Marlins Are Simply Smelly Fish to Fans on Other Side of Florida

The Florida Marlins apparently are not Florida’s team.

Fans on the West Coast of Florida still are upset about baseball awarding an expansion franchise to southern Florida, and some still hold Marlin owner Wayne Huizenga responsible for the major leagues’ rejection of Tampa Bay’s bid for the San Francisco Giants.

When the Marlins played an exhibition at Bradenton, 30 miles from Tampa, they were greeted by signs including:

“My two favorite teams are the Pirates and any team that beats the Marlins.”

“Tampa Bay hates Wayne and his MIAMI Marlins.”

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All in a name: David Martindale points out in the Sporting News that Jones won 31 games last year--11 by Doug, 10 by Jimmy, seven by Barry and three by Calvin. And Martinez hit 48 home runs--18 by Edgar, 16 by Tino, five by Chito, five by Carlos, three by Dave and one by Domingo.

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Trivia time: Knuckleball pitcher Hoyt Wilhelm hit a home run in his first time at bat in the major leagues. How many more did he hit in his 20-year career?

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Masters influence?Nick Faldo’s wife, Gill, gave birth last week to a girl, their third child and second daughter.

She was named Georgia, as in Augusta.

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One too many: Super-welterweight Troy Waters, ranked No. 4 by the World Boxing Council, was about to leave his hotel room in Newcastle, Australia, to fight American Carl Sullivan on Friday night.

Waters decided to take one more warm-up swing at the pads in the room. That was a big mistake. He further damaged a hand he had hurt in a sparring session, and when the doctor checked him before the bout, Waters was ruled not fit to fight.

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Still going: Kenneth Beer, 90, of Hillsborough, Calif., is the favorite to win the first 90s Plus Senior Seniors tennis tournament this week in Orlando, Fla. Beer won the 80s singles in 1982 and was ranked No. 1 in 80s singles for all 10 years.

When asked what advice he had for young people who would like to be playing tennis at the age of 90, Beer said, “Keep playing.”

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Generous Gwynn: Tony Gwynn, who holds San Diego State’s basketball single-game, season and career records for assists, came up with a big assist for his alma mater’s baseball program.

The four-time National League batting champion purchased 40,000 $1 tickets for an exhibition Thursday between San Diego State and the Padres’ triple-A Las Vegas Stars at San Diego Jack Murphy Stadium.

“We dropped off 5,000 tickets to the Unified School District, and we’ve been to every handicapped group and every hospital,” San Diego State Coach Jim Dietz said. “That’s the way Tony wanted it. He just wants a lot of kids at the ballpark that night.”

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Trivia answer: None.

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Soccer, too: All the fighting doesn’t take place on the basketball court or the hockey rink. Paul Kennedy of Soccer America quotes Spanish physiotherapist Aureliano Cachadinas of Atletico Madrid after a match in Greece against Olympiakos:

“These people are animals, real savages, they should be in jail breaking rocks. What happened out there can’t be allowed on a soccer field.”

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Quotebook: Michael Eisner, whose expansion hockey team the Mighty Ducks took its nickname from the inept team in the Disney movie: “You go see the movie, you’ll notice they didn’t start winning right away.”