If He Must Wear a Costume, He Should Avoid Big Bird

CBS baseball announcer Tim McCarver has a new assignment. He will be seen on WORM in January. No, that’s not his identification for a Deion Sanders all-star extravaganza. McCarver will appear in an episode of “Sesame Street” as the announcer for WORM at the first Worm Winter Games in Squigglyville, France.

Add McCarver: How significant is the $1,000 fine levied on Sanders for dousing McCarver with three buckets of ice water after the Atlanta Braves had clinched the National League championship? Sanders earns $1,000 in roughly 30 seconds of a regular-season game.

Last add McCarver: ABC’s Dan Dierdorf, commenting after Sanders had made a particularly hard tackle during a Monday night game: “Deion must have thought that was Tim McCarver.”

Trivia time: Of Wayne Gretzky’s 49 NHL hat tricks, how many were made with the Kings?

School of hard knocks: Coahoma Community College of Clarksdale, Miss., recently finished a football season that became part of a seven-year ordeal.

Coahoma’s winless streak began in 1985 and stands at 0-77-1.

Bob Holloway, who previously coached the Tigers, said that players from solid programs catch the losing disease once they reach Coahoma.

“It’s like going from a steak dinner to a hot dog roast,” he said. “When you leave a $23 steak on the table for a wienie roast, that doesn’t do much for you, unless you just like wienies.”

Growth factor: When the Senior PGA Tour was started in 1980 with two tournaments, the total purse was $250,000. This year, 27 golfers earned more than $250,000 each--from Lee Trevino’s $836,538 to Orville Moody’s $261,363.

Scary: From John Nelson of the Associated Press: “TNT’s studio host, Ken Stabler, has gotten awfully creepy looking, hasn’t he? Sort of like he should be hosting ‘Tales from the Crypt’ instead of a football game. Get some fresh air, Ken.”

Resume highlights: In the Phoenix Cardinals’ media guide, a list of General Manager Larry Wilson’s accomplishments includes, “He also instigated the Cardinals’ change to red pants in 1990.”

Looking back: The Jack Dempsey-Tommy Gibbons fight was nearly 70 years ago--July 4, 1923--but when Seattle Times columnist Emmett Watson visited Shelby, Mont., recently he found the local citizenry still talking about the world championship fight.

It wasn’t Dempsey’s decision over the challenger that has their continued interest. It was the fact that four banks in Shelby and neighboring towns had to close within days of the fight because they had been fleeced by fight promoter Jack (Doc) Kearns.

“When the fight ended, Kearns, still stuffing money into two canvas bags, got out of town on a caboose and steam engine he had hired in advance,” Watson wrote.

Trivia answer: Six, since joining the Kings in 1988.

Quotebook: George Brett of the Kansas City Royals, after playing in a celebrity pro-am golf tournament: “I was three over--one over a house, one over a patio and one over a swimming pool.”