. Of course, the truth is that the current Commissioner rarely does anything to help the game itself. What he does is use his power to reward, and to pad the pockets of, the owners he works for, and to punish those he disagrees with.

MLB, in essence, is an oligarchy run by control freaks. The owners are wealthy and powerful men who have one interest: to preserve their wealth and power. They also want to be united and of the same opinion when it comes to any matters concerning the game's structure and finances. Their power is rooted in unanimity, and dissident owners are quickly censured.

Bill Veeck is the classic example of an owner whose views constantly clashed with the baseball establishment, but that was an earlier generation. MLB does not want another Bill Veeck in their midst. That's why I'm convinced someone like Mark Cuban will never own an MLB team. He's just too off-the-cuff, too much of a loose cannon for the tight-lipped millionaires and billionaires who run the business of baseball.

But MLB would most likely view public ownership as even more onerous than Mark Cuban. The thought of a totally unknown quantity sitting across from the owners in the MLB boardroom -- and, God forbid, it might even be a baseball fan like you or me -- would cause many a sleepless night for the bigwigs that run the Big Show.

There's no doubt that the McCourts are an embarrassment to Los Angeles and to MLB, and I'm sure their activities are being monitored closely by the Commissioner. But don't expect the Commissioner or any owner to "pull an O'Malley" and actually state an opinion about the mess in Los Angeles. The fact is that although the Dodger brand is being tarnished with each passing day under the McCourt ownership, the franchise's value may be higher than ever and the divorce is not negatively affecting the pocketbooks of other owners.

So why should the owners worry? I mean, after all, if they survived steroids and came out making more money than ever, what harm will be done to them by the McCourts' incessant bickering?

In the meantime, here's my suggestion for down-in-the-dump Dodger fans who are agonizing over whether or not to buy those season tickets or multi-game packages. Everyone should take the money they are thinking about spending, pool their resources, and turn the tables on the McCourts.

Let's hire Vladimir Shpunt, the Russian psychic, set him up in front of a photo of the lovely couple, and have him send negative energy to the McCourts to get them the hell out of town. Now that's an idea Bill Veeck would have embraced!

== Josh Fisher of DodgerDivorce.com (linked here):

The premise is that you and I will lay out some of our money to buy a piece of the team. I see two threshold problems:

First, while I'm certainly against using public money to make this happen, we must recognize that the same financial issues the state faces are affecting many of us, too. Simply put, the same way there are fewer billionaires ready to buy the Dodgers outright than there were a few years ago, there are also fewer civilians, as it were, prepared to lay out thousands for an interesting piece of paper.

The second problem, of course, is a technical one. It would be awfully tough to pull this off. ... While there might be nothing that explicitly forbids public ownership of a Major League franchise, that approval process would seem to serve as a de facto prohibition, should MLB choose to use it as such. Baseball often has enough trouble reining in small ownership groups. Imagine how it feels about a group of thousands.

One of the several tracks on repeat during the McCourt trial was Jamie McCourt's supposed unwillingness to submit to the structures of ownership: the personal guarantees, indemnifications, invasive background investigation, et cetera. The point is that Baseball really likes keeping the club small and private. Full disclosure is not Baseball's strong suit. ...

The takeaway, in my opinion, is that we really do view the Dodgers as something much more than a business, and we would like whoever or whatever controls the Dodgers to feel the same. Nothing would be a purer solution than for the fans themselves to own the team, but that's unlikely for a host of reasons. Instead, we'll hope for the next best option: that whoever owns the Dodgers, McCourt or otherwise, reestablish a connection with the city that has been lost over the last decade.

== Roberto Baly, from VinScullyIsMyHomeboy.com (linked here):

The fans in charge? Let's be honest, that would be scary.

It would be cool to be like the Green Bay Packers. But let's wake up, it's not going to happen.

If the Dodgers do get on the market, I would like a couple of ownership groups to be involved. I'm asking for business men and women from Southern California. You can have a majority owner and several minor owners.

I wouldn't want them to run the team. Hire someone with baseball experience and name him or her President of the club. The President will be in charge with all baseball duties. The general manager needs to go to the President before making any baseball on the field moves.

Then, you hire another person that's in charge of the business side of baseball. You see, you hire several people and form a great group. If you have the correct people, you will succeed.

Let me give you an example. Jerry Buss is the majority owner of the Los Angeles Lakers. But they have many minority owners that includes the Anschutz Entertainment Group (AEG) and Magic Johnson.

AEG does a great job in Staples Center and fan experience. It can happen with the Dodgers too.

== Ernest Reyes, editor of DodgersBlueHeaven blog (linked here):

I have thought about how cool it would be to be a part owner of the team for years. Imagine the Green Bay model in L.A.

On a side note, a Dodger team owned by the city would be a nightmare. Imagine future elections centered around whether the Mayor would fire the manager or should the team go into rebuilding mode. Local politics would become more unbearable than you could imagine.

== Eric Stephen, editor of TrueBlueLA.com blog (linked here):

While I think fan ownership is an intriguing idea, I wonder in the end just how effective the execution of a plan can be. I liken this to fan walk-outs. In theory, it sounds like a great idea to make a stand, but not enough people are willing to follow through.

Count me as a skeptic. Even if there were enough fans willing to take the leap into ownership, and it could be achieved in some sort of organized way, I don't think it would be approved by MLB. I think the best bet for the Dodgers is either to get a new owner without the massive debt load of Frank McCourt, or for an equity partner to ride in on a white horse and help utilize one of the top operating revenues in the league.

== The editors of SonsOfSteveGarvey.com (linked here)
Sure it's a pipe dream. But fans can dream, can't they?

== From reader Al Sheahen, Sherman Oaks:

Tom Hoffarth's well-researched column is right. Why should assorted billionaires own sports teams that rightly should belong to the communities who support and identify with the teams?

For every Jerry Buss who wants to win, you get others who use their teams to boost their egos and use as tax write-offs.

The McCourts are pinching every penny they can. The Dodgers finished a distant fourth in the National League West this year and prospects for 2011 are even dimmer. Dodger free agents are going to walk. The McCourts are treating the Dodgers, not as the civic institution it should be, but as their own private piggy bank. And they just rubbed our nose in it by raising ticket prices.

Green Bay got it right many years ago. It virtually sold the Packers to a group of taxpayer/investors throughout Wisconsin. The team is a civic institution. It will never leave Green Bay. The team has had more on-field success than any other NFL franchise. It makes money.

Why can't Los Angeles do the same?

== From reader Robert E. Stenson of El Segundo:

There is an old Irish expression that goes "It seemed like a good idea at the time." This line is frequently heard after the speaker has tossed back a few too many pints and then made some tragically stupid decision like going home to tell his wife that he is not going to the Christening for his sister-in-law's baby on Super Bowl Sunday because she was an idiot for scheduling it on that day.

It would appear that Mr. Hoffarth and Councilwomen Hahn may have been bending the elbow one too many times at their favorite Los Angeles public house when they came up with this retread of an idea.

While I could fill a similarly voluminous column with reasons against public ownership, I will instead revert to the hackneyed rip off of David Letterman's Top Ten List of why you don't want citizens owning the Dodgers:

10. 9.8 million people showing up to games saying "Don't worry, I don't need a ticket, I'm an owner."

9. The cost of stocking the refrigerator and bar in the owner's box.

8. Expanding the clubhouse to accommodate all of the owners for the presentation of the World Series trophy.

7. Scott Boras buying shares and then, through a proxy fight, forcing the Dodgers to sign all of his clients to 20-year guaranteed contracts.

6. I can't find a job in Los Angeles but at least I own part of a team that pays its average player $3.9 million.

5. Having a stock certificate on my wall as a daily reminder that I can't afford to go to a game.

4. Knowing that I was stupid enough to throw away my money by buying the stock as opposed to just having it taken from me through taxes.

3. Now every time Hoffarth writes a bad column about the Dodgers, it won't just be fans sending him hate mail, it will be owners.

2. The new team slogan, "Are you feeling blue now?" will hit just a little too close to home as an owner.

1. Out of 33 million people in this state, we decided that Meg Whitman and Jerry Brown were our two best choices for governor.

"Stanley Ketchel was twenty-four years old when he was fatally shot in the back by the common-law husband of the lady who was cooking his breakfast."

It's not just John Schulian's opinion that those are quite certainly the 25 most perfect words ever written by a sportswriter -- John Lardner's lead to a story entitled "Down Great Purple Valleys" from a 1954 issue of True Magazine, about the former world middleweight boxing champion, who some say was the best ever in his class.

In Schulian's new book, "The John Lardner Reader: A Press Box Legend's Classic Sportswriting" (linked here), equally esteemed sportswriter Dan Jenkins agrees. About Lardner being in a class of his own as well.

"It's my strenous opinion that any newspaper or magazine sports scribe over the last fifty years who is worth his weight in typewritter ribbons -- or delete keys nowadays, I should say -- has studied the works of John Lardner, the greatest sportswriter who ever lived ... Literary giant is more accurate," Jenkins writes in the forward to Schulian's book.

Roger Kahn, of "The Boys of Summer" fame, did the 1961 anthology of Lardner's work, published a year after Lardner's death. Kahn recently wrote in his 2004 book, "Memories of Summer: When Baseball Was a Art And Writing About it was a Game," that the best Lardner lead he ever came across was on Bill Veeck after he recently purchased what was considered to be just about the worst team in baseball at the time: "Bill Veeck bought the St. Louis Browns, under the impression the Browns were owned."

Schulian, who says he first read Kahn's book on Lardner in 1972, adds in his own re-intro: "John Lardner has been forgotten. That's as wrong as wearing white socks at a funeral."

We've caught up with Pasadena-based Schulian, a former sports columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times and Philadelphia Daily News, included in the "Sports Illustrated Fifty Years of Great Writing" and frequent "Best Sports Stories" anthology, who reinvented himself as a Hollywood TV scriptwriter but tends to most of his days now trying to bring a new generation up to speed on some of the best writing that can't be left behind.

Friday's media column will get into the legacy of Lardner, the oldest son of legendary humorist Ring Lardner .

Meanwhile:

== A John Lardner bio (linked here)

== Another interesting bio, including in an amazing listing of a donations his daughter made of her father's personal correspondence and other effects to the Newburry Library of Chicago (linked here)

== An National Public Radio show interview Schulian did recently on his Lardner book: (linked here)

== Columnist Stan Isaac's review of the Lardner Reader (linked here)

Wednesday's column (linked here) may not have hit it out of the park on public ownership of the Dodgers, but it found a gap and drew a nice assortment of reader email, and we're thankful for that.

Absurd as the premise may be to some, we also went the self-abusive route and sent the column to several Angelinos whose opinions we think matter. You might be surprised by their responses.

For starters:

== Radio personality and wine taster Tom Leykis (linked here):

First of all, my roots with and love for the Dodgers run deep, starting with my late aunt, Bernadette O'Mara, who went to school in Brooklyn with Peter O'Malley.

I would gladly do it if I had a billion dollars. Since I don't, I am prepared to do whatever I can to help whoever will end this public nightmare that has been created at the most Beautiful Ravine on Earth. And if Mr. McCourt won't sell, we have to do what is the hardest for those of us who love the Dodgers to do and that is to stay away from Dodger Stadium until it becomes financially untenable for him to hold onto the team. Let's see how intransigent he can be if attendance drops by a million or two.

== Comedian Matt Iseman, host of the Versus show "Sports Soup" (linked here):

The McCourts have turned the once-proud Dodgers into an incompetent team that regularly snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. As citizens of L.A., we cannot allow the Dodgers to encroach on the territory so ably and reliably filled by the Clippers. We must purchase back los Doyers.

To sweeten the deal, we can give the McCourts their own reality show on E! called 'Courting with the McCourts' ... Jamie can court her employees while Frank goes to court to prove he not only owns the Dodgers but also holds the deed to the Louisiana Purchase.

Plus, if we owned the team, I could ask Vin Scully to call my drive to the ballpark and that would make the traffic on the 5 so much more bearable.

I am in. Where to I give my check for $97?

== Chad Moriyama, editor of MemoriesOfKevinMalone.com Dodger blog (linked here):

I'm a bit of a skeptic by nature, so I have to wonder whether fans would be this committed to begin with. I assume that the divorce story is mainstream enough to disgust even the most common fan, but whether that's enough for them to actually take action or not is something else entirely. After all, these are the same fans that were asking for Frank McCourt's autograph last month, so I'm not exactly on solid ground with the majority of fans.

I will say that this would make a great story, and in the short term, I don't see how it could be any worse than the road of doom and gloom that most Dodgers fans are already heading down.

A link to Wednesday's story: http://www.dailynews.com/sportscolumnists/ci_16324037

Do you think this could work? Email me at thomas.hoffarth@dailynews.com

wateromalley.com, via USC Specialized Libaries and Archives Collection.
Los Angeles County Supervisor Kenneth Hahn, left, and L.A. City Councilwoman Rosalind Wyman, two of the parties responsible for securing the Dodgers, make a presentation of an official proclamation welcoming Walter O'Malley and the ballclub in October, 1957.

It was about 10 days ago when L.A. City Councilwoman Janice Hahn's office issued a press release that may have gone under the radar, but years from now could be looked back on as a rather historic document.

== An explanation as to how it works to be a Green Bay Packers shareholder (linked here)
== An explanation of the "Give Fans A Chance Act" (linked here and linked here)
== Background on the Minnesota Twins' discussion once about community ownership (linked here).
== The bulk of the Major League Baseball ownership constitution (linked here)
== More predicent in community-owned pro sports teams (linked here)

The announcement at a press conference today that the Pasadena City Council has approved a $152 million renovation of the Rose Bowl that will start in January and be finished sometime before the 2013 football season -- in time for the 100th Rose Bowl game -- bodes well for an 88-year-old facility that's been a historic landmark property in Southern California.

And, they're still keeping those awesome metal bench seats that burn your legs on a sunny day, right? And keeping the cellphone reception to less than a half-bar, if we're lucky, correct?

But we do know they're adding a hedge on the field, like at the University of Georgia. And cutting the seating capacity down to about 89,000. And a lot more stuff.

The promises made in a press release issued just prior to today's press conference insist the Bruins will remain as tennants through 2042, with the New Year's Day Rose Bowl staying put through 2043.

That's forward thinking.

The Rose Bowl folks say that even without all the new, cool stuff, the stadium would still have needed $60 million in repairs just for safety reasons. So why not go more and really make USC feel less superior with its "renovated" Coliseum.

Primary funding for the renovations would come from bonds to be issued by the city of Pasadena -- no additional donations or a spike in ticket prices are supposed to be required of UCLA fans to fund any of this. A private philanthropic group, Legacy Connections, Inc., will do the fundraising campaign to raise funds for additional project elements to complete the renovation. There will also be an internet program established soon that allows small donations to be made toward the project.

The work is supposed to be done before and after UCLA's season and the Rose Bowl game. Groundbreaking should come in the middle of next month.

"We have been working diligently on this exciting project with the city of Pasadena and the Rose Bowl," said UCLA athletic director Dan Guerrero in the press release. "UCLA and the Rose Bowl have enjoyed a wonderful partnership since 1982 and we look forward to expanding on that relationship for at least the next 30 years."

In a Q-and-A section of the Rose Bowl's official website, it is asked: Does this mean Pasadena is trying to lure an NFL team, or a Super Bowl, to the site someday? The answer given: The residents of Pasadena defeated a ballot initative to negotiate for an NFL team in Pasadena. Improvements will preserve and reflect the traditions of the Rose Bowl as college football's premiere venue while enhancing the stadium to attract high-profile events, such as international soccer, and concerts, such as the 2009 U2 event.

Another question asked: Why do this now in such tough economic times? The answer: It is taking advantage of "a window of opportunity" with current low interest rates, lower construction costs and the project is eligible for stimulus funding through Dec., 2010 with Build America Bonds.

And about that seat issue: Will they be changed?

That answer: "Fan comfort is a major consideration and seating is an important part of that." And here comes the "but" for your butt: "However, due to the seating foundation in the historic landmark, the ability to alter seat spacing and size is limited. The Rose Bowl Organizing Committee and its stakeholders continually seek options to improve seating."

In other words, bring a blanket. And be glad if you have a back to your bench. And hope that hedge doesn't grow too high for your sightlevel.

So, what are they about to do? Here's the list:

== Widening the tunnels from the concourse to the seating area, adding aisles and seat access from the field.

== Widening the concourse for easier access to restrooms, seats and concession stands.

== Upgrading restrooms.

== A 50 percent increase in concession areas.

== A new video board -- 2 1/2 times larger than the current one.

== Fixing up the south scoreboard to keep its 1940s vintage look.

== A hedge around the field. "This will become an integral element of the field-level stadium access, acting as the barrier between fans and the playing field and improving ingress/egress to the lower levels of the stadium," the release says. Don't hedge your bets that this will go over well with anyone.

== The press box will be "substantially reconstructed" to include a "limited inventory" of luxury suites, loge boxes, club seats and lounge areas. It sounds as if the press who actually sit in the box won't be all that upgraded, but we'll be fine. Really.

After this season, the first phase will include upgrading the electrical serice, start on the south tunnels, fix the scoreboard, remodel some restroms and set the foundation for the new press box. In 2012, they'll work on the north press box wing and center section, north tunnels 7A and 15A, field-level entrances and exits, and new restrooms on the south end. In 2013, the south win of the press box goes, the hedge goes in, more concourse improvements and the north tunnels get revamped,

More info: www.rosebowlstadium.com

By Brian Mahoney
The Associated Press

Vlade Divac never had the chance to repair a friendship torn apart by war.

Divac, pictured above, and Drazen Petrovic were roommates on Yugoslavia's world championship team, confidants who spent long nights on the phone after they moved across the globe to chase their NBA dreams.

The calls soon stopped, followed by just about all communication. They were on opposite sides in a world that was breaking apart, and that was too much for their bond built around basketball.

Petrovic, pictured right, was killed in a car accident before the fighting stopped, so Divac will never know if he could have salvaged that relationship, as he eventually did with other teammates from Croatia.

The story is told in the new film "Once Brothers," which will debut on ESPN on Tuesday as part of its "30 for 30" series.

Divac, the one-time Lakers center, narrates the NBA Entertainment production, in which he visits Petrovic's homeland for the first time in two decades. A Serb was unwelcome there for many years after Croatia fought for and gained its independence -- Divac even skipped Petrovic's 1993 funeral -- and he's come to realize why he was shunned for so long by people he considered friends.

"I was mad, I didn't understand back then," he said in a phone interview. "Now I understand what kind of situation that they were in. But back then, for me it was shocking."

AP Photo/John Amis
Former President Jimmy Carter adjusts his cap during the first inning of Game 3 of the NLDS between the Atlanta Braves and the San Francisco Giants on Sunday in Atlanta.

Highlights of the week ahead in sports, both here and afar:

MONDAY

MLB playoffs: NLDS Game 4: San Francisco at Atlanta, 4:30 p.m., TBS:

Face it: No one's mistaking Brooks Conrad with Brooks Robinson right now in Atlanta. As the insufferable tomahawk chop lives to see another day, Braves fans would be in a better mood if not for the choppy play of their second baseman, a fill-in for injured All Star Martin Prado. The Giants, one win away from a visit to the NL Championship Series, give Tim Lincecum another day's rest and try rookie Madison Bumgarner, who didn't face the Braves this year.

NFL: Minnesota at N.Y. Jets, 5:30 p.m., ESPN:

Has anyone ever played in back-to-back Monday Night Football games? Randy Moss, you're up. Last week, with the Patriots. This week, back with the Vikings. Next week ... So why did Moss get traded back to Minnesota in the first place? CBS' Charley Casserly said on Sunday's NFL pregame show some of it may have to do with an argument Moss had with QB Tom Brady: "The week before Moss was traded, Tom Brady and Randy Moss went toe-to-toe and had to be separated when it happened. One of Brady's problems with Moss was his behavior as a Patriot. Then one of the things that was overheard was Brady telling Moss he needed to cut his beard. Moss countered,'You need to get your haircut. You look like a girl.'" As to why the Vikings were on the receiving end, Fox's Howie Long says: "I'm really not surprised. For Minnesota, the time is now, particularly with Brett Favre at quarterback. You're trying to take advantage of Favre's presence and maybe build a new stadium. They could easily be 3-0 coming out of this bye week. Minnesota is a good football team and Randy Moss now makes them a great football team." Meanwhile, back in N.Y., Favre is trying to avoid talking about this controversy he got himself into with sending photos of his junk to the Jets' "reporter" back in the day (linked here). The New York Post reported that "he went deep and came up short." Memo to Mark Sanchez through all this: Lay low and stay clean.

NHL: Ducks at St. Louis, 11 a.m., Prime:

A daytime event, so the kids ducking out of school on Columbus Day have a viable option.

TUESDAY

AP Photo/Chris O'Meara
The Angels may have the Rally Monkey, but the Tampa Bay Rays have DJ Kitty, who made an appearance on the Tropicana Field jumbo screen during Game 1 of an ALDS last Wednesday.

MLB playoffs: ALDS Game 5: Texas at Tampa Bay, 5 p.m., TBS:

The Rangers and Rays have given home-field advantage a bad name through the first four games. After Tampa finally figured out how to hit again in Games 3 and 4, it has to face Texas' Cliff Lee again for the second time in less than a week. But with that assignment may come one last appearance by Tampa's DJ Kitty - the Rays' answer to the Angels' Rally Monkey. The St. Petersburg Times reports (linked here) that since mid September, when the video of a hip-hop-dressed cat with a turntable debuted at Tropicana Field, more than 921,000 people have viewed it online - or 30 times the number of fans who show up for games on good days.

NHL: Kings vs. Atlanta, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

It's Bob Miller's 72nd birthday for the Kings' home opener. Our Top 72 Bob Miller moments: No. 72, the time he .... really, are we going to do this list? How about just put him up on the new jumbo-jumbo-jumbo Staples Center scoreboard, sing him "Happy Birthday" between periods, and let him call a victory against a team we didn't even realize was still in the league. By the way, nice vintage jerseys in the Saturday opener at 'Couver. Any chance of wearing 'em down here?

Series: "E:60," ESPN, 4 p.m.:

The press release says: "Reporter Rachel Nichols and the E:60 cameras offer an all-access view into what New York Jets second-year quarterback Mark Sanchez is doing to shake off his 'new kid' reputation and become the leader of a team projected as a Super Bowl contender - including an exclusive, inside look at what the take-charge Sanchez did for his receivers this summer." Take that, Inez.

NBA exhibition: Clippers vs. San Antonio in Mexico City, 6:30 p.m., NBA TV:

S#!t My Clippers Owner Does: Donald Sterling had his annual "white party" at his Malibu estate recently -- white was the color of clothes you were asked to wear, not the color of ... never mind. Yet, Sterling wore all black. He didn't get his own memo? He wanted to stand out? He was trying to blend in? Watch the video (linked here). Now, let's see how this party will fly in Mexico City. Is Sterling's visa still honored south of the border? What are the chances that this Clipper trip gets included in the current storyline of "Eastbound & Down"?

WEDNESDAY

MLB playoffs: If necessary: NLDS Game 5: Atlanta at San Francisco, 4:30 p.m., TBS:

Back to getting their "Freak" on if the Giants need it for this one.

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Sacramento in Las Vegas, 7 p.m., Channel 9:

A bio for the Maloof family (linked here) makes it clear that while Gavin and Joe are most associated with the Sacramento Kings' team ownership, the ever-confident-lookng brother George, a UNLV grad with a BA in hotel management, "is the leading force behind the building and operation of the hottest property in Las Vegas, the Palms, which is owned by the Maloof family, and has become one of the most sought-after destinations in the entertainment capital of the world." The Lakers will probably just be satisfied with flying in and flying home before and after this event.

NHL: Ducks vs. Vancouver, Honda Center, 7 p.m., Prime:

The two teams split their four-game series a year ago, but the Canucks won the last two en route to building momentum for the playoffs.

THURSDAY

NBA exhibition: Clippers vs. Denver, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m.:

Pucker up, sporties. Since no one is apt to watch this exhibition, go over to KCET Channel 28 for "Visiting . . . with Huell Howser." We may catch hell for this, but our wonder boy hangs out with six-time musical whistling champion Carole Anne Kaufman (linked here), whom the Clippers should consider hiring to perform the national anthem every home game. Seriously.

FRIDAY

MLB: American League Championship Series Game 1, N.Y. Yankees at Texas or Tampa Bay, TBA, TBS:

New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg said even before the Yankees finished a sweep of the Twins last week that he was "sort of trying to figure out where the parade should start" if there's another World Series march through town to do again. Eight more wins, and championship No. 28 would be in the bag. Yankees general manager Brian Cashman warned that "no one here is planning for anything like that . . . That stuff [is] not entering in any of our minds. We don't want to disappoint him, but more importantly we don't want to disappoint our fans. So I know they have the same hopes we have. But we've got a long way to go." Game 2 of this series lands on Saturday.

NHL: Kings vs. Vancouver, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

It's either this, or the opening of "Jackass-3D." What would Jack Johnson do?

NHL: Ducks vs. Atlanta, Honda Center, 7 p.m., Prime:

Five games into the season, they're handing out free magnet schedules to fans who show up to this one. Problem is, the picture here is actual size.

SATURDAY

MLB: National League Championship Series Game 1, San Francisco or Atlanta at Philadelphia, TBA, Channel 11:

You want a piece of Roy Halladay on a week-plus rest? The Phillies' "H20" rotation pretty much dominated the Reds in the NLDS, and a third trip to the NLDS (this time, not against the Dodgers) has to make them the heavy favorite no matter the opponent. Game 2 is Sunday.

Study: Americans Get Majority Of Exercise While Drunk

College football: USC vs. Cal, Coliseum, 12:30 p.m., FSW:

In the video above, a recent story from The Onion reports that 75 percent of Americans get their exercise while drunk -- chasing a crying girlfriend down the street, trying to find your car, stupid overzealous dancing, bar fighting, running after shoplifting hot dogs from a Circle K, keg stands, throwing glass mugs against a wall, climing the local water tower, sex in a bathroom stall ... It's all the kind of stuff that USC students attending a home football game have to look forward to for the rest of this season. The Trojans may not be in a bowl game, but their student section could be the strongest in the Pac-10 by the end of November. By the way, if the visiting Bears have the ball with about a minute to play trailing by two, Trojans fans probably won't bear to watch.

MLS: Galaxy vs. Colorado, Home Depot Center, 7:30 p.m., Prime:

Rapidly, the Galaxy's season is nearing an end. One more after this, then the playoffs. So, too, is the 2011 Miss Galaxy contest reaching a climax. We're getting behind Ethel R. (linked here). What say you, Becks?

NBA exhibition: Clippers vs. Utah, Staples Center, 4:30 p.m.; Lakers vs. Denver, Staples Center, 7:30 p.m., FSW:

The annual practice-game doubleheader at Staples doesn't interfere with any appearances by the "So You Think You Can Dance World 2010 Tour." But you kind of wish it did.

SUNDAY

College football: "BCS Countdown," ESPN, 5:15 p.m.:

The first Bowl Championship Series poll of the season comes out today, on this show. Right up against "Sunday Night Football." Where will USC and UCLA be ranked!

NFL: Dallas at Minnesota, 1 p.m., Channel 11:

Enough already of the Vikings in one week. Can't they just move to L.A. and get it over with?

NFL: Indianapolis at Washington, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4:

This matchup looked way better when the season started, but at least they're both above .500 at this point.

NHL: Ducks vs. Phoenix, Honda Center, 5 p.m., Prime:

Three home games in a row ends for the Ducks, who after this have to take a week-and-a-half, four-game roadie. One reason: UFC is coming in for a show in their house.

The Associated Press

MILWAUKEE -- While baseball is still refusing to fully embrace video replay, another sport with balls and strikes is getting on board. The Professional Bowlers Association will begin using replay to resolve disputed calls.

For competitors who value pinpoint accuracy, it's a move that's right up their alley.

"Everybody wants to win, but nobody wants to win by an unfairly judged call," said PBA Hall of Famer Parker Bohn III, who was involved in a controversy over the impromptu use of replay during an event in 1999 that led to players voting it out of the sport.

The introduction of replay on a permanent basis isn't expected to be a major change for bowling because officials don't anticipate many situations where reviews will be needed. There have been only a handful of disputes in recent memory that might have warranted a second look.

One area is foul line infractions, when a bowler's foot slips past the line that marks the beginning of the lane as he delivers the ball. There also can be issues if a pinsetting machine knocks over a pin, which isn't supposed to count.

"It doesn't happen often," says PBA vice president and tour director Kirk von Krueger. "But it does happen."

Photo by Peter Iovino.
Josh Duhamel, left, as TV director Eric Messer, and Brooke Josephson (Liz) are in "Life As We Know It," in theatres today.

Movies, as we know them, can bend the truth, distort history, and leave the imperfect impression on what actually happened. Especially with sports as the basis of a "based on a true story" script.

Kevin Modesti's take on the new Disney-fied, PG for "brief mild language" movie, "Secretariat," hits all those notes in today's column (linked here) that serves as our media feast for today's newspaper issue. (Kevin fails to note that "Enterouge" star Kevin Connolly plans a reporter in the flick, but that's probably intentional (linked here).

We added some notes and smokes/chokes (linked here).

Meanwhile, sports, as we know it, can lead to a crazy lifestyle for those of us who work in the field. We know that all too well.

"Life As We Know It," a Warner Brothers' PG-13 flick with Josh Duhamel as a "promising network sports TV director," reveals that even more as his character, and Katherine Heigl as a restaurateur, discover they have to now take care of their God daughter, Sophie, even though the two main characters really don't like each other.

And, again, sports and family life don't easily mesh. Not with kids. Or little kids.

The life plan for Eric Messer (Duhamel) is "moving up from being a broadcast technician to a full-fledged director in national sports television," according to the movie's press notes (note: we missed a few opportunties to see a screening of this, so we're going with the softball version rather than a first-hand account).

Duhamel said he spent a lot of time discussing the character with director Greg Berlanti.

"Greg and I felt it would be easy to fall into the trap of just playing him as a charming womanizer who needs to learn about love, but we wanted him to be a lot more than that," said Duhamel. "We both felt that it was OK if he was unapologetic or says or does things that the audience may not like right away. Face it, guys can be like that."

The press notes also point out that the NBA was also "very cooperative with the production," allowing the movie to use real footage and access to Atlanta's Phillips Arena. TBS, based in Atlanta, also lent them use of a large production booth for use in the scene where Messner has "a critical moment" in his life plan.

As for Duhamel, you can find all kinds of stories that explain how he really is into sports -- especially football, since he quarterbacked a team for Minot State in his native North Dakota. His wife, Fergie, along with the Black-Eyed Peas, are supposed to be playing at halftime of the next Super Bowl.

He tells ESPN (linked here) that it "my goal in life to play sports. I had a real passion for it. I guess this is close to it. .... Sports shows you how to compete, how to win and lose," he said. "And it shows you how to be grateful for the opportunities you have. All that aesthetic stuff is fleeting."

He tells ESPN SportsNation in a chat (linked here) that "I'm a sports junkie so I think I could see myself" being a sportscaster.

He tells Dan Patrick (linked here) that if Dan can get him on at Augusta, he'll get Dan into one of his next movies. Boo-yah!

He tells USA Today (linked here) that he made a big mistake last November, when, while during the filming of the movie, he went to an Atlanta strip club and got his face plastered all over the National Enquirer (linked here) after a stripper named "Delilah" accused him of infidelity.

"That was ... ." He trails off, his face falling. When his gaze refocuses, Duhamel's eyes are wet.

"I was like, 'Wow, these people really exist.' If they make money, they'll do it. And so the hardest part is that my wife had to go through all that. She didn't deserve that."

Dude's either a really good actor, or we went somewhere where we shouldn't have gone .... or he shouldn't have gone.

Sorry, man. That's just the media life as we know it. Yucky.

On to far more tame matters...

== The MLB and Turner Sports has come to realize it can't jam four playoff games into one night, especially with no West Coast games, so the Sunday lineup of all four division series contests have been broken up, tentatively (linked here). If a fourth game of the ALDS series between Tampa Bay at Texas is needed, it'll go at 10 a.m. on TBS. The NLDS Game 3 with San Francisco at Atlanta is slotted for TBS at 1:30 p.m., and ALDS Game 4 (if necessary) between Minnesota and the N.Y. Yankees at 5 p.m. on TBS. The NLDS Game 3 with Philadelphia at Cincinnati has been pushed over to TNT with a 4 p.m. first pitch -- up against the NBC NFL coverage of Philadelphia-S.F. Chances are that Sunday lineup will be re-arranged if either ALDS series ends with a sweep in their game 3s on Saturday, putting the remaining games on TBS in the 10 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 5 p.m. windows.

== Your NFL lineup for Los Angeles, because everyone's watching (linked here), including Ben Roethlisburger for another week:

= Sunday, 10 a.m., Channel 11: Green Bay at Washington (with Joe Buck, Troy Aikman and Pam Oliver), instead of N.Y. Giants-Houston, Chicago-Carolina, Atlanta-Cleveland, Tampa-Cincinnati or St. Louis-Detroit.

= Sunday, 10 a.m., Channel 2: Kansas City at Indianapolis (with Greg Gumbel and Dan Dierdorf), instead of Jacksonville-Buffalo or Denver-Buffalo.

= Sunday, 1 p.m., Channel 2: San Diego at Oakland (with Kevin Harlan and Solomon Wilcotts) instead of Tennessee-Dallas (with Jim Nantz and Phil Simms). Fox also has New Orleans-Arizona in this window (using Kurt Warner as an analyst).

= Sunday, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4: Philadelphia at San Francisco (with Al Michaels, Cris Collinsworth and Andre Kremer, and since they're up in the Bay Area, maybe John Madden?)

= Monday, 5:30 p.m., ESPN: Minnesota at N.Y. Jets (with Mike Tirico, Ron Jaworski and Jon Gruden).

== Barry Tompkins, Petros Papadakis and Rebecca Haarlow do the UCLA-Cal game from Berkeley (Saturday, 12:30 p.m., Prime Ticket) -- unless you have the Dish Network (linked here) -- while Mike Patrick, Craig James and Shelley Smith are at USC-Stanford (Saturday, 5 p.m., Channel 7).

The downside to USC-Stanford questionably taking the ABC prime-time window is that L.A. viewers won't see Florida State at Miami (with steriod-friendly Brent Musburger (read all about it, again, linked here) and overzealous journalistic youngsters Kirk Herbstreit and Heather Cox), because that shares the regional options available. ESPN is locked in with LSU at Florida (with Joe Tessitore, Todd Blackledge and Holly Rowe, at 4:30 p.m.), and ESPN2 has Auburn at Kentucky (with Mark Jones and Bob Davie, at 4:30 p.m.).

== NBA TV says former Laker Rick Fox, who staved off elimination this week on "Dancing With The Stars," will join the network for "select appearances throughout the year" as a guest studio analyst.

== ESPN, seemingly home to all that is college football in the post-season, starts its quest to lineup the bowls with its first weekly "BCS Countdown" show of the season (Sunday, 5:15 p.m.). It will also have the BCS standings, starting with the first to be released on Oct. 17, through Dec. 5. Rece Davis hosts it with BCS prediction "expert" Brad Edwards.

== Aw, screw it, let's go bowling (linked here).

AP Photo/Lenny Ignelzi
Jimmie Johnson climbs out of his car as a thousand students from Emerald Middle School in his hometown of El Cajon greet him on Tuesday. Johnson's foundation has given the school $100,000.

== Marty Reid, Dale Jarrett and Andy Petree call the NASCAR Sprint Cup Chase race at Fontana, dubbed the Pepsi Max 400, from the so-called Auto Club Speedway. ESPN has the race (Sunday, starting with NASCAR Countdown at 11 a.m., with the green flag at 12:16 p.m.). ESPN2 has the practice today (noon) and qualifying (3:30 p.m.), as well as the Nationwide Series race (Saturday, 1:30 p.m.).

We must also note: SportsMediaWatch.com (linked here) reports that for the third straight week, NASCAR's Chase For The Cup put up poor numbers on ESPN. Sunday's Price Chopper 400 drew a 2.3 rating on ESPN, down 28 percent from last year's race on ABC (3.2) and down 34 percent from the 2008 race on ABC (3.5). The race is tied as the lowest rated Chase For The Cup race ever -- matching the Sylvania 300 earlier this year. Additionally, the three races rank as easily the lowest rated regularly-scheduled NASCAR races of at least the past four seasons.

The half-full spin: Last Sunday's race was the 14th most-viewed program of the week on cable, and the No. 2 event of the week on ESPN, ahead of every college football telecast.

== Is it true: Jim Gray received a half-mil for his performance/sparking the idea for the LeBron James' "The Decision"? That's what we got from an ESPN source.

== If Robert Wuhl is never remembered for HBO's "Arliss," or as Al Stump in "Cobb," or as the pitching coach (did you know his name was Larry Hockett) in "Bull Durham," or as the "angry customer" in "Good Burger," he could assume the position of a sports-talk host. Wuhl told the New York Times that he'll start a syndicated, three-hour midday show for Westwood One starting in January.

"I can do sports talk," he told the Times (linked here), "but I can also talk about movies and politics. It's not filtered. There are great hosts, like Dan Patrick, Jim Rome and Mike Francesa, but I come from a little different place. I joke that I can't vote for the Heisman but I can vote for the Academy Awards."

== TNT sends Marv Albert, Mike Fratello, Steve Kerr and Cheryl Miller to Indian Wells for the annual NBA outdoor game on a tennis court, this year featuring Dallas and Phoenix (Saturday, 6:30 p.m.).

== Next in line for ESPN's "30 for 30" series is the relationship that former Lakers center Vlade Divac had with the late Drazen Petrovic called "Once Brothers" (Tuesday, 5 p.m., ESPN). Interviews with former Yugoslavian teammates Toni Kukoc and Dino Radja, as well as Magic Johnson and Jerry West are included in the NBA Entertainment-produced piece. A review and interview with Divac coming soon on this.

== AND FINALLY:

== If ESPN is intent on having NBA fans treat the Miami Heat like college basketball fans think of Duke, it's on its way with an aptly-named, oiled-up device called "The Heat Index," launching on ESPN.com starting Monday under the website's NBA section.

Think columns, blogs, video, audio, automated modules, social media elements, photo galleries and other multimedia offerings related to, but hardly excluding, LeBron, Bosh and D-Wade.

Brian Windhorst has been hired away from the Cleveland Plain-Dealer to serve as "one of the leading authorities on LeBron James," according to ESPN PR speak. Windhorst has written two books about James and has covered him since middle school. He covered the Cavs for the last seven years, but now he's based in Miami as one of two beat writers for ESPN assigned to the Heat.The other is Michael Wallace, hired away from the Miami Herald as the Heat beat writer for the previous three seasons.

One of the features on this site sure to please Lakers fans is called "Chase for 72," which is "an automated, daily forecast of how many games the Heat will win including ESPN.com's John Hollinger projecting the odds of the Heat matching the Chicago Bulls' record of 72 wins." There's also "Hollinger's All-Time Power Rankings," which attempts to regularily rank the Heat against the NBA's all-time great teams, and "The Scene," which makes Jemele Hill cover the culture, scene and lifestyle angles tied to South Beach as it relates to the team.

If somewhere in that mess it keeps track of the Lakers' pursuit of a three-peat, maybe that gives it some proper context.

A single championship does not a best sports city make, says The Sporting News in naming its annual "Best Sports Cities" ranking (linked here).

Meaning, New Orleans' Super Bowl, or Chicago's Stanley Cup victory ... or the Lakers' repeat NBA title ... isn't a deal breaker.

But what did Boston win again to push it past L.A. into the No. 2 spot on this year's ranking?

The list, which goes from summer 2009 to summer 2010, is based on point values assigned to various categories, including but not limited to won-lost records, postseason appearances, applicable power ratings, number of teams and attendance.

So it goes for the Top 50 (it goes all the way to Yakama at No. 402):

1. Chicago + Evanston
2. Boston
3. Los Angeles
4. Philadelphia
5. Dallas + Fort Worth

6. New York
7. Phoenix + Tempe
8. Atlanta
9. Denver + Boulder
10. Detroit+ Ann Arbor + Ypsilanti

11. Miami
12. Pittsburgh
13. Minneapolis + St. Paul
14. Houston
15. Indianapolis

16. Cincinnati
17. Salt Lake City
18. Nashville
19. San Jose + Palo Alto + Santa Clara
20. Washington

21. San Diego
22. New Orleans
23. Anaheim
24. Orlando
25. Raleigh + Durham + Chapel Hill

26. St. Louis
27. Tampa + St. Petersburg
28. Cleveland
29. Baltimore
30. Charlotte

31. Oklahoma City + Norman
32. San Francisco
33. Seattle
34. Milwaukee
35. Buffalo

36. San Antonio
37. Oakland + Berkeley
38. Columbus
39. Vancouver
40. Portland

41. Tuscaloosa, Ala.
42. Green Bay
43. Austin, Texas
44. Toronto
45. Montreal

46. Ottawa
47. Memphis
48. Calgary
49. Jacksonville
50. Gainesville, Fla.

Others:
52. Sacramento
100. Fresno
136. Moraga, Calif.
146. Stockton, Calif.
152. Santa Barbara
197. Riverside

201. Davis
203. San Luis Obispo
268. Fontana (ahead of Loudon, N.H., Martinsville, Va., Talladega, Ala., Augusta, Ga., and Bristol, Tenn., Brooklyn, Mich., Darlington, S.C., and Watkins Glen, N.Y., if it matters).
283. Sonoma

310. Carlsbad
316. La Quinta
317. Monterey
320. Palm Springs
344. Napa
347. Adelanto
350. Modesto
358. Lake Elsinore
360. Visalia
361. Rancho Cucamonga
367. San Bernardino

370. Lancaster
378. Wappingers Falls, N.Y.

The ongoing subscription fee dispute between the Dish Network and Fox has reared its ugly headline as those who half-million plugged into this system in L.A. seem destined not to get the UCLA-Cal game on Saturday that'll be on Prime Ticket unless something is resolved prior to kickoff.

As usual, other cable providers and DirecTV are trying to take advantage of this negotiation by telling people to come over and buy their product, which, for now, has all the Fox channels -- Dish Network has suspended carrying FSWest, Prime, FX and National Geographic, and they claim that as of Nov. 1, they could also drop KTTV-Fox Channel 11.

Dish dropped all 19 of Fox's regional sports networks on Oct. 1, but fearing a mass exodus from the service, allowed its subscribers to see the UCLA-Washington State on Prime Ticket from the Rose Bowl.

(Actually, those who sending out the propaganda against Dish network insist that "coming off two back-to-back wins vs. ranked opponents, the Bruins could grab their first victory at Memorial Stadium since 1998." Washington State, of course, wasn't ranked, and almost beat UCLA last Saturday).

The release of some of the photos you'll find in the ESPN "Body Issue," which hits newsstands on Friday, and opens with a shot of WNBA star Diana Taurasi letting her hair down and continues with Jeanette Lee showing a black-widow-maker pose:

== Your U.S. women's national water polo squad (or, how to make 12 women seem coy at the same time, both in color and black and white):

== Behold masters athlete Phil Raschker, who turns 64 in February:

== The classic form of javeliner Rachel Yurkovich:

== Julia Mancuso,
minus the flashy skiwear, followed by volleyballer Kim Glass, minus the floorburns:

== And meet 29-year-old Esther Vergeer, wheelchair tennis player, five-time Paralympics champion, 11-time consecutive world-champion and the world's top ranked player since 1999, unbeaten in singles matches since January 2003. Some say she may be the most dominant player in any professional sport ....

== Did any males make the issue? Butt, of course. Down there, it's surfer Kelly Slater, one of several well-formed men to shed their clothes, although, if you've ever seen KS perform, you'd probably seen him close to this disposition nearly every time he goes out:

About five years ago, we did a story about the minor proliferation of local kickball leagues (linked here), and left it at that.

It was probably going to be like the dodgeball fad. There's a movie made about it, lazy people see it as a way to reconnect to their past and get some exercise since they can't play softball, and it dies off until beer pong comes along.

Doesn't look like that.

We find out that more than a dozen L.A. area adult kickball teams are competing this weekend at the World Kickball Championships (linked here).

In Fargo? Branson, Mo.?

Naw, Las Vegas. Why else would 13 teams from L.A. make the journey?

L.A. has the largest representation of the 60 teams (and 2,000 participants) entered to play in the WAKA-sponsored event, its 13th, at Desert Breeze Park in Vegas during the upcoming Columbus Day weekend (that's here already ... quick, get to the bank before it closes on Monday).

ESPN's Jemele Hill did a story about last year's event (linked here), but that didn't seem to embarass the participants enough.

The teams participating this time from your neighborhood:

== Pitch Please from Hollywood
== Blue Ballerz from Long Beach
== AKT from Los Angeles
== Inflatable Party Sheep, The Dandy Lions and The Monster Cartel from North Hollywood
== Brew Crew from Pasadena
== Yo JabbaWAKAs from Silver Lake
== Sofa King Good and The Guy Fawkes Conservatory from Studio City
== Playground Posse from Torrance
== Hot Box from Venice, and
== Los Borrachos from West Hollywood

WAKA says more than 70,000 play the sport now in co-ed adult leagues, both in the U.S. and as far away as London and Iraq. "Typical" WAKA players are "former athletes, UFC fighters, celebrities, rocket scientists, marketing execs, teachers, doctors and so on," according to the organization.

By John Marshall
AP College Football Writer

Oregon coach Chip Kelly liked the idea of moving the start of his team's game against Stanford up three hours because fans in Eugene didn't have to wait all day to see the game, then face a drive home late at night.

Other than that, Kelly could have cared less; he'll play anytime.

"I have absolutely no say in the scheduling," he said. "If you want to play at 3 a.m., I'll play at 3 a.m. I don't care."

The Pac-10's new leadership had a different perspective. They were thrilled with the time change because of the exposure it gave the conference.

Had the game gone off at its original time of 8:15 p.m. it would have started after some East Coasters were already in bed and ended well after last call.

By moving kickoff up to 5:15 p.m., No. 9 Stanford at No. 4 Oregon became a prime-time showcase -- one not involving those Trojans -- that served as the capper to a day filled with premier games.

"A year ago when I started in this role, I was told by a lot of people that nationally people see USC and don't see the depth of the conference after that," Pac-10 Commissioner Larry Scott said.

"To have a year later, Stanford and Oregon be the game that has the most interest in a week with the Red River Rivalry, Florida-Alabama and other important games makes a big statement of where the Pac-10 is at, how it's seen and the fact that we have two potential national contenders playing."

The late-night game has been an issue for the Pac-10 for years.

The show description for tonight's season debut of "South Park" (Comedy Central, 10 p.m.) called "Poor and Stupid," for Episode 203:

With NASCAR in Southern California this weekend, taking "The Chase" to Fontana, we can't wait to chase down this episode.

It's in the book, "How to Watch Football on Television," written 45 years ago by Chris Schenkel, the ABC play-by-play man:

"Unique in 1964 were weekday night telecast of NFL games, and several doubleheaders on Sunday. Viewers are now able to watch a complete game in the East, followed by a complete game in the West -- nearly six hours of professional football in one afternoon.

"Said Unitas, 'People are going to get tired of seeing so much pro football on television. Part of the lure has been the fact that it hasn't been easily attainable for the fans.'"

Not unique in 2010: People can't get enough NFL games on TV. Day, night, prime-time, replays. Pregame. Postgame. 24/7 network-run channel.

Heck, more fans are watching NFL games on television through the season's first four weeks than ever before, according to information provided by The Nielsen Company and reported, verbatum from a press release, by the league.

The numbers show that more than 150 million* have tuned in to at least part of an NFL game this season - topping 146.1 million at this point last year. The average NFL game telecast (including broadcast and cable) has drawn 18.9 million* viewers - double the average primetime viewership (9.2 million) for CBS, NBC, ABC and Fox in the new TV season.

* -- estimates pending final viewership numbers for Week 4 CBS single and Fox regional telecasts due Thursday.

Nine games have already topped the 20-million viewer mark, a record. Most recently, Sunday's Redskins-Eagles game (23.1 mil). Only two programs, other than the NFL, have drawn 20 million viewers this fall.

Games are averaging 18.9 million viewers, up 9 percent from this time last year. That's more than double the average prime-time viewership of 9.2 million for the big four broadcast networks in the new TV season. The gap has grown from last year, when the NFL averaged 17.4 million to 9.3 million for prime-time programming.

If Ed Sullivan were around, he'd be doing an NFL pregame show somewhere...

Yeah, yeah, yeah....

The Associated Press

FARMINGTON, Conn. -- An ESPN producer has been arrested on a public indecency charge after a peeping Tom complaint in a Connecticut apartment complex.

Police Lt. Marshall Porter tells the Hartford Courant newspaper 52-year-old Neil Goldberg turned himself in Tuesday to face charges including public indecency, trespass, disorderly conduct and breach of peace.

Goldberg is the coordinating producer of motorsports coverage for ESPN.

Police say Goldberg admitted watching through a window last month as a neighbor got dressed at an apartment in Farmington, a wealthy suburb of Hartford.

A woman walking her dog had reported seeing a man outside on a stool peering through the window and masturbating.

Goldberg has been released from police custody after posting a $1,000 bond.

Messages seeking comment were left today with ESPN and at a listing for Goldberg.

The Professional Bowlers Tour. Chick Hearn and "Bowling For Dollars." NCAA competition. Lawn bowling. "Strikes, Spares and Shmenges."

It would seem to be a self-sustainable channel. Those who bowl also seem to be the kind that like to sit and watch others bowl.

Think of the ancellary programming -- fashion, playing tips, travel shows, a visit to the Ebonite factory. One whole hour on what are the best oils to use on the lanes.

And "The Flintstones." Plus, overnight, "The Big Lebowski" and "Kingpin" on an endless loop.

That dream seems to have been pushed back with ESPN's announcement today that it renewed its agreement with the PBA through 2013. Part of that deal means the $1 million PBA Tournament of Champions will air live on ABC on Jan. 22 from Las Vegas. The event last aired on ABC in 1997.

The new deals calls for more than 20 telecasts on ABC, ESPN and ESPN2. More details are on www.pba.com.

The PBA and ESPN go back to the network's launch in 1979, but we all know that without Chris Schenkel and Bo Burton, all those years at ABC meant much more.

Maybe they just need more instances of women beating men in major events for them to reconsider The Bowling Channel to someday come into being.

C'mon. Roll with it.

Rene Cardenas, who helped create the first Spanish-language baseball broadcast in 1958 with the Dodgers and worked 38 years for the Dodgers, Astros and Rangers, is among the 10 named as finalists for the 2011 Ford C. Frick Award, given annually to a baseball broadcaster and inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown.

The other nine: Tom Cheek, Dizzy Dean, Jacques Doucet, Bill King, Ned Martin, Tim McCarver, Graham McNamee, Eric Nadel and Dave Van Horne. Cheek, Doucet and King were added to the ballot via fan Facebook.com voting.

The winner will be announced on December 7.

McCarver, Nadel and Van Horne are the only active broadcasters on the ballot. Cardenas and Doucet are the only other living candidates.

Cardenas, 80, worked with future Hall of Famer Jaime Jarrin for three seasons, calling games in Spanish for the Dodgers starting in 1959, and then again for 16 seasons starting in 1982. When Cardenas left for a job in Houston in 1961, Jarrin was still a rookie. When he returned several years later, Jarrin had been working with Cardenas' replacement, Jose Garcia, but already on his way to solidifying his status as a Dodgers legend.

To us, the most interesting names to pop up here are McCarver and Dean.

Like it or not, McCarver has been in the TV booth for 30 seasons, the last 15 for Fox. This year he will extend a streak of 21 years working in the postseason.

Dean did 24 years in St. Louis and nationally on CBS' Game of the Week from 1955-65 following a Hall of Fame pitching career. He would be the first to be named to the Hall as both a player and broadcaster.

To be considered, an active or retired broadcaster must have a minimum of 10 years of continuous major league broadcast service with a ball club, network, or a combination of the two. In 2010, more than 200 broadcasters were eligible for consideration.

You remember Jon Secrist. How could you forget him?

The Westlake Village actor-turned-mobile notary public and legal document courier with a sidelight writing scripts, thought he had a pretty good story -- about his own life as a knuckleball pitcher.

We helped him write about his dreams a couple of times (linked here), with some cool pictures (linked here), first about a stint he got with the Independent League's St. Paul Saints in 1999 that made him, at 44, baseball's oldest rookie.

Neither of us could believe it when Saints owner Mike Veeck, who read that story, agreed to give Secrist another tryout before the 2009 season.

Secrist, now 53, then gave us updates every other day on his adventure, until the time came for him to take the Amtrak train home (linked here).

Secrist dropped us a line the other day, to explain that the end of his playing days was finally here.

"I'm hanging up the emery board for the last time," he said, tell us that Sunday's game for the Pasadena Redbirds at Brookside Park near the Rose Bowl would be his last.

After his latest St. Paul journey, he decided that he was back in playing shape and enjoyed getting on the mound again, so he kept up in the local semi-pro leagues, going up against college-age prospects. As a middle reliever, he ended the 2008 season with a 1-0 record, one save and a 2.82 ERA. In '09, he was 1-1 with a save and 3.02 ERA.

Going into his final game, he was 1-0 with a 3.80 ERA. At age 55.

Why quit now?

"Comebacker," he said. "A couple weeks ago a bullet came back at me and I didn't react until it was past me. I realized right then and there it wasn't Father Time tapping me on the shoulder, it was the Grim Reaper."

As for his final performance, he said it "didn't go all too bad," pitching two innings, giving up a run with two outs in the final inning.

"Perhaps the best part was I struck out my final batter," he said. "A good time was had by all."

As a tribute to Secrist, his teammates all wore vintage uniforms, with his No. 40.

"My cynical catch phrase was I wore the number 40 because it meant my baseball career was 'for nothing,'" said Secrist, who last February landed a full-time job as with Bank of America in the bankruptcy department as a corporate notary public.

"It was all to keep with my 'the glass is tipped over ' way of looking at things. But that was the wrong view. I played a season in Holland. I played in Saint Paul -- and I never played high school (Monroe High of North Hills) or college. I've made friends for life from this wonderful game."

Don't be an idiot. As a playoff primer to the MLB divisional series starting Wednesday, absorb the next ESPN "30 For 30" documentary, "Four Days in October," set for Tuesday at 5 p.m. on ESPN.

Time, again, has a way of putting things into perspective, and this time, it's the Boston Red Sox's climb from a 0-3 deficit against Joe Torre's New York Yankees in the 2004 American League Championship Series. Here, we go back to that ridiculous run that launched the Red Sox into the World Series, where they'd go on to win the unthinkable title and end the idiotic 86-year losing streak.

Remember, the Yankees embarassed their most hated rival, 19-8, at Fenway Park in Game 3. Are the "happy-go-lucky" Red Sox a "pack of frauds," asked Boston Globe columnist Dan Shaunessey, or are they about to do something historic?

Even those who were involved in the production of the movie "Fever Pitch," had no idea how their script would be rewritten.

Still, this documentary isn't quite like many of the others that have been part of this remarkable ESPN Films project.

MLB Films did most of the heavy lifting with this one -- yet, it's hardly something of the propoganda you'd think would be produced with such an embedded crew helping out on this. So much of this is culled from home video provided by Red Sox players, in the locker room, on the field. It's far from regurgitated pictures and sounds you've already seen but might have forgotten about.

That's what gives this such a fresh take on a sporting event that, again, with some distance, makes it even more incredible to realize that it actually took place.

Fans of Kevin Millar, above, the one-time Hart High standout, will get a kick out of his appearances throughout -- including near the start, asking Shaunessey if this "pack of frauds" description is worth eating his words once the team makes it to Game 7, where Millar suggests that even with Shaunessey playing second base, the Red Sox will win.

"If there's a group of idiots that can do it, it's us," Millar says.

Day One turns into Day Two as the Red Sox trail, 4-3, in Game 4 with Mariano Riviera coming in. As the clock goes past midnight, Millar draws a walk, and Dave Roberts , the former UCLA standout who the Dodgers traded to Boston right at the July 31 deadline for some minor leaguer that never materialized, goes in as a pinch runner for him ...

Yeah, you may know the rest. But pretend you don't. You'll enjoy it more.

Dan Patrick's syndicated radio show heard via many Fox Sports Radio affiliates, including Los Angeles' 570-AM from 6 to 9 a.m., and also simulcast for the last 14 months on DirecTV's 101 Network (both live and with repeats throughout the day), makes another leap into sports-media stratosphere.

DirecTV announced today that those with access to the Fox Sports Net -- dish or cable systems -- will have Patrick's show starting Oct. 25, including locally on Prime Ticket. That means an extra 85 million viewer homes in all major markets.

DirecTV says it marks the first time that a programming distributor has sold its original content into national syndication. The show will remain on DTV's 101 channel as well.

What has made the TV version of this radio show work in contrast to ESPN's simulcasting of the "Mike And Mike" or "Colin Cowherd" radio shows are the between-commercial insights, man-cave banter and even some friction between Patrick and "The Danettes" -- Paul Pabst, Patrick "Seton" O'Connor, Todd Fritz and Andrew "McLovin'" Perloff. The four, who work on the show as the producer, audio, booker and blogger, have actually created a weekly spin-off show for DirecTV's 101 where they sit and chat about the day's sports events as well as their personal lives.

The affiliates carrying the show live Monday through Friday are on DanPatrick.com.

"DirecTV took a radio show and seamlessly developed it into a hybrid of radio and television in one show," Patrick said in a DTV statement. "And it's not stagnant. It's not us doing a radio show with two cameras showing us talking. We will show you the good and bad of what goes on during a show and during the breaks. If we screw up, we can't hide it."

Jeff Krolik, the executive vice president of FSN, added that the show "consistently delivers great, timely guests, smart conversation, and an unpredictable cast of characters that will connect with our viewers."

Patrick, who left ESPN three years ago and started his own syndicated radio show on his own, growing it to 230 affiliates with Fox Radio's push, said on Monday's show: "It's a loyal following, an educated audience, and thank you for letting us expand this."

AP Photo/Matt Dunham
Holy Schnikes: Holly Sweeney, girlfriend of Europe's Rory McIlroy watches the play on the third day of the 2010 Ryder Cup golf tournament at the Celtic Manor Resort in Newport, Wales on Sunday.

Highlights of the week ahead in sports, both here and afar:

MONDAY

Golf: Ryder Cup, 12 individual matches, 1 a.m., USA Network:

During Sunday's broadcast, it was pointed out that Euro Ryder Cup captain Colin Montgomerie had asked the course technical support help not to show so much video on the giant replay screens of American victories. He didn't want any negativity to be shown to his players. It became obvious that in matches where the U.S. teams were winning, the results were delayed in posting. "That's cheezy," NBC's Johnny Miller said. No, cheezy is something Montgomerie orders off the menu in most restaurants he visits. That was just plain poor sportsmanship. With the rain still coming into play in Wales -- who could have seen that coming -- the final day gets pushed back, with the U.S. needing to win more than half of the remaining 12 matches to retain the Cup. Meanwhile, the U.S. government has issued a warning to American citizens to be vigilant in Europe due to terror threats.

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Minnesota, London, noon, NBA TV; 7 p.m., Channel 9:

What kind of trouble can Ron Artest get in London? Stealing a double-decker bus and crashing it into Big Ben? Hey, that's just crazy talk. Like, him describing why he's changed his number again. He says he's switched from No. 37 (as a tribute to Michael Jackson) to No. 15 to "get a chance to finish off what I started," since he had that number at St. John's back in the day. "The MJ tribute is never over. It was a great season, and that 37 was special." For those who are trying to keep up with Artest's thinking behind all the numbers he has worn over the years, NBA TV talked to him about it last week and allowed Artest to explain: When Artest's dad was in high school, he wore 51, so Ron switched the numbers and wore 15 at St. John's, then in the NBA with the Bulls and Pacers. He switched to 23 in 2002-2003 in honor of Michael Jordan. He switched to 91 in 2004-2005 in honor of Dennis Rodman, and that's the jersey you see Artest in during "The Malice at The Palace." Traded to Sacramento, he changed to 93 because, as he said, it represented the letter Q and an uppercase B, like Queensbridge, the housing project where he grew up. Traded to Houston, he changed to 96 because ... it's a Q and a lower-case B. Then came the Michael Jackson tribute -- 37, because that's how many weeks "Thriller" was atop the Billboard charts.

NFL: New England at Miami, 5:30 p.m., ESPN:

Patriots quarterback Tom Brady, who continues to sport the Justin Bieber look because his wife Gisele insists it looks groovy, is 40-11 in his career as a starter in the regular season against AFC East opponents, with six of those loses against the Dolphins, and five of them in Miami. Maybe this time, they won't recognize him with the hair extensions. Or, if he keeps his knitcap in place.

TUESDAY

NBA exhibition: Detroit at Miami, 4:30 p.m., NBA TV:

It's our understanding that the Heat, based in Miami, made some off-season changes. And now it's time to see how they look against a modest defense in a practice game that will be viewed by millions across the world as if it's they're seeing the Beatles playing in the Cavern Club. By the way, you can have LeBron, D-Wade and Bosh. We'll take ... dance teammers 1, 2 and 3.

Series: "The Biggest Loser," 8 p.m., Channel 4:

The title kind of sums up the professional tennis career of Anna Kournikova, but that's not why she makes a guest appearance on the "reality" show tonight. The remaining 15 contestants are supposed to compete in a tennis-workout challenge led by Kournikova, who, at 29, must really like being surrounded by overweight people who make her look fit and trim. It's an old TV trick that still works for those trying to stay looking young and healthy. Although, looking at her in 3D in the new edition of Maxium, she could actually stand to put on a few lbs. In 2D, she looks just fine.

College football: Troy at Middle Tennessee, 5 p.m., ESPN2:

It's the first of a five-days-in-a-row college football blitz at ESPN, including appearances by Central Florida (Wednesday), Nebraska and Kansas State (Thursday), UConn at Rutgers, plus Oklahoma State (Friday) and the usual array of big-namers on Saturday. Think of it as a prep for college basketball season.

WEDNESDAY

MLB playoffs: ALDS Game 1: Texas at Tampa Bay, 10:30 a.m., TBS; NLDS Game 1: Cincinnati at Philadephia, 2 p.m., TBS; ALDS Game 1: N.Y. Yankees at Minnesota, 5:30 p.m., TBS:

The Phillies could go with Halladay, Oswalt and Hamels on the mound the rest of the season. The Twins will have to go the first round without Morneau. And the Rays start it off wondering if they'll get more than 13,000 at Tropicana Field. Let the early best-of-three fall ball begin.

NBA exhibition: New York vs. Minnesota in Paris, 11 a.m., NBA TV:

Forget Paris. The new season of "South Park" starts tonight.

THURSDAY

NBA exhibition: Lakers vs. Barcelona in Spain, 7 p.m., Channel 9, ESPN2:

Pau Gasol could figure out a way to play one half with each team. What a gas for the fans. After this, the Lakers' vacation ends, and practice begins again in the states, with six more exhibitions (in places like Vegas, Anaheim, Ontario and San Diego), working toward the Oct. 26 regular-season opener.

MLB playoffs: ALDS Game 2: Texas at Tampa Bay, 11:30 a.m., TBS; ALDS Game 2: N.Y. Yankees at Minnesota, 3 p.m., TBS; NLDS Game 1: Atlanta at San Francisco, 6:30 p.m., TBS:

"Fear the Beard" comes out as the Giants' rally cry since their closer Brian Wilson decided to dye his to look like something out of the House of David team. Be true to your school.

MLS: Galaxy at Philadelphia, 5 p.m., ESPN2:

The league said it won't punish David Beckham for reacting to a fan who heckled him about allegations he had sex with prostitutes during the Galaxy's game at Home Depot Center against the New York Red Bulls two weeks ago. The fan shouted "stop with the prostitutes" from underneath the stands as Beckham walked to the dressing room following the 2-0 loss. Beckham turned around and walked toward the fan: "Do you want to say it again? Want to say it again? You got a Galaxy shirt on. You got a Galaxy shirt on." Beckham then walked away and said, "Say it to my face." Philly fan, are you paying attention?

FRIDAY

NHL: Ducks at Detroit, 4 p.m., Prime:

On this date 17 years ago, the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, before 17,174 at the Arrowhead Pond, lose 7-2 to the Detroit Red Wings in their first NHL game. Yup, good times. The Ducks open the season with three road games, including Saturday in Nashville and Monday in St. Louis. And, by Christmas, we'll probably have forgotten all about them. Except, we'll keep an eye on Cam Fowler, the 18-year-old defenseman picked 12th overall in the 2010 draft who appears to have made the team's roster.

MLB playoffs: NLDS Game 2: Cincinnati at Philadelphia, 3 p.m., TBS; NLDS Game 2: Atlanta at San Francisco, 6:30 p.m., TBS:

Reds manager Dusty Baker says he'll start Bronson Arroyo in this one instead of Game so that he can pitch between Edinson Volquez and Johnny Cueto to have a softer thrower between two power arms. "You hate to put two similar guys back-to-back," Baker said. "I know the Phillies have two similar guys back-to-back, but they're different -- (Roy) Halladay and (Roy) Oswalt." Way different.

SATURDAY

NHL: Kings at Vancouver, 7 p.m., FSW:

There's no sneaking up on the Western Conference for the Kings, even though SI annual season prediction has them in kinda low in the No. 5 hole. The season opener against the team that knocked them out of the playoffs last year seems intentional. And time to stop talking about Ilya Kovalchuk. If we had to buy a player jersey to wear for this season, it would be one honoring Wayne Simmonds.

MLB playoffs: ALDS Game 3: Tampa Bay at Texas, 2 p.m., TBS; ALDS Game 3: Minnesota at N.Y. Yankees, 5:30 p.m., TBS:

Did you know: Minnesota has faced New York in the first round in three of its past four playoff appearances. The Twins lost all three of those series to New York, winning a total of just two games over that span.

NASCAR: Nationwide CampingWorld.com 300, Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, 1:30 p.m., ESPN2:

When Danica Patrick jumped into the Nationwide event at Fontana back on Feb. 20, she started 36th, finished 31st, and was still running when she completed all but three of the 152 laps at the end. You go, daddy. With her IndyCar schedule finished -- she pulled in second at the season-ender, 10th in the overall standings -- her plans are to race here and then four more events before the Nationwide schedule is over. So why not invest in her Hot Wheel cars. While they're hot.

College football: UCLA at Cal, 12:30 p.m., FSW:

Cal says because its athletic department budget is almost $13 mil in the red, they're going to eliminate baseball, men's and women's gymnastics, women's lacrosse, and no longer fully fund their defending champion rugby squad. And that will save $4 mil. But they keep football, the economic driver for everyone else. Is this a red flag as to what could happen to another UC school, like the one in Westwood? Ponder that as these Bruins take the week off after this Bay Area trip before traveling to Eugene, Ore.

College football: USC at Stanford, 5 p.m., Channel 7:

The smart money is on Stanford in this one, even after the Cardinal fell from No. 9 to No. 16 after their loss in Oregon. Good luck to the Trojans, out of the Top 25 all together, in making it out of October alive now.

College football: Oregon State at Arizona, 4 p.m., Versus:

The 4-0 Wildcats, up to No. 9 in the AP poll, are third in the nation in giving up just 11 points a game. That includes surrendering 27 to Iowa in a Week 3 win.

SUNDAY

NASCAR: Pepsi 400, Auto Club Speedway in Fontana, noon, ESPN:

Because 10/10/10 is considered a lucky day in some cultures, why not get hitched at a NASCAR track? Prior to this important Sprint Cup chase event, Speedway president Gillian Zucker (left) has been authorized to officiate a legal group wedding ceremony at the start/finish line for those couples who pay as little as a $200 entry fee (which includes two tickets to the race, two pit passes, two sprinkled cupcakes, a champaign flute set with two glasses, a bridal bouquet and groom boutoninere, a photo with Michael Waltrip as the "best man" and the Miss Sprint Cup threesome as the "maids of honor," plus and a victory lap around the track in a "wedding tram"). If you're willing to fork out $900, you get everything, plus access to a special wedding reception suite loaded with food and drink.
Meanwhile, "guests" who pay from $75 to the basic package or $450 for the deluxe deal that includes the reception also get a ticket, pit pass, cupcake and "1 pair of commemorate lug nuts." Which, by the time this is done, is pretty much what the bride has taken from the groom. For more info (linked here), contact track wedding coordinator Seneca Manzo. Come for the vows, stay for the tow trucks.

MLB playoffs: ALDS Game 4 (if necessary): Minnesota at N.Y. Yankees, TBA, TBS; ALDS Game 4 (if necessary): Tampa Bay at Texas, TBA, TBS; NLDS Game 3: Philadelphia at Cincinnati, TBA, TBS; NLDS Game 3: San Francisco at Atlanta, TBA, TBS:

If necessary, four games on one channel? Probably not. One will likely be on TNT, since there's no West Coast site able to start at 8:30 p.m. local time.

NFL: San Diego at Oakland, 1 p.m., Channel 2:

Satisfies all requirements of Chargers and Raiders fans in L.A. who can't let it go.

NFL: Philadelphia at San Francisco, 5:20 p.m., Channel 4:

Satisfies all requirements of a network getting Donovan McNabb into a prime-time game at least once a month.

NHL: Kings at Calgary, 5 p.m., FSW:

Where do the Kings find some good Chinese food in Calgary? May we suggest a visit to King's Chinese Food on 17th Avenue SW (linked here). This review of the joint from Google: "The young lady was a completely rude. 'What do you want' (and) 'Pay now' were the only things we heard out of her mouth. If the food was great it wouldn't have bothered me but it was just mediocre. The Won-ton soup tasted sour, like it was about to turn. There are way to (sic) many Chinese food restaurants in this city. Don't bother with this one." We are so there, leading the Calgary stampede to a heaping helping of deep-fried resentment.

Don't tell my wife, but I went behind her back on Saturday to see a younger woman.

Quite surprisingly, it all fell into place pretty easy. Too perfect, you could say, for some haphazard horseplay.

Out at the Coliseum with her USC friends, where the Trojans were putting their 4-0 record on the line, my wife was about to get her fix of Traveler.

But out at Hollywood Park, with an 18-0 record on the line, I had a late-afternoon rendezvous planned with this amazing amazon named Zenyatta.

There was no secret about it: The Lady's Secret Stakes had been on my calendar for weeks. I'd be cheating fate if I didn't make it out there.

This all goes back to that day last November, at Santa Anita, when Zenyatta completely blindsided me. I'd heard of her reputation - all good, by the way -- but there was absolutely no way to describe the goose-bump moment she produced on that stage, dancing from so far back to overtake this field of studs with a burst of power, assuredness and strength to manhandle the Breeders' Cup Classic.

Every little thing she did was magic.

Smitten at first sight? You bet. With a winning ticket to prove it.

But then, as sometimes happens when a man has to choose between a female and his money, I did the stupid thing. I cashed in. Within moments of driving home, I realized I had cheapened whatever special moment Zenyatta and I had just had. To me, it was easier to explain to my wife that I made a few wagers, broke even, and all was good. I couldn't lie.

Of course, Zenyatta has gotten into my head, and now my heart.

It's bothered me almost a full year later. Redemption can be a backward walk uphill, especially after we were all led to believe that after her incredible victory, Zenyatta was about to saunter off, Garbo-esque, rarely if ever to be seen in public again.

But the public demanded an encore.

Over the past few months -- once back at Hollywood Park, another time down at Del Mar - I missed the chance of seeing her again. Maybe I was just too afraid.

But things still didn't sit right. Knowing that after Saturday's race, win or lose, and then she'd go off to Kentucky before retiring for good, I needed some closure.

Think about the greatest female athletes you've seen race over the last few decades, the ones who've caused you to double- and triple-take, completely stolen your attention and then won't give it back. Zenyatta has the strength and grace of Marion Jones, without the added benefits. The endorsement-powerful charm of a Danica Patrick, and the bedroom eyes of Amanda Beard, but with a much more complete body of work.

No piercings or tattoos. No extra baggage. No high maintenance. And legs that go on forever. Four of 'em.

She made me want to be a better sportswriter.

I stuck a couple bucks out at the pari-mutuel clerk, as nervous as a kid at his first junior-high prom, and made a simple request: Two dollars, No. 5 horse to win the seventh race. It was the very least I could do.

If Zenyatta won, it would be a very inexpensive souvenir, but something I could keep as a reminder of our last meeting.

If she lost . . . let's not even go there. The script doesn't call for that option.

As the 1-9 favorite, and then one horse short now of an original six-gal field, Zenyatta had a nearly impossible task of making this event Saturday memorable. It should have quick and easy.

Out in the paddock beforehand, playing to the thousands who snapped her picture, she did her usual posing and posturing, hamming it up, kicking at the ground, bowing her head.

She's too good.

Then, on her trip around the track, she held to form, stayed after back from the gaggle, waited, waited, slipped through on the final turn, then whipped all 1,200 pounds of her past whatever was in her way -- Satans Quick Chick, Switch, Emmy Darling and Moon De French. The triumph by less than a length to a predictable roar was followed by a quick bath, making her coat glisten as she pranced back on the track toward her stable, soaking in the adulation.

With all due respect, she is a drama queen.

As I stood near the finish line, still in awe as close to the rail as I could possibly be, I think that as she walked passed me, she gave me a wink.

I'll keep this winning ticket, one last memento, in a secret place.

My wife doesn't have to know. Right?

Made-to-order for those who missed it from today's newspaper:

There's PlayoffPAC.com, an action group simply trying to expose the flaws of college football's Bowl Championship Series setup, filing a 27-page complaint with the IRS that details all kinds of corruption involved with all these bowl committees disguised as non-profits but profiting at the top with alarming payouts to its CEOs. And now, despite all the evidence it produces, the reaction from bowl people is predictable (linked here): They have an regrettable agenda, and they're going to manipulate and "sensationalize" the numbers to back their cause.

There's A.J. Green, the star receiver for the University of Georgia, finally able to play today after serving a three-game NCAA-enforced suspension because it was discovered he sold his Independence Bowl jersey to someone who apparently meets the NCAA's definition of an agent. Green gave the money he made off the sale to charity, but the punishment stuck. And now, the University of Nebraska is in the process of selling off all 158 jerseys belonging to Cornhuskers who will play in the Oct. 16 game against Texas at an auction to benefit their own athletic department. Bids start at $250 (linked here). But they'll take the names off the jersey before they're sold.

There's Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith, who just signed a new contract that will pay him $1.2 million a year. That's nine times the salary of the Ohio state governor Ted Strickland. Head football coach Jim Tressel makes $3.5 million a year. Ask one of the Buckeyes' football players to do the math on that.

And there's nothing disturbing about any of this? Even Erin Andrews wearing glasses while on the set of ESPN "College GameDay" to look smarter could figure out how this just doesn't add up, eh?

== Rachel Nichols has more than 65,000 Twitter followers, and JennBrownESPN, who calls herself "ESPN Broadcaster and all around badass ;)" and just tweeted "just saw social network ... it was awesome!!" has only 19,000?

== What kind of liability does Mark Dantonio bring to the Michigan State football team trying to return too soon from a heart attack?

== Why mock the NBA for making Stan Van Gundy's wearing turtle necks instead of crumpled Van Husen collared shirts with the top button snapped off, the neck tie loosened and a couple of mustard stains visible?

== Why couldn't escort-less Tiger Woods have brought his mom to the Ryder Cup?

== Now Matt Kemp decides he's going to go for a 30-30 season?

== The Cubs are the one who'll be remembered for ending the Padres' playoff hopes?

== Whether or not you're a stat freak, what's the best reason not to hand Felix Hernandez (13-12, 2.27, 232 Ks) the AL Cy Young? Remember back in 1987, when 40-year-old Houston Astros star Nolan Ryan led the league with a 2.76 ERA and 270 Ks, but also had an 8-16 record -- and was just tied for fifth in the NL Cy Young, which was for some absurd reason instead given to Phillies relief pitcher Steve Bedrosian (40 saves, facing 366 batters in 89 innings, with a 5-3 record)?

You'd want that vote on your conscious?

Because Dodger fans deserve better, here's the list of sponsor-related (and otherwise) giveaways at Sunday's Dodger season-ender, in order of dazzleness (and remember, you'll probalby be asked to pay taxes on this stuff):

Very nice:

== A 2011 Hyndai Sonana (donated by Hyundai)
== A 55-inch Vizio flat-screen TV (donated by Vizio)
== A 40-inch Sharp TV and flat-panel mount (donated by Sharp)
== A 2010-2011 Mammoth Mountain Season Pass and Snowboard (donated by Mammoth Mountain)
== Signed jerseys from Joe Torre, Don Mattingly, Matt Kemp, Chad Billingsley, Rafael Furcal (road), Hiroki Kuroda and Casey Blake (road), plus signed bats from Blake and Loney and a game-used signed bat from James Loney (donated by the Dodgers Dream Foundation).

Sure, we'll take it...

== A voucher to fly on JetBlue (four available, donated by JetBlue)
== A case of Tommy Lasorda Wine (donated by Tommy Lasorda)
== A year's supply of Dreyer's Ice Cream (donated by Dreyer's Ice Cream)
== Two gift cards to the Guadalajara Grill (worth $100 each, donated by the Guadalajara Grill)
== A $100 gift card to the Hard Rock Cafe (donated by the Hard Rock Cafe)
== A $100 gift card to the Capital Grille (donated by the Capital Grille)
== A $100 gift card to Trader Joe's (donated by Trader Joe's)
== A $125 gift card to Morton's The Steakhouse (donated by Morton's The Steakhouse)
== A $50 gift card to MLB.com (donated by MLB.com)
== A MSI All In One Desktop Computer (donated by MSI)
== A one-night stay at the Hampton Inn & Suites, two show tickets for Sublime (Nov. 4) and dinner for 2 at the Pines Restaurant (donated by San Manuel Indian Bingo & Casino)
== A year's supply of dog food (donated by Natural Balance)

Uh, OK ... we could probably find someone to give it away to ...

== Four tickets to the special "Petros and Money Show" at Medieval Times on Oct. 6 (donated by KLAC-AM 570)
== Two tickets to Lakers-Warriors game, two tickets to USC-ASU football game, and two passes to watch Mason & Ireland Show (from ESPN-AM 710)
== A bowling party for eight including two hours of bowling and $50 of food and beverage (donated by Lucky Strike Lanes at LA Live)
== Two certificates for two unlimited ride wristbands at Pacific Park in Santa Monica (donated by Pacific Park)
== Universal Studio passes (200 of them available, donated by Universal Studios)
== Best Buy $50 gift cards (for of them available, donated by Best Buy)
== Chipolte gift cards (30 of them available, donated by Chipolte)
== A Disney XD Skateboard and merchandise, and Moto Bike with Helmet and Pads (donated by Disney)
== An NHRA John Force Racing autographed replica car (donated by NHRA)
== A two night stay at the Viceroy Hotel in Santa Monica (donated by the Viceroy Hotel)
== A four day/three night stay at the Sirena Del Mar in Cabo (donated by Welk Resorts)
== Dodgers season tickets on the loge level (donated by the Dodgers).

Seriously? Can we just decline?

== Tickets to NASCAR Nationwide Series (18 pairs, not for the Sprint Cup Series, from Auto Club Speedway).
== A spa gift basket (donated by Alba Botanica)
== Autographed Fox 11 personality headshots (donated by KTTV Channel 11)
== VIP guest seats to the "Price Is Right" and autographed memorabilia (donated by the "Price Is Right")
== A prize basket from "The Doctors" (donated by "The Doctors" TV show)
== Four tickets to Yo Gabba Gabba at the Nokia Theater on Nov. 26 (donated by Ticket Master)
== A collection of 23 CDs (for packs available, donated by Universal Music)
== Dr. Phil "prize basket" (donated by Dr. Phil)
== Four VIP passes to "The Insider" and signed Mary Hart memorabilia (from "Entertainment Tonight")

The NFL announced today that Kansas City defensive tackle Shaun Smith was one of three players to receive a $10,000 punishment, the result of grabbing the groin of San Francisco 49ers offensive lineman Anthony Davis during a running play in the Chiefs' 31-10 victory last Sunday.

What else can you do in the league to receive such a fine?

Buffalo's Steve Johnson was hit for $10,000 for pretending to shoot a shotgun after a touchdown in the Bills' 38-30 loss to New England.

Minnesota's Ray Edwards will also pay $10,000, but that's the result of two fines -- one of $5,000 for hitting Detroit quarterback Shaun Hill in the head area, and another $5,000 for unnecessary roughness when he shoved a Lions player last week.

Other fines handed out Friday:

The Associated Press

VANCOUVER, British Columbia -- Rafael Nadal, Maria Sharapova and other tennis players might gain something by grunting.

That's according to researchers at the University of British Columbia and University of Hawaii, who say that tennis players who grunt during points might be getting an advantage over their opponents.

Their study, posted online today by the Public Library of Science, looks at the effects of noise on how people perceive where shots are going, and says: "The presence of an extraneous sound interfered with a participants' performance, making their responses both slower and less accurate."

One of the study's authors, Scott Sinnett, says he plans further research on the subject.

== The study: http://www.plosone.org

The late Bill King, remembered in L.A. for his years doing play-by-play on Raiders games, will be on the ballot to possibly be named winner of the 2011 Ford C. Frick Award honored to excellence in broadcasting in baseball.

King, who called games for the Oakland Athletics for 25 years starting in the early 1980s up until his death, was among the top-three vote getters during September's online fan voting for the award on the Baseball Hall of Fame's Facebook page.

Tom Cheek, who called games for the Montreal Expos and Toronto Blue Jays for 31 years (the last 28 with the Blue Jays), received the most fan votes (11,661). King got 4,758 votes, and Jacques Doucet, who spent 34 years as the French play-by-play man for the Expos, was third with 2,715 votes.

The three will be automatically on the final 10-name ballot for the award, which will be announced in the near future. The winner is picked by a 20-member group that includes Dodgers' Hall of Fame broadcasters Vin Scully and Jaime Jarrin.

King, who died in 2005 at age 78, finished first in the '05 and '06 online fan voting for the award, but did not make it the last three years.

King joined the Raiders in 1966 and stayed with the team through 1992. For 10 years, he flew down from his home in Salsalito to L.A. doing the games for KFI-AM in L.A., as well as broadcasts back to the Oakland market. The Raiders left L.A. back for Oakland after the 1994 season.

Read this piece that Bruce Magownan did recently on him for the Contra Costa Times (linked here).

Worthy complaints about how NBC was showing Day 2 of the Ryder Cup on a 5-plus hour delay were washed away this morning by rains that delayed Day 1, pushing the afternoon session back and a scramble to finish the morning session before darnkess in Wales.

(The Euro players, we understand, were playing "Tiger Woods Golf" on Xbox during the delay).

NBC, which owns the U.S. TV rights to the Ryder Cup (it made an agreement to give the first day to ESPN, whose live coverage starting at 11:30 p.m. Saturday and going overnight really didn't make for much compelling TV, which is why it's still on the air live right now), says this is how it will move forward:

== Tonight:

Back to ESPN live at 11:30 p.m. until 5 a.m. Saturday, handing it off to NBC live at 5 a.m. until 3 p.m.

== Sunday:

NBC now comes on at 1 a.m. PDT instead of 4 a.m., and goes until the conclusion of play. If it spills to Monday (Wales time), NBC's USA Network jumps in (it once did this back in the day), starting at 11 p.m. Sunday night live and going until it ends Monday morning.

California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger took it all the way to the last day of September to sign a bunch of bills, so many that they're not even updated on his website (linked here), but included in the batch was AB 2079.

It matters because .... (linked here).

Congrats to Ramogi Huma.

There are already more than 200 comments posted on this blog offering by Joe Posnanski on his Sports Illustrated piece (coming up in a future issue) on Vin Scully (linked here).

A clip:

Vin Scully begins his stories with apologies these days. He's reached that plateau of fame. "I'm sorry if I'm repeating myself," he says. "I know you've probably already heard this," he says. "I've told this many times before," he says. It is a mark of the man's grace that he is the one apologizing repeatedly and not the reporter who asks him precisely the same questions people have been asking for 50 years. Scully genuinely -- and generously -- wants to help the writer tell a good story.

"I know you've probably heard about the radio," he says, and indeed I have heard it, but I ask if he will tell it again. ...

The fact that CNN's Soledad O'Brien, more famous recently for her "Black in America" series (linked here) for the cable news network, would land the first major post-Cavs TV interview with LeBron James and his marketing man Maverick Carter can be the prism through which we look at the transcript of their chat the other night.

The archived transcripts from CNN's Wednesday "PrimeTime" show are on the network's website (linked here) but were pared down at SportsByBrooks.com (linked here), under the headline "LeBron Says Racism Factor In 'Decision' Backlash." Which allows us to read:

O'BRIEN (on camera): Do you think there's a role that race plays in this.

JAMES: I think so at times. It's always, you know, a race factor.

CARTER: It definitely played a role in some of the stuff coming out of the media, things that were written for sure.

No follow up?

No further explanation from James or Carter?

You've agreed with the premise of the race card played by the media, but have no examples, no further comment about it ...

Let's talk about it ... Oh, you've said all you want to say about it? Now you've left it open to further interpretation. In a bad, stupid, unproductive way.

How much more are you going to mishandle this decision to move on?

It goes further:

O'BRIEN (voice-over): LeBron James and Maverick Carter say what does bother them is that lost amid the controversy is the fact that "The Decision" TV program raised $3 million for Boys & Girls Club of America.

CARTER: We own the advertising time. We went out and sold it to brands and we took every dime and donated it to charity.

SportsByBrooks.com's Brooks Melchior points out that "Carter was incorrect in stating that 'every dime' of the ad revenue from the TV broadcast announcing James' free agent intentions was given to charity. Reporter Jim Gray has confirmed publicly that he received a 'stipend' from the James camp for his appearance on the program."

Still, this whole thing stinks to high Heat heck, and it's offensive that James and/or Carter would even answer O'Brien's question about that -- unless she was put up to it.

Was she even listening? Did she even watch 'The Decision' on ESPN -- which she never references?

(We do enjoy this part of the transcript, though, as the segment started):

Meaning, from now on, identifying Gray as "unidentified male" is appropriate.

We try to move forward with far more mundane sports media notes that didn't make it into today's newspaper and Internet edition (linked here), as we are watching the first day of the Ryder Cup while it's very dark outside:

== DirecTV's "NFL Sunday Ticket" premium service will be offered as part of JetBlue flights starting this Sunday (as long as you're flying in the continental U.S.), the companies announced. JetBlue has been using DirecTV programming since 2000.

== Carter Blackburn, Brock Huard, Mike Bellotti and Shelley Smith are on the broadcast team doing the USC-Washington football game from the Coliseum (5 p.m., ESPN2, ESPN3.com).

== Bill Macdonald, James Washington and Rebecca Haarlow are on the FSW coverage of UCLA-Washington State from the Rose Bowl. Patrick O'Neal and JJ Stokes will man the pre- and post-game shows.

== Chris McGee and John Jackson call tonight's Westlake Village-Oaks Christian high school football game on FSW at 8:30 p.m.

== CBS NFL analyst Phil Simms, who'll be doing the Baltimore-Pittsburgh game with Jim Nantz (Sunday, 10 a.m., Channel 2), misses out in attending a halftime ceremony during the New York Giants' game Sunday against Chicago honoring 30 into their Ring of Honor. Fox delivers Carolina at New Orleans (Sunday, 10 a.m., Channel 11 with Kenny Albert, Darryl Johnston and Tony Siragusa) and Washington-Philadelphia (Sunday, 1 p.m., Channel 11, with Joe Buck and Troy Aikman, instead of Arizona at San Diego).

== Buck has to jet out of Boston on Saturday, after doing the Red Sox's home game against the New York Yankees, to make it to Philly for the Sunday NFL game. L.A. viewers of Fox MLB on Saturday get San Diego-San Francisco instead at 1 p.m. (with Josh Lewin and Mark Grace). For the final weekend of the MLB season, the MLB Network has Philadelphia at Atlanta tonight (4:30 p.m.) and then San Diego at San Francisco (7 p.m.), taking the home-feed broadcasts. Later Saturday, the MLB Network optis for Tampa Bay at Kansas City (4 p.m.).

== ESPN's next "30 For 30" documentary is an MLB-produced ditty called "Four Days in October," recalling the Boston Red Sox's comeback from an 0-3 deficit against the New York Yankees in the American League Championship Series of 2004 that launched them to their first World Series title in a bajillion years. Not just archived coverage, but this will have never-before-seen footage from multiple Red Sox players' personal camcorders -- including seeing Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling pull back the bandage on his injured ankle prior to the now-famous "bloody sock game" in Game Six to reveal the after-effects of the surgery he endured in order to pitch. The episode first airs Tuesday at 5 p.m. on ESPN, the day before the MLB playoffs begin on TBS.

== From Hannah Storm and Linda Cohn to Chris McKendry and Sage Steel, a rare moment in ESPN Women's History, and neither Sara Walsh nor Michelle Bonner are involved? (linked here)

== Considering it took ESPN.com ombudsman Don Ohlmeyer a couple of weeks to finally chime in on the Jay Mariotti arrest and the controversy around the column from ESPNLosAngeles.com reporter Arash Markazi about LeBron James in Las Vegas that was killed, we thought we'd get around to finally mentioning that we did read it (linked here) and thought it was more amusing to comb through the reactions to it.
The Big Lead's Jason McIntyre (linked here): "After nearly a 60-day summer siesta, Don Ohlmeyer ... waited far too long to address these issues, as both are stale and nobody cares about Mariotti until his next court date."
A response to McIntyre's response, from "illformula": "i know i'm in the minority here, but every "story" involving media members bores the s--t out of me."

== And a head's up to Ohlmeyer, who in 1997 when he was the NBC executive suggested Norm Macdonald be fired as the "Saturday Night Live" Weekend Update host because he thought Macdonald just was "not funny" -- Macdonald is helping create "a 'Daily Show' for sports" on Comedy Central, according to various reports (linked here).
Strange, in that Comedy Central has already supposedly been supporting a sports-related satire show from The Onion that's been in production.

== NHL preview show alert: FSW sizes up the Kings at 3:30 p.m. Sunday, while Prime Ticket has the Ducks' show at 4:30 p.m. Sunday.

== Take a trip inside the Dodgers' Sports Lab (linked here) with the team's VP of Broadcasting Lauryn Lukin.

== Lee "Hacksaw" Hamilton (not his name is bumped to the 10 a.m.-to-2 p.m. slot on XX Sports Radio in San Diego, replaced in the afternoon-drive slot by Darren Smith when the station reformats its fall lineup starting Monday, according to Jay Posner at the San Diego Union Tribune. Hamilton has been an afternoon staple for most of the last 23 years he's been doing sports-talk in San Diego on various stations.
Posner also reports that ESPN Radio, which had been on XX Sports, will move to San Diego 1700 (XEPE-AM) starting Oct. 6 to coincide with the MLB playoffs.

== Deadspin.com asks: How did Ken Burns skip the Ugueth Urbina angle from "Tenth Inning"? This oughta cover it (linked here).

== AND FINALLY:

== To promote the Oct. 8 release of "The Body Issue" in ESPN's magazine, ESPN2 will air a one-hour special on Monday (from 4-to-5 p.m.) so that viewers can join in the "celebration and exploration of the athletic form, honoring athletes of diverse shapes, sizes, colors, genders and race."

Amanda Beard (at right, if you couldn't figure that out), Rudy Garcia-Tolson, Randy Couture and Nate Robinson (not pictured at right) are featured in the special, which uses CGI and body-mapping technology to show how each has become strong and faster in their sports.

There are 40 athletes who agreed to be photographed in some sort of nude way or another for the magazine. They include the U.S. women's water polo team, the WNBA's Diana Taurasi, billiards' Jeanette Lee, skiier Julia Mancuso, javelin athlete Rachel Yurkovich, volleyball standout Kim Glass, the NBA's Amare Stoudemire, figure skater Evan Lysacek, former NFL star and current MMA fighter Herschel Walker, surfer Kelly Slater (isn't he already pretty much naked?), the NFL's Patrick Willis ...

And masters track and field standout Phillipa Raschker, who hardly looks her age -- 63. The magazine will no doubt prove that.