Angels Know How to Blow the Roof Off a Joint

A 500-pound concrete and steel expansion joint falls into empty seats at Yankee Stadium in the middle of the afternoon for no apparent reason.

Well, the Angels were in town.

If there is some strange, inexplicable occurrence in baseball, the Angels are involved more often than not.

One of the stranger occurrences involving the Angels happened on April 26, 1986, at that architectural wonder, the Metrodome, in Minneapolis.

In the eighth inning, the wind picked up and tore a hole in the soft roof, sending rain gushing into the upper deck like a leak in the Titanic, and prompted this account in The Times:

“The Angels and the Minnesota Twins were privy to a sneak preview of Hades: the Metrodome roof appeared on the verge of collapse, with 80-mph winds tearing holes in the fiberglass dome and whipping through the stadium, sending speakers and light standards swaying on their cables like yo-yos in a wind tunnel.”

The game was postponed for nine minutes.

Said rookie Wally Joyner, one of the first players to sprint off the field for the relative safety of the dugout: “I was out of there. It was crazy. A lot of people could have gotten hurt and I didn’t want to be one of them.”

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Freezing in Philly: The Angels aren’t the only L.A. team ever involved in building mishaps.

A blizzard whipping through the East hit Philadelphia particularly hard on March 13, 1993, and the wind blew out a window at the Spectrum during a Kings-Flyers game. The temperature started dropping and spectators put on their coats. Reporters in the press box donned hats and gloves.

Play was stopped after one period and the game was later played in full.

After the postponement, one King asked, “Does my goal count?”

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More Philly: With no buses or taxis in sight the next day, the Kings had to rely on the kindness of strangers to get to the airport. The NBA’s Denver Nuggets were gracious enough to share their team bus.

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Trivia time: Which NFL team drafted Bo Jackson in 1986?

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Bald ambition: American soccer goalie Brad Friedel, playing for Liverpool in England’s Premier League, may have to do something with his hair to get the kind of attention given his U.S. teammates, Alexi Lalas and Cobi Jones.

“Alexi’s got a distinctive look, so people know him as a soccer player,” Friedel told Matchday magazine. “So does Cobi Jones. Now with my plain Jane looks . . . my hair isn’t distinctive or anything. Maybe if I shaved all my hair off.

“Well, I think that in my case I would be bald because of genetics.”

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Feels like a million: Boston Bruin rookie Sergei Samsonov has a creative contract. It pays him $1 million if he reaches two of six incentives. One is 20 goals, which he has, and the other is a top-five finish in rookie voting.

His coach, Pat Burns, is working on the second.

“He is the best rookie in the NHL this year,” Burns said. “He has won us hockey games. I don’t care about the points of other rookies. What have they done?”

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Mike says: New York Daily News columnist Mike Lupica on the sporting landscape in New York:

“[The Yankees] are the principal sports conversation of the city, all the way until October, and sometimes in the off-season as well. Everything else is second place. The Yankees carry us, all the way until football. Good or bad.”

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More Lupica: “You look at the mess the Rangers have become and have to ask yourself this question: Why would Wayne Gretzky want to waste any more of his time here?”

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Trivia answer: Tampa Bay.

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And finally: Tennis star Venus Williams, on being called the Tiger Woods of tennis: “That doesn’t motivate me, but it is a good analogy for people who might not follow tennis to understand what I am for tennis.”