This Was Too Much for Lendl to Swallow

When they asked John McEnroe about the possibility of Ivan Lendl joining him on the U.S. Davis Cup team if Lendl gains U.S. citizenship, he said: “That’s very difficult for me to swallow.”

Said Lendl: “It’s hard to imagine with his mouth that he has a hard time swallowing anything.”

Add Lendl: Of his rivalry with McEnroe, he said: “I have one problem with him. He keeps insulting me on the court, calling me names.”

What kind of names?

Lendl: “If you want to hear them, just come follow me on the golf course and you’ll hear them.”

From Washington Redskins kicker Jess Atkinson, whose father is a Navy pilot: “I told him once about how I made 93 straight extra points at Maryland. He said, ‘Well, Jess, I had 104 successful night carrier landings. What do think would have happened if I only had 93?’ I stopped talking.”

Trivia Time: Who are the only brothers to pitch no-hitters in the major leagues? (Answer below.)

11 Years Ago Today: On Aug. 9, 1976, John Candelaria became the first Pirate pitcher in 69 years to throw a no-hitter in Pittsburgh, beating the Dodgers, 2-0, at Three Rivers Stadium. No Pirate ever threw a no-hitter at Forbes Field.

Mickey Mantle, on Don Mattingly: “He is my idol right now. He’s the best thing going. Ted Williams is the greatest hitter I’ve ever seen, but Don Mattingly is close. He can really hit and field and he’s out there early taking batting practice every day. He’s the best guy on a baseball team I’ve seen.”

More from the Mick: On juiced-up baseballs: “I played in an old-timers’ game in Atlanta, hit the ball off my fists, and it went into the upper deck. It was enough to make me think about coming out of retirement.”

On scuffballs: “I think Whitey Ford probably invented the scuffed ball. He had mudballs, scuffed balls--he could do just about anything with a baseball.”

Only recently, Ford admitted he was scuffing again.

“I’m tired of losing old-timers’ games,” he said.

Ohio State’s Chris Spielman, a leading candidate for the Butkus Award as the nation’s top college linebacker, was asked by the Columbus Dispatch if he had ever met the man for whom the award is named.

“Nope,” he said. “Maybe I’ll get a chance someday. I’d like to know if he could play four downs in a row now in the NFL. He was great against the run, but now you’ve got to defend against the pass and play man-to-man defense. But if he reads that, he might come and crush me.”

Add Butkus: Alabama football Coach Bill Curry, a former NFL center, says: “Just to think about Butkus was intimidating. I’d come up over the ball and instead of thinking, ‘I’m going to take three steps at a 45-degree angle and cut him off and I’m going to knock his knees out from under him,’ I’d wonder, ‘What’s he going to do to me now. Where is he?’ ”

It-had-to-happen Dept.: Said ESPN analyst Bruce Devlin as Mac O’Grady teed off on the par-3 15th hole in the PGA: “A lot of people have a lot of respect for this man’s golf swing.”

So did the gallery. His shot had them running for cover.

Trivia Answer: Bob and Ken Forsch. Bob did it twice.

Quotebook

Dick Butkus, denying he was a dirty player: “I never set out to hurt anybody deliberately unless it was, you know, important--like a league game or something.”