Ironhead Is No Bo; Clippers Prove You <i> Can</i> Repeat in NBA

Pounding the sports beat . . .

It was a sad moment when the Rams bypassed Craig (Ironhead) Heyward in Sunday’s draft. No offense to Gaston Green, but Ironhead has what the Rams need--great pass-catching hands and durability. You get the feeling a guy named Ironhead isn’t going to phone in sick with turf tootsie or a dislocated car key.

Obviously the Ram and Raider draft picks were influenced by Bo Jackson. Bo provided a brief but dramatic display of what speed can do for a ballclub. All the muscle in the world does you no good if you can’t move it. Don’t think opposing teams aren’t heaving a collective sigh of relief at the retirement of Ron Brown, questionable hands or no.

Ironhead’s chief drawback, more than his alleged attitude, was his caboose.

“My problems are behind me,” Ironhead was assuring everyone.

“So we see,” said the Rams.

How difficult is it to repeat in the National Basketball Assn.?

Almost impossible, but the Clippers pulled it off. They finished with the league’s worst record for the second straight season. Indiana pulled a back-to-backer in ’84 and ‘85, but with an asterisk, since the Pacers shared the cellar with the Golden State Warriors in ’85.

The Nets repeated at the bottom in ’77 and ‘78, but also with an asterisk: They switched states between seasons, from New York to New Jersey. Before the Clippers, the last outright back-to-back king loser was the Philadelphia 76ers, in ’73 and ’74.

How nice that President Reagan took the time to phone Baltimore Orioles Manager Frank Robinson. Wish I’d had a phone tap on that conversation. It would have been interesting to hear the two leaders compare notes on losing streaks.

What will happen to Terry O’Reilly, Boston Bruin coach, who smashed windows of a parked car that was blocking the Bruins’ team bus in Hartford, Conn.?

My legal experts tell me O’Reilly, if found guilty, will be sentenced to two minutes for high-sticking, and the car will get two minutes for interference.

Ben Johnson, in passing up an invitation to run against Carl Lewis in the coming Pepsi Meet at UCLA, cost himself--and Lewis--about $200,000, or about $2,000 per meter.

Last summer in a meet at Switzerland, Johnson scratched from the 100 meters when Lewis entered that race, then scratched from the 200 when Lewis entered that race. Johnson wound up running a special 60-meter dash. If Lewis had entered that one, Johnson would have become a pole vaulter.

If Michael Jordan isn’t the NBA MVP--which he will be, even though the award should go to Magic Johnson--then the league should institute a new award: MTP--most thrilling player. The trophy would be a set of solid gold wings mounted atop a replica of Blueberry Hill.

For sheer entertainment, Jordan is the greatest show in sports.

And if the NBA gave an award for best-conditioned athlete, Jordan would win that, too. He is the most tireless, devastating fourth-quarter player since the prime of Moses Malone.

Aundray Bruce, the National Football League’s No. 1 draft pick, claims agents offered him “shopping bags filled with money” to sign with them before his college season ended. This shows how stupid agents are. If they wanted to tempt Bruce with riches, they should have offered shopping bags filled with groceries.

Pat Riley will be sending out thank-you notes to the four CBS basketball experts who picked the Lakers not to win the NBA title. Three of the experts picked the Celtics and one voted for the Detroit Pistons.

This was a wonderful gift to the Lakers and Riley, who are always searching for a psychological edge. Had the four wise men picked the Lakers, it would have cast a terrible pall over Riley and his guys. Right now they’re up in Santa Barbara, getting mad at the world.

Baseball usually does a great job of avalanching us with statistics. But we need two new ones: BKA, a pitcher’s balk average, per nine innings, and BC, bats confiscated for suspicion of cork. Howard Johnson leads the NL in BC, with three.

Fan alert: We’re looking at a vintage year for tennis. On the women’s side, Gabriela Sabatini beats Steffi Graf twice in a row, Martina crushes Sabatini, Chrissie thumps Martina . . .

And on the men’s side, Mac is back. John McEnroe’s recent win in Japan was no fluke. The kid, for probably the first time in his life, is in shape. And in control.

The question hard-bitten cynics and hoop insiders are asking, in regard to Chris Mills and the $1,000-in-the-package mystery: What happened to the other 49 payments?