As Baseball Tantrums Go, This One Was Major League

Al Gallagher, manager of the Bend (Ore.) Bandits in the Western Baseball League, didn’t take it kindly when he was ejected from a game in Palm Springs against the Suns.

Gallagher, who was known as Dirty Al when he played third base for the Angels in the early ‘70s, uprooted the first base bag and threw it into the outfield. Then he took off his shoes and, pretending they were hand grenades, hurled them toward umpire Dennis Haynes.

“I told the umpire that his calls smelled as bad as my socks,” Gallagher said.

He was suspended for one game and fined $100.

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Trivia time: Who was hockey’s Stanley Cup named after?

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Trivia time II: Who was named after the Stanley Cup?

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Turning the tables: Floyd Reese, general manager of the Houston Oilers, had this to say in comparing his rookie quarterback, Steve McNair, with another No. 1 draft pick, Kerry Collins:

“McNair could have done what Collins did at Penn State, but I don’t think Collins could have done what McNair did at Alcorn State.”

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Not the MVP: Peter Gammons, writing in the Boston Globe, notes that in the three years Kevin Kennedy has managed Jose Canseco, his teams are 82-90 with him in the lineup and 82-65 without him.

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Upside down: The Chicago White Sox are going nowhere this season and owner Jerry Reinsdorf thinks he knows the reason.

“Most years that teams win, a lot of their players have career years,” he said. “This season, all of our players are having career-worst seasons.”

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Fashion note: Twenty years ago, when the Cleveland Indians wore solid red uniforms, they had 6-foot 4-inch, 235-pound Boog Powell in the outfield.

“I looked like the world’s biggest Bloody Mary,” he said.

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Down under: Robert Allenby, winner of the Australian Order of Merit last year, was the first alternate at the U.S. Open, but U.S. Golf Assn. officials wouldn’t let him on the practice range at Shinnecock Hills.

Brett Ogle, another Aussie who is now on the PGA Tour, experienced similar snubs at the Masters, prompting his wife, Maggie, to comment: “We’re just a pimple on the bottom of the globe.”

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Around and around: Scotland’s David Coulthard, one of Formula One’s brightest young stars, is thinking about Indy cars.

“I’m not much interested in Indy cars on a road course, but as for the ovals, I think it must just be mind-blowing to run at those sorts of speeds,” he said.

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Trivia answer: Frederick Arthur, Lord Stanley of Preston, governor general of Canada in 1892, and son of the Earl of Derby.

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Trivia answer II: Stanley Bowman, son of Detroit Red Wing Coach Scotty Bowman, who was born after his father had won his second Stanley Cup in Montreal.

Quotebook: Former tennis star Ivan Lendl, on why he likes golf: “There are no bad calls.”