Couple of Beers Were a Good Buy for Duffy

The subject was recruiting, and former Michigan State football coach Duffy Daugherty told about a trip he made to Texas.

“I was speaking in Beaumont and met Willy Ray Smith, a high school coach,” Daugherty said. “He and some other black coaches wanted to talk football, but in those days, they weren’t allowed into some bars, so I bought a couple of cases of beer and we went up to my hotel suite and talked football.

“A few years later, Willy Ray called me and said, ‘How would you like to try to make a man out of my son?’ I told him, ‘He’s your son, you make a man out of him. I’ll try to make him a football player.’ ”

And so it was that Bubba Smith became a Spartan.

Matt Young, the former Seattle Mariners relief pitcher acquired by the Dodgers Wednesday, was known as one of the American League’s hardest throwers and weakest fielders.

Said a San Francisco Giants executive after the trade: “The scouting report says he can’t field. He’ll fit right in with that defense down there.”

From Mickey Shuler, New York Jets tight end, admitting that he hasn’t been much fun around the house lately: “I wouldn’t want my daughter to have to deal with this kind of life. For that matter, I don’t think it’s such a great deal for the dog, either.”

Trivia Time: Name the only player who has scored three touchdowns in a Super Bowl game. (Answer below.)

St. Louis Cardinals Manager Whitey Herzog, on talks with Pittsburgh General Manager Syd Thrift about acquiring catcher Tony Pena: “Well, Syd doesn’t move that fast. It took him nine months to trade Rick Rhoden. I saw him this morning and said, ‘Let’s start talking now. I may be fired by the time we do it.’ ”

Would-you-believe-it Dept.: Detlef Schrempf of the Dallas Mavericks says the only NBA player he heard of while growing up in Leverkusen, West Germany, was Bill Walton.

Alan Greenberg of the Hartford Courant, on New York Giants tackle Brad Benson: “Two years ago, when former Giant offensive line coach Tom Bresnahan told Coach Bill Parcells he wanted to bench Benson, who isn’t especially strong or fast, in favor of Bill Roberts, a No. 1 draft choice who looks as if he can bench press the world, Parcells got rid of Bresnahan and kept Benson.”

Last Sunday, it was Benson, a nine-year veteran from Penn State, who rendered the Washington Redskins’ Dexter Manley sackless.

Add Benson: He was such a nervous wreck the week before the game that on Thursday his wife couldn’t take it anymore. She went to stay at her mother’s.

“The problem is,” Benson said, “I didn’t know she was gone.”

Former middleweight champion Vito Antuofermo, who fought Marvelous Marvin Hagler to a draw in 1979 and was knocked out in a rematch, gives Sugar Ray Leonard little chance against Hagler next April.

“I laid off three years and wasn’t the same when I came back,” Antuofermo told the Baltimore Sun. “And Leonard, with his past eye surgery, has to have some psychological scars no matter what he says. I think Hagler will stop him in three rounds. Leonard thinking he can win is like me saying I can be king of the world.”

Trivia Answer: Roger Craig of the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl XIX.

Quotebook

Gary Nuhn of the Dayton Daily News, on golfer Tom Sieckmann: “In 1981, he won the Philippine Open, the Thailand Open and the Singapore Open, leaving him second only to the U.S. Marines for victories in the Pacific.”