It’s One of the Greatest Upsets in Texas High School History

Tradition or no tradition, Brock will have nothing to do with high school football.

Last Saturday, the voters of Brock, Tex., an unincorporated rural community 30 miles west of Ft. Worth, rejected a proposal to “include football in the extracurricular program” of the town’s 97-student high school.

According to the Associated Press, this was the first football referendum in Texas’ history.

According to natural law, a Texas town without high school football is not a Texas town.

But in a record turnout, the vote was 295-190 against. AP reported: “Land owners felt they’d be footing the bill.”

Voter Joyce Walker said: “Kids love football and I like football, too. But not when we can’t afford it.”

Add Brock: Phil Lumsden, a school board member, proposed the measure in December. The board turned it down, by a 5-2 vote, but agreed to allow the referendum.

Said Lumsden: “It’s got me a little stumped. What happened is we got out-foxed. (Opponents) appealed to older people, telling them that their taxes would go up.”

Proponents argued that most of the equipment and uniforms could be donated. Besides, Lumsden added: “It just seems un-Texan not to have football.”

Trivia time: Which National League team has never had a player win a batting title, a home run title or an RBI title?

Walks like a duck: As soon as prized recruit Mike Miller, a 5-foot-7, 160-pound wide receiver from Sugar Land, Tex., signed his national letter of intent to attend Notre Dame, the comparisons began: Here comes the next Raghib (Rocket) Ismail.

Irish Coach Lou Holtz joined the chorus . . . or did he?

Said Holtz: “He looks like Rocket, he talks like Rocket, he’s even got some of the same facial expressions. He’s slightly faster than Rocket and more experienced coming in at wide receiver. But I do not expect him to be another Rocket.”

On second thought: The Union of European Football Assns. recently ordered the Greek club Olympiakos Piraeus to play two European Cup home games in empty stadiums after its fans’ unruly behavior at a match in October.

The club appealed the decision, and on Thursday the appeal board, citing persistent unruly behavior, suspended Olympiakos Piraeus for one season.

For winning colors: When Mike Gresham and his wife, Anne, owners of Lane Pharmaceuticals, couldn’t come up with a name for their new hair polish for horses, they held a contest among their employees.

None of the entries (including “Spit Shine”) appealed to them, so the Greshams proposed that they name the stuff after Secretariat. Their deal with the Jockey Club Research Foundation calls for a portion of the proceeds to help fund equine veterinary research.

So Secretariat hair polish it is--an appropriate complement to another Lane Pharmaceuticals product, Man o’ War shampoo.

Trivia answer: The Houston Astros.

Quotebook: Auburn Coach Pat Dye, on what it would take to create a playoff to determine a college football champion: “You get one of those networks to put up $75 million, and you’d have it in a heartbeat.”