Boston Should Be a Breeze for McNamara

In Boston, they’re saying it’s win-or-else for John McNamara this year, but the manager doesn’t look concerned. After all, this is a man who worked for Charlie Finley and lived to tell about it. He even survived San Diego.

Wrote Steve Fainaru of the Hartford Courant: “Ray Kroc hired him as manager of the Padres in 1974. On opening night, Kroc came on the public address system during the seventh-inning stretch and announced to the crowd, ‘This is the worst exhibition of baseball I’ve ever seen.’

“A streaker ran across the infield as Kroc was offering refunds. McNamara sat in the dugout, his boss’ voice booming throughout the stadium to ‘get that guy,’ who was running nude through Jack Murphy Stadium.”

Said McNamara: “I was going, ‘Now what the hell have you gotten yourself into?’ ”

Just Asking: Has there ever been a more aptly named coach for a school than Willem Hendrik (Butch) van Breda Kolff? He’s back for a second term as head basketball coach at Hofstra, known as the Flying Dutchmen.

Van Breda Kolff, 64, ended a second term at Lafayette to return to Hofstra. Before Lafayette, he was at Picayune Memorial High School in Picayune, Miss.

“People down there,” he said, “figured out I’ll be back in Picayune in 2013.”

Note: Like John McNamara, Van Breda Kolff put in a stint for Charlie Finley. He coached Finley’s Memphis Tams of the American Basketball Assn. in 1973.

Add Van Breda Kolff: He said he’s given up beer, cigars and caffeine and stays in shape playing tennis.

“Instead of coming in at 6 in the morning, I get up at 6 in the morning,” he said.

Trivia Time: Name two All-Americans from the University of Kansas who have played for the Harlem Globetrotters. (Answer follows.)

Billy Martin, explaining his managerial style, told Tom Verducci of Newsday: “I look into a player’s eyes. You can tell a lot that way. At least I can. Jim Northrup in Detroit hated my guts. I didn’t like him too much, either. But I played him.

“Reggie really disliked me. I didn’t dislike him as a person. I didn’t approve of a lot of theories he had. I didn’t like his theories at all. Like when he came to the Yankees in 1977 and said, ‘Now we’re going to win.’ Hell, we would have won without him. We didn’t need him. We won the year before. And then the year he’s there all hell broke out. That was my toughest year ever as a manager. But I don’t hate him for that.”

For What It’s Worth: Arnie Ferrin, the National Collegiate Athletic Assn. selection committee chairman, who led Utah to the 1943-44 title, was college basketball’s first four-time All-American. The others are Tony Lavelli (Yale), Tom Gola (La Salle) and Keith Lee (Memphis State).

Trivia Answer: Wilt Chamberlain and Lynette Woodard.

Quotebook

Atlanta Braves owner Ted Turner, explaining the team’s problems to Los Angeles reporters: “You know, if I were you in Dodgerland, you ain’t got a whole lot to smile about either.”