NASCAR Spin No Accident in Other Sports

After all the excitement in Indianapolis about the Brickyard 400, it made Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer wonder . . .

What if NASCAR ran everything in sports?

* “One trip to the wind tunnel, and Michael Jordan is banned as illegal equipment.”

* “After weeks of whining by NL pitchers that they ‘need something’ to level the competition, baseball makes Mark McGwire bat with 20-pound weights strapped to his wrists.”

* “Arnold Palmer gets a lifetime provisional start for every PGA tournament. They’d let him play the first hole, then turn his clubs over to a replacement golfer to finish the round.”

And in the fifth set of a losing effort at the U.S. Open, tennis players can just go ahead and say it, “I ran out of gas.”

*

Trivia time: How many UCLA players have finished in the top three in balloting for the Heisman Trophy?

*

Mis-match: Tennis Match magazine sometimes reads like a racier Tiger Beat. On the heels of an Anna Kournikova cover shot of the teenager leaning over in a tank top comes a Patrick Rafter interview in which he is quizzed about sex, escaping about as tactfully as he could.

“It doesn’t enter my mind so much,” Rafter said. “Even when I’m playing badly, sex doesn’t enter my mind. You know, I have my girlfriend there. . . .”

Later, asked “What turns you on?” Rafter stalled for time.

“In what way?” he said.

“Wow!” proclaims a letter to the editor. “I had no idea the tennis world is so obsessed with sex and fashion. That must be why I lost my last two matches. Here I am working on my backhand when I really should be concentrating on my ‘come hither’ glance or my butt shake.”

*

More Rafter: Asked by Tennis Match what his epitaph will read, Rafter made it clear it won’t say Nobel Prize winner.

“You mean when I die? That’s something that goes on the gravestone, isn’t it?”

*

More racing: A member of Germany’s Greens party has criticized Formula One auto racing, calling for it to be banned because it encourages young drivers to speed.

“It’s not only a case of several crazy people driving around in circles as fast as possible,” Greens traffic spokesman Egbert Nitsch said. “Especially young spectators think they must show that they can race as well as Michael Schumacher.”

Sure, but think of all the defensive driving tips they can pick up.

*

Trivia answer: Three. Paul Cameron was third in 1953, Gary Beban won in 1967, and Troy Aikman was third in 1988.

*

And finally: Courtesy of the Charlotte Observer again, what would be the first thing to happen if NASCAR took over football?

The NFL would eliminate injury timeouts to speed up the game, of course.

“Instead, teams play half-speed under caution while the injured player is scraped off the field.”