Jazz Man Is at It Again

Did you hear about Utah Jazz Coach Frank Layden being pulled over on the highway by police?

When the cop came to the window, Layden said: “What’s the problem? I wasn’t speeding and I didn’t run a light.”

Said the cop: “I just thought you might like to know that your wife fell out of the car about three miles back.”

Said Layden: “Gee, thanks, I thought I was going deaf.”

That’s Incredible!: For the record, Cathy Lee Crosby, actress and star of the former television series “That’s Incredible!”, and Joe Theismann, ex-Washington Redskins quarterback, are not married, as reported in this space on Sept. 3. The couple are, however, engaged.

Would-you-believe-it dept.: If outfielder Mike Marshall plays the rest of the games for the Dodgers this season, he will have played in one more game than Mike Marshall did in 1974. That was the year that Marshall, the relief pitcher, set a major league record with 106 appearances for the Dodgers.

Add Forgettable Quotes: Said Mike Schmidt before the season, claiming you don’t see sluggers such as Willie Mays, Henry Aaron and Willie Stargell anymore: “Let’s face it, home run hitting is a lost art. I mean, if I hit 30 this year, I’ve got a chance to lead the league.”

Schmidt hit his 30th Tuesday night, but there are six players ahead of him, led by Andre Dawson with 44.

Trivia Time: Since 1936, the first year of wire service ratings in college football, who is the only coach to win the national championship in his first year as a head coach? (Answer below.)

Ray Guy, who retired after 14 years as the Raider punter, said a lot of the fun went out of the game after the team moved from Oakland.

Interviewed by Edvins Beitiks of the San Francisco Examiner in Hattiesburg, Miss., Guy said: “Back in Oakland it was nothing to see six, seven guys hanging out together after the game, during the week. But in L.A., it got to where everybody had something to do--movie contracts, endorsements.

“Three or four of the guys tried to keep up the old tradition of looseness once we moved, but it was all in vain. And I’ll tell you, there are going to be problems until they get that unity back, until that togetherness is there.”

Add Guy: Of Marc Wilson, he said: “I don’t think he was ever the same after that Chicago game in 1984, when everybody got beat up so bad. Seemed like he got gun-shy for hits from the blind side.”

Of the team, he said: “That toughness is just not there anymore. They don’t have it on offense or defense. That one big mass of black jerseys coming in on people, you just don’t see that.”

Anyone remember that Charlie McNeil, father of U.S. Open semifinalist Lori McNeil, was a star defensive lineman at Centennial High?

Dick Bass might. Bass was the biggest name in the 1955 Shrine All-Star game at the Coliseum after a spectacular career at Vallejo High, but he netted only 22 yards as the South beat the North, 17-0. McNeil, who led the South defense, was named player of the game.

Centennial won the 1954 CIF Southern Section title with a 12-6 win over Glendale Hoover. The winning score came on the last play of the game, a touchdown pass by future Oregon State and San Diego Chargers star Paul Lowe.

Trivia Answer: Bennie Oosterbaan of Michigan, with a 9-0 record in 1948. He had succeeded Fritz Crisler, who moved up to athletic director after Michigan completed a perfect season in 1947 with a 49-0 win over USC in the Rose Bowl.

Quotebook

Bill Lyon of the Philadelphia Inquirer: “If at first you don’t succeed, hire yourself out as a consultant.”