He could get rep as a dirty player

Talk about grounds for celebration.

Tom Shearn, a 30-year-old pitcher who works as a groundskeeper for a minor league team in Texas during the off-season, won his first major league start Aug. 26 for the Cincinnati Reds after 11 seasons in the minors.

“Shearny knows how to pick up a shovel, so somebody must have raised him right,” Texas Rangers grounds director Dennis Klein, his former supervisor, told the Associated Press.

Earlier this season, while pitching for triple-A Louisville, Shearn would occasionally help out the maintenance crew and even lived in groundskeeper Tom Nielsen’s camper behind the outfield wall for a while to save money on rent.

“But I had to get out of there so fast last weekend, I didn’t have time to pay him,” Shearn told a reporter. “I still owe Tom some money.”

Shearn’s victory over Florida in his debut -- he held the Marlins to four hits and three runs over seven innings -- earned him another start Friday, in which he gave up three runs and seven hits in 4 1/3 innings and got no decision in a loss to St. Louis.

Klein, who used to supervise Shearn’s work during the winter for the triple-A Round Rock Express, said his skills might launch another career in baseball when his pitching days are done.

“I told him, ‘Hey, man, when you’re in my job, you can stay in the game until you’re 60,’ ” Klein said.

Trivia time

Who is the last man besides Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal to win the singles title at a Grand Slam tennis tournament?

Another way to lose

A Las Vegas sports book has begun taking wagers on fantasy football.

Station Casinos isn’t running fantasy leagues, simply setting a line for 24 players every week based on a fantasy formula of six points for a touchdown, one point for every 30 yards passing and one for every 10 yards rushing or receiving.

So instead of betting on whether the Indianapolis Colts will beat the New Orleans Saints, the AP report explained, bettors might wager on whether Reggie Bush will have more or less than 16 points.

Think you can win big bucks?

There’s your fantasy, right there.

Bronco fever

Boise State’s licensing revenue jumped 60% after its undefeated 2006 football season and Fiesta Bowl victory over Oklahoma, USA Today reported.

Come on, everybody knows it’s Oklahoma State fans who are snatching up all that Boise gear.

Many happy returns

Andy Roddick’s 25th birthday came on Thursday at the U.S. Open, and reporters asked about his celebrations as a youngster, when his mother sometimes took him to the Open for his birthday.

“I’d get here for the first match and I wouldn’t leave till it was over,” he said. “I actually snuck into the players lounge one time and stole a cheesecake.”

It seemed to strike Roddick as odd when someone asked if there were any birthday pony rides in his past.

“Pony rides? I’d lie to you if I did take pony rides,” he said.

And this just in . . .

A late-August news bulletin from the spoof publication The Onion: “Non-Doping Cyclists Finish Tour de France.”

Trivia answer

Marat Safin, who won the Australian Open in 2005.

And finally

Andy Mill, the ex-husband of tennis great Chris Evert, quoted in Golf World on Evert’s reportedly dating Greg Norman:

“Greg Norman at one time was my best friend, and a year and a half ago I would have taken a bullet for this guy. But I didn’t realize he was the one who was going to pull the trigger.”

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robyn.norwood@latimes.com