Notes on a Scorecard - March 21, 1990

Dear John Robinson: Please accept my apology. I was wrong about the Eric Dickerson trade. You made a good deal when you shipped him to Indianapolis. . . .

Dickerson was underpaid by the Rams, but now he is proving that he is all-malcontent as well as all-pro. He says he will quit pro football unless the Indianapolis Colts trade him. His beef is that the offensive line is so porous that he risks his life every time he carries the ball. Strange, but two Colt offensive linemen, center Ray Donaldson and tackle Chris Hinton, were voted onto the AFC Pro Bowl first team. . . .

When Loyola University was changed to Loyola Marymount in 1973, it meant the end of the annoying parentheses at the end of the school’s name in the college basketball scores. That was so Loyola (Calif.) wouldn’t be confused with Loyola (Ill.), which won the NCAA championship in 1963. . . .

Loyola Marymount’s mission in the wake of Hank Gathers’ death is similar to that of the Colorado football team last season after quarterback Sal Aunese succumbed to cancer. The Buffaloes fell one victory short of the national championship. . . .

Somehow, it’s hard to think of UCLA and North Carolina as giant-killers. . . .

Coach Gene Keady’s tirade against the officials after Purdue’s loss to Texas Sunday brought to mind the time Indiana was fined $10,000 after Bobby Knight pounded his fist on the scorer’s table during an NCAA tournament game against LSU. Knight didn’t even draw a technical foul that day but his act so infuriated LSU Coach Dale Brown that the two didn’t speak until recently, when they settled their differences. . . .

Nice to see Gary Colson, who got a raw deal from New Mexico, land the Fresno State coaching job. . . .

The decision of Michigan forward Sean Higgins to turn pro a year early isn’t going to change the look of the NBA lottery draft. . . .

At least Higgins was honest about why he went to college. He said he wanted to win an NCAA championship. And he did, last year. . . .

There isn’t a bigger celebrity in Las Vegas than Jerry Tarkanian. . . .

In case you were still wondering if college basketball is a team game, none of the 26 players with the highest scoring averages in NCAA Division I history ever played for a national champion. . . .

Kenny Smith of the Hawks, a disappointment in the pros, may not even be the best guard in his family playing basketball in the city of Atlanta. His cousin is Kenny Anderson, the exceptional Georgia Tech freshman. . . .

Look-alikes: Loyola Marymount guard Jeff Fryer and former NBA star Paul Westphal. . . .

Maybe the Julio Cesar Chavez-Meldrick Taylor classic will persuade the TV networks to give more exposure to the lighter weight divisions, where the majority of the best fights are waged. . . .

Tomas Sandstrom and Tony Granato have come to life for the Kings, but Bernie Nicholls has scored only two goals in his last 13 games for the Rangers. . . .

Whatever happened to Gordie Howe’s comeback? . . .

The late Tom Harmon was proud of the football exploits of his son Mark, who played quarterback for UCLA in 1972-73, but never pushed him. . . .

AFC rushing champion Christian Okoye, who got married last week, told track promoter Al Franken that he still prefers throwing the discus to running the football. He plays for the Kansas City Chiefs because the money is better. . . .

USC has only two returning starters on defense, but the offense had trouble moving the football in a spring practice scrimmage. Particularly impressive were inside linebackers Scott Ross, Brian Tuliau, Matt Gee and Gidion (Batman) Murrell. . . .

The London tabloids are going berserk, as only they can, over the proposal to change soccer from halves to quarters in order to create more dead time and accommodate World Cup television sponsors. . . .

Now it’s bigger news when 13-year-old Jennifer Capriati loses than when she wins. . . .

Santa Anita wasn’t the only track criticized for the inconsistency of its racing surface this winter. Many horsemen shipped out of Gulfstream early because of the same problem. . . . The Lakers hold a much wider edge over their opponents in three-point field goals than two-pointers. . . .

Don’t believe most of those attendance figures you see at the bottom of Clipper box scores. Ah, for the good old days of the crowd-meter at the Sports Arena. . . .

Maybe Donald Sterling shouldn’t have fired Jimmy Lynam, who has the Philadelphia 76ers contending for the Atlantic Division championship. . . .

Never thought I would say it, but it was kind of nice to see ballplayers doing sit-ups on TV Monday.