In Hindsight, It’s Easy to See Why He Chose to Be a Coach

Bones McKinney, former Wake Forest basketball coach who likes to tell stories, is out with a book titled, “Bones--Honk Your Horn if You Love Basketball.” Frank Hyland of the Atlanta Journal and Constitution passes along one of the stories.

McKinney swears he flunked out of Southeastern Theological Seminary when he blew the key question on a midterm test. The question was, “What was Paul’s vision on the road to Damascus?”

McKinney’s answer: “20/20.”

Raging optimism: When Toronto Blue Jays rookie Alex Sanchez walked leadoff batter Dan Gladden in his big league debut against the Minnesota Twins, catcher Bob Brenly, looking on the bright side, went to the mound and said, “Well, you got your first hitter out of the way and you still got your no-hitter going.”

Trivia time: In 1915, when Babe Ruth hit the first home run of his career, in a game won by the New York Yankees, in what stadium was he playing?

Add 1915: From “The Great American Sports Book” by George Gipe: “The spring of 1915 was enlivened by aviatrix Ruth Law’s dropping a grapefruit on former major league catcher Gabby Street, who previously had caught a baseball dropped from the top of the 555-foot high Washington Monument.

“Miss Law did not intend to drop a grapefruit, but she forgot the ball and selected a grapefruit at the last minute.

“Casey Stengel, then a Brooklyn Dodger outfielder, described the event: ‘The missile caromed off the edge of the mitt and hit him in the chest. He spun around and then fell over, like in a Western movie where they see an Indian on the hill and they shoot him and he goes around in a circle and falls dead.’ ”

My friends call me . . . : Dave Bristol, third base coach of the Cincinnati Reds, tells this story, as passed along by the Houston Chronicle:

“Gene Mauch was the Montreal manager when Bristol coached third at Montreal. One night, Mauch flashed the squeeze sign. Bristol relayed it to the hitter, then alerted Bob Bailey, the runner at third.

“The tipoff was, ‘Anything with your last name in it,’ ” Bristol said. “I said, ‘Be alive, Bailey.’ But Bailey calls time out and says, ‘Dave, we’ve been together three years. You can call me Bob.’ ”

Two in a canoe: From Furman Bisher of the Atlanta Journal: “Jim Kelly, Bernie Kosar, Vinny Testaverde, etc., have come off the quarterback assembly line at Miami, but Gary Stevens, the departed QB coach, says Craig Erickson will be better than any of the above. No kin to the new coach, Dennis Erickson, but now both Ericksons are on the spot.”

Trivia answer: The Polo Grounds, in which both the New York Giants and Yankees played. Ruth, a 20-year-old pitcher for the Boston Red Sox, homered off Jack Warhop of the Yankees.

Quotebook: Bert Blyleven of the Angels, on how he became a pitcher instead of a catcher: “When I started throwing the ball back to the pitcher harder than he was throwing to me, we changed positions.”