But They Won’t Be Manning the Booth

CBS announcers Jim Nantz and Phil Simms, on stage last week during the network’s fall preview presentation to advertisers in New York, were joined by Indianapolis Colts quarterback Peyton Manning and his brother Eli, quarterback of the New York Giants.

The Colts and Giants meet Sept. 10 in NBC’s first Sunday night NFL game. The New York Daily News quoted Simms saying, “At least NBC will have one hit this year.”

Said Nantz: “When they meet a second time, in February down in Miami [site of the Super Bowl], it will be on CBS.”

Trivia time: The Angels’ Vladimir Guerrero was the American League most valuable player in 2004. Who was the last Dodger to be voted National League MVP?

Name game: Stanley Cup, 57, the steel mill worker from western Pennsylvania who OLN brought to New York to make some NHL playoff promos, said he gets a lot of calls about his name around this time of year, mainly from radio stations.

So when the advertising agency in charge of the promos began calling, Cup said he at first didn’t return the calls, figuring it was just someone wanting to have fun with his name.

“I’m glad I finally did call back,” he said.

More name game: Cup said his parents knew nothing about hockey. They simply named him Stanley because it was his father Steven’s middle name.

He had his number: In a segment about Ryan Leaf on HBO’s “Real Sports,” John Trotter, who was a San Diego Chargers beat writer when the quarterback was with the team, recalls when Leaf once said he had an injured hand and couldn’t practice but later was seen playing golf.

Trotter says the next day, with writers gathered around his locker, Leaf turned his back and got on his cellphone.

“I was in the other corner of the locker room and there were two players over there,” Trotter recalled. “One of them said, ‘I bet he’s not on the phone.’ So he picked up the phone to call him and one of the guys said, ‘What’s his number?’ And the other player said, ‘619 J-E-R-K.’ ”

Once is enough: From the Flip Side column in the Baltimore Sun, on why Paul Allen shouldn’t sell the Portland Trail Blazers to Hollywood Video founder Mark Wattles: “Because he’d probably just watch them once and then want to return them.”

Looking back: On this day in 1965, Muhammad Ali knocked out Sonny Liston with what became known as the “phantom punch” one minute into the first round of their rematch at Lewiston, Maine. Ali won their first fight, at Miami Beach, when Liston failed to come out for the seventh round.

Trivia answer: Kirk Gibson in 1988.

And finally: Gene Collier of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, saying baseball couldn’t have a better citizen to rewrite its tainted record books than St. Louis’ Albert Pujols, wrote: “It would just feel better if we hadn’t said the same things about [Mark] McGwire and [Sammy] Sosa.”

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Larry Stewart can be reached at larry.stewart@latimes.com.