Ebbets Field Isn’t Part of His Memory

In a column about old-time ballparks, Ira Berkow of the New York Times told about a Brooklyn man named Bob Rosen who grew up rooting for the Dodgers.

A few years ago, Rosen took his young son on a drive through Flatbush, finally stopping at a housing project where Ebbets Field once stood.

“Son,” he said, his voice tender, “that’s where the Dodgers used to play ball.”

The boy looked out the car window and said, “Which floor, Pop?”

Oops Dept.: The answer Channel 4 gave to its trivia question Sunday night was George Foreman. It should have been Leon Spinks.

The question: “Who was the last undisputed heavyweight champion who also won an Olympic gold medal?”

Tom Watson, five-time British Open champion, feels better about his chances of winning a sixth after reading a book on the short game and changing his putting stroke.

“The book says your backswing should be shorter than your follow-through,” Watson said. “Mine wasn’t. Now it is.”

The name of the book is “Getting Up and Down.” The author?

Tom Watson.

Trivia Time: Who knocked in the first run in All-Star game history? (Answer below.)

Chicago White Sox Manager Jim Fregosi had to smile when told that the All-Star pitchers who started games Sunday probably wouldn’t be used tonight.

Fregosi: “I remember one All-Star game where Bob Gibson pitched 10 innings on Sunday and had no trouble pitching in the All-Star game on Tuesday. Of course, he wasn’t up to par. He only threw at about 97 m.p.h. I even took him to the warning track with a fly ball.”

33 Years Ago Today: On July 12, 1955, Stan Musial hit Frank Sullivan’s first pitch of the 12th inning for a home run to give the National League a 6-5 victory over the American League at Milwaukee’s County Stadium. The American League had led, 5-0, after six innings. The big blow was a three-run homer by Mickey Mantle.

When Boston Red Sox Manager John McNamara came under fire the other day, Tim Kurkjian of the Baltimore Sun wrote: “The ‘Knife the Mac Watch’ is on again in Boston.’ ”

Kinerism-of-the-Week: Said New York Mets announcer Ralph Kiner when asked how Branch Rickey would have reacted to free agency: “If Mr. Rickey were alive today, he’d be spinning in his grave.”

Bob Smith, president of the International Baseball Assn., said that Marat Gramov, president of the Soviet Olympic Committee, told him that with Cuba’s help, the Soviets will soon be competitive with the United States in baseball.

Smith said that when he relayed this to Fidel Castro, the Cuban president said, “The Soviets will get good enough to beat you, but we’ll never teach them enough to beat us.”

It-had-to-happen dept.: Wrote Murray Chass of the New York Times in a Sunday column on Darryl Strawberry: “In his sixth season, the Mets’ right fielder has become as feared as any hitter in the league.”

Over the weekend, Strawberry went 0 for 12 in three games against Houston, striking out six times.

Trivia Answer: Lefty Gomez.

Quotebook

Soviet basketball star Arvidas Sabonis, a draft pick of the Portland Trail Blazers, on the friendliness of women in Portland: “If I had known this six months ago, I would have known English by now.”