Strange but True: Dodgers Did Merge With the Yanks

Yes, Virginia, there was a pro football team called the Brooklyn Dodgers.

In response to a recent Morning Briefing item, several callers to The Times doubted that Brooklyn once had an NFL team with the same nickname as the baseball team.

The football Dodgers played at Ebbets Field from 1930 through ’44 before merging with the Boston Yanks in 1945 to play home games in both cities. In 1946, the Brooklyn Dodgers resurfaced for a few years as an All-America Conference team.

Homeless: In 1926, an upstart organization called the American Football League was formed, and Los Angeles had a franchise called the Wildcats. But the Wildcats played all of their games on the road and the league folded after one year.

There was also a rival Los Angeles franchise in the NFL called the Buccaneers. Like the Wildcats, they never played a game in L.A. and were out of a business in a year.

Trivia time: How many Pacific 10 Conference schools have a winning record in the Rose Bowl game?

Sour grapes? San Francisco Giant President Al Rosen is skeptical about the Dodgers’ recent acquisition, knuckleball pitcher Tom Candiotti.

“In (the National League), they’ll be running on him all the time,” Rosen told Glenn Dickey of the San Francisco Chronicle. “They don’t run as much in the American League, but the speedsters in this league will be going every time he cocks his arm.”

Missed a Lot(t): Raider safety Ronnie Lott, a Plan B reject of the San Francisco 49ers, has an NFL-leading eight interceptions.

The 49ers? They have 10 as a team.

Nickname needed: The Philadelphia Eagles’ defense is now being compared with the best defensive units in NFL history.

“Let me tell you where these guys are exceptional,” Phoenix Cardinal defensive coordinator Fritz Shurmur told the Boston Globe. “All 11 of them can really tackle. I don’t know if I have ever seen another defense where all 11 guys can hit, and like to hit. They’re exceptionally physical.”

Add defense: The 1977 Atlanta Falcons allowed only 129 points in a 14-game season, the lowest total in the past 30 years, excluding the strike-shortened season in 1982.

Jerry Glanville, Atlanta’s coach, was the defensive coordinator at the time.

“We blitzed every play,” Glanville said. “We were crazy. We drove people nuts. They couldn’t handle us. They didn’t know that we had two cornerbacks that couldn’t cover anybody. Other teams used to look at our films and be scared to death.”

So scared that the Falcons finished with a 7-7 record.

More on manure: An item in the Nov. 21 Morning Briefing told of a past UCLA prank of dumping manure on USC’s statue of Tommy Trojan from a helicopter.

Reader Milton Diehl corrects the version from the book, “60 Years of UCLA-USC Football.”

Diehl said that when the Bruin pranksters opened the bags of manure and dumped them, the backwash caused by the chopper blades blew the stuff back on them.

Later, they weren’t allowed into classrooms.

Trivia answer: Only two. USC is 19-8, Arizona State 1-0.

Quotebook: General Manager George Young of the New York Giants, on his affinity for offensive linemen: “I’m a ‘Save the Whales’ guy.”