King of Futility to Wear Crown Another Year

Former Oakland Athletic pitcher Brian Kingman, the last major league pitcher to lose 20 games in 1980, was rooting for Minnesota’s Scott Erickson to avoid No. 20.

“I worked hard for those losses, and I’d just as soon hold onto that dubious distinction,” Kingman said.

Not to worry. Erickson wound up the season with 19 losses.

The all-time loser is one John R. Coleman of Philadelphia of the National League with 48 losses in 1883.

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Trivia time: Who holds the NFL record for most pass receptions in a game?

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Frugal: Detroit Tiger Manager Sparky Anderson on how he will spend money from a contract extension that will pay him $1 million in 1995:

“We don’t need much, my wife and me. All we ever do is go to the Sizzler and use our senior citizen’s cards.”

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Shut-hoot: Christian High of Hollywood (Fla.) had to move all its home football games this season because owls have taken up residence at the team’s usual home field and, by law, cannot be bothered.

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Worth a try: From John Eisenberg of the Baltimore Sun: “Let’s put the baseball owners in the next Biosphere experiment and, you know, see what happens.”

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Prove it: Harold Baldwin, co-owner of the Pittsburgh Penguins, disputes the notion that the Kings’ Wayne Gretzky, with his three-year salary of $25.5 million, is the highest-paid player in the NHL.

Baldwin told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that reports of Gretzky’s contract being superior to Mario Lemieux’s are the result of “bogus” information being circulated in Los Angeles.

However, he declined to divulge details of Gretzky’s or Lemieux’s contracts.

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Wrong Waterloo: The office of the Waterloo (Iowa) Black Hawks junior league hockey team has been flooded with phone calls about an exhibition between Team USA and Team Canada.

They started after the Oct. 1 edition of Hockey News listed the game for Nov. 26 in Waterloo, Iowa. The game is in Waterloo, all right, but not Iowa. It’s in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.

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Elvis lives: Potential franchise owners in Memphis have been told by the NFL not to suggest Hound Dogs as the team’s name, but that doesn’t mean they are giving up on paying homage to Elvis Presley.

Prospective co-owner William Dunavant has submitted these possible candidates: Bandits, Blues, Gamblers, Heartbreakers, Phantoms and Rockers.

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Frank who? Butch Huskey, a New York Met rookie, said: “I think if you can make it here, you can make it anywhere.”

Moments later he claimed he was unaware of the lyrics of “New York, New York.”

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Trivia answer: Tom Fears of the Rams, with 18 against Green Bay on Dec. 3, 1950.

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Quotebook: Joe Falls of the Detroit News on the quarterback problems of the Detroit Lions: “I have the solution: Andre Ware’s body and Rodney Peete’s mind.”