Grace Fleeting Faster Than Baseball Fame

As fans, you must be gratified to hear that baseball players are on a post-strike charm offensive.

“We are going to have to take time for that extra handshake, that extra autograph,” says first baseman Mark McGwire of the Oakland Athletics. “We are going to have to recognize the fans more than ever.”

But old habits die hard. The New York Times reported that while longtime goodwill ambassador Don Mattingly stayed late to accommodate everyone in Ft. Lauderdale, “other Yankees buzzed past autograph-seeking fans once the television cameras had vanished.”

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Oops: Talking of PR problems, there’s Barry Bonds.

The Giants’ star is being sued by his former wife for spousal support and by a porn star who claims he fathered her unborn child.

He said he was upset at press speculation that he would have crossed the picket line.

“Wrong again, just wrong,” Bonds told the New York Times’ Tom Friend. “You guys could just put a big wrong on your forehead. But one day you will be right--I will go into the Hall of Fame.”

Bonds’ former wife, Sun Branco Bonds, a native of Sweden, signed a prenuptial agreement before marrying him in 1988 but says now she could barely read English.

Court documents show the couple had monthly expenses of $1,500 for a cellular phone and $2,242 for clothes. Bonds allegedly spent $212,368 for stereo equipment in 15 months.

Bonds, who did little for fans before--he didn’t show at the dinner to accept his 1993 MVP award--isn’t planning any changes.

“I’m like this,” he said. “You like me or you don’t. That’s me. I mean, what are you going to do, blame me for the strike?”

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Trivia time: The NBA champion Houston Rockets are on pace to finish sixth in their conference. Which was the last champion to take as big a fall?

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The alums: Former UCLA star Tracy Murray, now a Houston Rocket, was especially happy for Coach Jim Harrick that the Bruins won the NCAA title.

“It’s been hard for him there,” Murray said. “The ghost of (John) Wooden is killing him, and that’s very unfair.

“They’ve got 10 championships and winning one isn’t good enough. That’s sad. But everybody there is spoiled. Next year, they won’t remember he won it this year.”

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Trivia answer: The Boston Celtics won a championship in 1969 and fell to sixth in the East in 1970, their first season without Bill Russell.

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Quotebook: Former Celtic Cedric Maxwell, honored as part of the farewell to the Boston Garden and listening to a list of his accomplishments: “Damn, I was pretty good, wasn’t I?”