No One’s Wearing the Collar When the Jacket Is Such a Hit

The biggest concern in the Boston Red Sox clubhouse these days is figuring out who wears the Hit Man jacket.

One day it belonged to Bob Zupcic for a game-winning double. The next day it went to Luis Rivera for his first homer in 22 months. Then it went to Mo Vaughn for a grand slam and three other hits.

The coveted garment--dark blue with HITMAN in red letters across the back--is awarded to the hitting star of each game. Lately, with Boston hitting more than .300 while getting in the thick of the pennant race, it hasn’t been easy picking that star.

Trivia time: Who are the smallest competitors in the Olympic Festival?

Good reason: Weightlifter Mark Henry, who weighs 365 pounds, threw the discus in high school, but he missed the state meet one year because he decided to race a friend in the high hurdles.

“I cleared the first hurdle just beautiful, technique and everything,” he said. “It’s just that I couldn’t get off the ground when I got over it.”

Not the same game: Michael Jordan has won three NBA championships with the Chicago Bulls, but his softball team needs a little work. His team, which included actors Tom Selleck and Mark Harmon, singer Hammer, broadcaster Ahmad Rashad and Magic Johnson, lost to a team led by singer Michael Bolton, 7-1.

“Michael brought in the heavyweights, but we dealt with them appropriately and swiftly,” said Bolton, whose team was his band.

Maybe a halibut: Columnist Mitch Albom was not overly impressed with Greg Norman’s conquest of the British Open. The Detroit writer said on ESPN’s “Sports Reporters” program: “I’m not sure a guy who wins a major once every millennium should be called a shark. Or even a big fish.”

Turnabouts: Atlanta’s Tom Glavine lost both of his NL playoff starts to Pittsburgh last October, but is 3-0 with an 0.78 earned-run average against the Pirates this season and 7-0 against them the last two seasons.

When the Braves’ Francisco Cabrera faced Pirate reliever Stan Belinda for the first time since Game 7 of the playoffs last season, he hit a routine fly in the ninth inning.

Buckeye sacrilege: What would the late Woody Hayes have thought when Ernie Johnson, one of the TNT hosts at the Olympic Festival, said: “Ohio State is a hotbed of synchronized swimming”?

Gun control: Cincinnati pitcher Jose Rijo was ordered to turn in his guns--squirt guns.

Rijo has several times sprayed water into the stands and on teammates with “super soakers.” He said no teammates or fans had complained, but General Manager Jim Bowden called a halt to the sprayings.

Rijo said he was turning over his set of three water weapons to his son, 4 1/2, but only after he got in a few last shots Saturday night. Two young fans were delighted, he said, and one, a 7-year-old girl, told him “it was the most beautiful fun she ever had.”

Trivia answer: Gymnast Jenny Thompson, who weighs 54 pounds, and rhythmic gymnast Tina Tharp, who stands 4 feet tall.

Quotebook: Jack Olson, golf pro at Cedar Rapids Country Club in Iowa: “We had a late winter, a wet spring and now a flooded summer. When will it all end?”