Golf Becomes a Contact Sport, so It’s Time to Contact a Lawyer

Golfer Alan Greco plays to a 32 handicap, which is bad enough. But now he’s being sued for $3 million because his errant shot hit a co-worker, James Henn, during an outing at a private Long Island (N.Y.) club in July 1993.

Henn was sipping a drink on a patio near the 18th green when Greco’s shot went wildly off line, hit Henn in the forehead and knocked him unconscious.

Henn’s lawyer charges that Greco didn’t give Henn sufficient warning, yelling “Fore!” only after his shot was headed for the patio.

But Greco’s lawyer says, “Errant golf shots are not negligent.”

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Trivia time: Who holds the single-game scoring record in the NCAA basketball tournament?

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Fine tuning: Johnny Kerr, the Chicago Bulls’ radio and TV analyst and No. 2 on the NBA list of consecutive games played with 844, on the rehabilitative advantages players have today:

“For us, ultrasound [treatment] was putting your foot on the radio and turning it to an FM station.”

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Soup’s on: Texas Ranger infielder Mark McLemore hurt his rib cage and came up with an old-fashioned cure.

“I rubbed some chicken soup on it,” he said. “Chicken soup works for everything--colds, headaches, strains.”

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Qualified invitation: Ram owner Georgia Frontiere welcomed Wayne Gretzky to St. Louis with a full-page newspaper ad: “Come see us at our house, but leave your stick behind.”

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Sleight of hand: Colorado Avalanche Coach Marc Crawford on a shot by Warren Rychel that went high over the net, off the glass, back over the net, and hit Ottawa goaltender Don Rhodes on the back of the leg for a weird goal:

“It was a Michael Jordan shot--off the stick, off the glass and nothing but net.”

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Rich get richer: From the SportsLetter of the Amateur Athletic Foundation of Los Angeles:

“The NCAA had total revenues of $222,078,824 according to the Jan. 8 edition of the NCAA News. After allocating $50,361,023 to men’s basketball and their championship tourney, the NCAA was left with $27,933,785 in unallocated funds (read surplus).

“Of course, the NCAA is a nonprofit organization.”

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Solid answer: Indy car driver Parker Johnstone, after suffering a concussion in a crash before the recent Homestead (Fla.) Grand Prix, was asked by a hospital clerk if he was allergic to anything: “Yeah, concrete.”

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FYI: Only one team has scored fewer than UCLA’s 41 points in an NCAA Southeast Regional game. Ohio University had 38 against Kansas in 1985, and 40 against Kentucky in 1983.

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Trivia answer: Bill Bradley scored 58 points for Princeton against Wichita State in the third-place game in 1965.

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Quotebook: Boxing promoter Don King discussing his hair on CNBC’s “America After Hours”: “It’s an aura from God. No artificial chemical abuse. What you see is what you get.”