Poor Paul Is Not Exactly Rapid Robert

Paul Meyer of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette writes that after the Pirates played the Cleveland Indians in an exhibition game in Florida, Pirate pitcher Paul Wagner spotted Bob Feller signing autographs.

“Wagner rushed to get a ball and a pen and get in line. ‘I’m going to get his autograph,’ Wagner said. ‘In four or five years, he’ll be asking for mine.’ ”

Don’t count on it, Paul.

Trivia time: Who holds the record for the most free throws made in a Final Four men’s basketball semifinal?

Hot ticket: How big is the Final Four?

“I’m sure the Final Four could sell three or four hundred thousand tickets in this market,” says John Samerjan, spokesman for the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, which runs the arena at the Meadowlands Sports Complex.

“The ticket interest in this is beyond anything that we’ve seen,” Samerjan said. “We’ve had papal visits. We’ve had seven World Cup games, [Bruce] Springsteen at his peak and Stanley Cup Championship games, and if you roll them all into one, it pales in comparison, almost.”

In reality, there were only 1,000 tickets available to the general public, distributed through a lottery system in which 91,000 entries were received.

Nevermore: One of the possible nicknames for Baltimore’s NFL franchise is the Ravens. The name is a tribute to the brooding poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe, who is buried in Baltimore.

Top 40? Russell Walters, a guitar-playing power forward for Mississippi State, also writes lyrics for his own country songs. Some of his down-home titles: “Cheap Whiskey,” Low as a Snake” and “Ain’t Goin’ Home.”

Going off: Sacramento King Coach Garry St. Jean, ending an interview after a recent 26-point loss to the Minnesota Timberwolves:

“If I say much more, you’re not going to be able to print it in your newspapers, put it on your radio stations or wherever the . . . you want to put it.”

Will he start? Jay Leno on the Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League recently drafting a a dead player: “The good news is they managed to trade him to the New York Jets.”

Shell shock: Frank Howard, the late Clemson football coach and athletic director, was no fan of rowing. He once said:

“I wouldn’t put in no sport where they sit on their butts and go backwards to win. If they wanted to row, they could go to one of them Yankee schools, but not here. We play football in the South.”

Alas, Clemson has a rowing club now.

Wear and tear: Miami Heat guard Rex Chapman in an interview with Amy Shipley of the Miami Herald: “If you could see us walking up and down the steps of the plane . . . it’s mostly the older guys--we walk sideways, limping, using the handrail.”

Chapman is 28.

Trivia answer: Jerry West of West Virginia, with 14 of 20 against Louisville in 1959.