Columnist’s Pen Isn’t Mightier Than the Sore

Criticizing Don James in Seattle can be dangerous to a columnist’s health, as Steve Kelley of the Seattle Times has found out.

After a writing a column critical of James for resigning as Washington’s football coach, his voice mail contained such threats as “I’m going to break your legs,” and “You’re dead meat.”

Said Kelley: “One guy called me a lousy sack of manure, and that was my brother.”

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Add Kelley: He said he has received threatening mail before. “Several years ago, I got a signed letter from a couple of gentlemen who asked me if they could have my address,” Kelley said. “They wanted to fire-bomb my house.”

“I took the letter to a King County sheriff’s deputy. He read it and said to me, ‘I’d like to sign that letter.’ ”

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Trivia time: What was the last school to beat Washington in football at Seattle?

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Sobering thought: Some players on the Medicine Hat Tigers are upset about a new Western Hockey League policy banning chewing tobacco.

“If there are some guys who want to do it, then they should be allowed to do it,” goaltender Sonny Mignacca said. “It’s not like we’re getting boozed up and passing out.”

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FYI: The San Francisco 49ers will lead the NFL in air travel miles this year, 44,692. Cincinnati will be the least-traveled team, 12,590 miles.

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Restrictions: Dave Winfield of the Twins was a multisport athlete at the University of Minnesota, but he doesn’t regret his decision to stay exclusively with baseball.

“I’m happy for Bo (Jackson) and Deion (Sanders). They seem to have gotten what they want out of life,” Winfield said. “But neither of them will ever be half the baseball player I’ve been because they didn’t do it full-time.”

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Lost cause: New York Met Manager Dallas Green, explaining why he hasn’t been tough on his last-place team: “You can beat a dead horse with a two-by-four and you’re not going to get much activity.”

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Arrogant Andre: From Peter Bodo of Tennis magazine: “When Andre Agassi, a big gun on the U.S. Davis Cup squad and a loose cannon most of the time, heard that the American team would be facing the Bahamas in its next match (Sept. 24-26), he said: ‘We could probably beat them even if we sent Jennifer Capriati to play.”

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Spooky: New England linebacker Andre Tippett on Coach Bill Parcells:

“He’s up on the defense. He knows what’s happening on offense. He knows what’s happening on special teams. He sees somebody missing a play, he is calling you out. He has what I call jungle eyes.”

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Trivia answer: UCLA, Nov. 10, 1990.

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Quotebook: Bernie Lincicome of the Chicago Tribune on the New York Mets: “Good thing Dallas Green is a tough disciplinarian or the Mets would be throwing cherry bombs and squirting bleach on people.”