They’re Also Blazing Trail in Team Travel

OK, the Portland Trail Blazers may be in a struggle to reach the NBA playoffs this season, but they lead the league in travel comfort.

The 12-man basketball team flies on team owner Paul Allen’s customized Boeing 757.

We’re talking big-screen TVs, two lounge areas, card tables and TVs that pop out of the armrests of the 35 seats--in a plane that normally seats 239.

According to Boeing, a new 757 costs nearly $70 million.

Said Eddie Doucette, the club’s television announcer, “Even the wallpaper is magnificent.”

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Trivia time: Which university has the most combined seats in its football stadium and basketball arena? Domed stadiums don’t count.

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Friendless: Billy Paultz, on how his former teammate, basketball Hall of Famer Rick Barry, was perceived by other teammates: “Half the players disliked Rick Barry. The other half hated him.”

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Gator ball: The Texas Rangers’ Juan Gonzalez hit a spring training home run at Port Charlotte, Fla., the other day that went unchased.

The ball landed in a pond inhabited by an eight-foot alligator.

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Stick around: Georgetown basketball Coach John Thompson, on staying in school:

“The kids who go in the first five NBA picks are the ones who need [the extra years in] college the most, because they always get picked by the worst teams.

“Why do you think those teams are so bad? You better be psychologically, emotionally, educationally and socially prepared to deal with that, because you are going to the most disorganized teams and the most unhappy players.”

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Duck, everyone: The Washington Post’s Tom Boswell, on former Baltimore Manager Earl Weaver’s induction into the Hall of Fame:

“It’s wonderful he can be inducted into Cooperstown while he’s still sharp enough to insult anybody he pleases at the ceremony.”

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Add Weaver: Boswell recently watched a video of a 1980s tirade by Weaver with umpire Bill Haller, when Weaver was wired for sound.

Weaver: “You’re a liar. . . . You ain’t no good!”

Haller: “You’re no good either!”

Weaver: “Yeah? Five, 10 bleepin’ years from now, you look who’s in the Hall of Fame!”

Haller: “Oooohh . . . yoooou’re gonna be in the Hall of Fame?”

Weaver: “You know it.”

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Stop, thief! The Chicago Bulls’ Scottie Pippen, on his first day in Chicago:

“I put my suitcase down, looked up at the Sears Tower, and said: ‘Chicago, here I am and I’m gonna conquer you.’ Then I looked down and my suitcase was gone.”

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Trivia answer: Tennessee. An expansion will give the Volunteers 102,400 football seats in the fall, and the basketball arena seats 25,000.

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Quotebook: New York columnist Mark Kriegel, on why New England Patriot Coach Bill Parcells turns down $25,000 offers for motivational speeches: “He has zero interest in infusing little accountants with competitive wisdom.”