Don’t Send Flowers, Check Will Be Enough

Jimmy Connors didn’t bring flowers, as Bobby Riggs did, but he did pull out a chair for Martina Navratilova.

This was at a glitzy promotion for their Sept. 25 match in Las Vegas that picks up where Riggs and Billie Jean King left off 19 years ago.

Riggs flustered Margaret Court with flowers before beating her in the first of these matches, then got his comeuppance against King.

Connors, never one to shy away from a high-priced exhibition, immediately liked the idea of a $500,000 winner’s prize for the two-out-of-three-set match.

“I don’t want you all to think this is for fun,” Connors said. “It is for fun, I guess, if you want to look at it that way, but this is for this.”

As he spoke, Connors pointed to the check for $500,000 that goes to the winner.

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A bit of fencing: Navratilova, along with Chris Evert the only players in the history of tennis to win more titles than Connors, readily agreed to the match--if she got a handicap.

“I know Jimmy would beat me with regular rules,” Navratilova said. “Jimmy is still beating the top men’s players.”

After some negotiation, Connors agreed that he will get only one serve and that Navratilova will hit the ball into a court that is four feet wider than regulation.

Quipped Connors: “She wanted the whole court, from fence to fence.”

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Trivia time: Which NBA player appeared in 84 regular-season games in 1991-92, even though teams play 82 games?

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Hitting the Shaqpot: Not that things have gotten out of hand in Orlando, but the Magic recently held a news conference to announce that Shaquille O’Neal will wear uniform No. 32.

“There was a lot of negative press surrounding this issue,” O’Neal said. “They were saying I was the spoiled rookie and Terry Catledge was the veteran being forced to give up his number. Well, it was never that way. Terry and I are teammates and he has elected to keep No. 33 for personal reasons, so I have elected to wear jersey No. 32. It is the very first number that I wore when I started playing basketball.”

Give O’Neal and his representatives and the Magic credit, though. When he signed a reported seven-year, $40-million contract, it was the earliest a No. 1 pick had come to terms since 1981 and the quickest for any top selection in the lottery era. The latest? Danny Manning with the Clippers in 1988.

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Add jerseys: Indiana State is finally ready--able is more like it--to retire the blue-and-white uniform Larry Bird wore while leading the Sycamores to the NCAA final in 1979.

Bird requested that his No. 33 not be retired until he left basketball, though no one else has worn it. Now that he has retired from the Boston Celtics, a ceremony, and Bird’s induction into the school’s hall of fame, is being planned.

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Trivia answer: Thurl Bailey. He played the first 13 games with the Utah Jazz before being traded to Minnesota and played 71 more with the Timberwolves.

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Quotebook: Riddick Bowe, preparing to fight champion Evander Holyfield for the heavyweight title Nov. 13: “He has always been a great guy ever since I’ve known him. It’s going to be a shame to jump on him.”