Morning briefing

He might be stashing away votes

Baseball fans have until tonight to select two more players for the All-Star game, and the New York Yankees are pulling out all the stops to help Jason Giambi earn a spot.

The team has enlisted the American Mustache Institute to lobby for Giambi votes.

“It doesn’t take a mathematician to figure out that Jason Giambi’s hitting prowess, plus a fashionable mustache, equals a bona fide All-Star,” Aaron Perlut, executive director of the American Mustache Institute, said in a news release issued by the team.

“Giambi’s significant first-half production as well as his powerful lip fur -- indicating great intellect and good looks -- make two very compelling reasons for his place on the American League All-Star roster.”

None of the other American League candidates -- Jermaine Dye, Jose Guillen, Evan Longoria and Brian Roberts -- has a mustache.

Trivia time

Giambi has been an All-Star five times in his career. How many of those were when he played for the Oakland A’s?

Stripping the championship

Candice Houlihan, a former dancer at a Boston gentleman’s club, told the Boston Herald that she had a brief affair with Alex Rodriguez in 2004.

She said one of her hookups with A-Rod came during the Yankees’ visit to Boston for the American League Championship Series that year. Boston won the series and went on to win its first World Series since 1918.

“He said he had a big game the next day,” she told the paper. “I like to say I helped us win. I reversed the curse.”

Not every American’s idol

Chipper Jones is from the Daytona Beach, Fla., area so he’s used to getting recognized when he’s in town, but he told ESPN the Magazine that he was thrown for a loop at the Daytona 500 last year.

“Kelly Clarkson, who had sung before the race, came into the room,” Jones said. “She walked my way, looking at me like she knew who I was, so I started to put out my hand. Then she pulls out a camera and asks me to take a photo of her and her friends. . . . I was so embarrassed that I just wanted to go get a beer. Boy, was I put out.”

Drinking it in

Charles Barkley recently swore off gambling, but there he was in Las Vegas last week, playing in a celebrity poker tournament.

It didn’t count, Barkley said, because all of the winnings would go to charity. He did plan on indulging in another vice, however.

“I can’t gamble, so I gotta drink,” Barkley joked. “Can you imagine how bad life would be if you couldn’t gamble or drink?”

More Barkley

Sir Charles, noted for his clunky golf swing, is a 500-1 longshot to win the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship this weekend at Lake Tahoe.

Former NFL quarterback Chris Chandler is the defending champion, but some celebrities say they will be looking at the bottom of the leaderboard to measure their success.

“As long as I’m ahead of Charles, I’m in good shape,” Jason Kidd said.

Needs the kid gloves

Duke football Coach David Cutcliffe is having his team go around campus picking up trash as part of a team unity and school pride exercise.

It turned into a laugh-fest when they came across a pile of four or five dirty diapers near the football stadium.

“One of our coaches picked it [up] with his hand before he realized what it was,” linebacker Michael Tauiliili said.

Trivia answer

Two, 2000 and 2001.

And finally

Former decathlete Dan O’Brien said there was an easy way for sprinter Tyson Gay to find out if his hamstring injury was a cramp or something more serious.

“If he can’t sit on the toilet tomorrow, he’s got problems,” O’Brien said.

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peter.yoon@latimes.com