Is George Making a Disappointment With Destiny?

Can George Steinbrenner, the man New York Yankee followers have grown to love and fear, be going soft? The Yankee owner says it’ll be OK if his team doesn’t win everything this year despite its run at the major league record for victories in a season.

“I wouldn’t be disappointed, they shouldn’t be disappointed, and the city shouldn’t be disappointed if they don’t go all the way,” Steinbrenner said last week.

Surely you’ve been misquoted, George.

*

Trivia time: When Roger Maris hit 61 home runs in 1961, how many did he hit in doubleheaders?

*

Is that 40 or 50? Middle age, columnist Franklin P. Adams once wrote, comes when one is too young to take up golf and too old to rush to the net.

*

Irish promise: Attention Notre Dame followers.

After going through a disappointing 19-12 record the last three years, this is the word from captain Kory Minor on the 1998 team: “We’re tired of losing. The players are tired of it, and the coaches are tired of it. It’s time to start winning, and we know it.”

*

Hard to stop: The last time Minnesota Viking rookie wide receiver Randy Moss was held without a touchdown in a game was in 1994.

Moss, who scored touchdowns in 28 consecutive games for Marshall and in two preseason games for the Vikings, never reached the end zone in DuPont High’s 10-7 loss to South Charleston in the West Virginia state playoffs.

“That’s a nice little claim to fame for that team,” South Charleston Coach Bryce Casto said.

*

Beefy Bam: Bam Morris showed up for a workout with the Kansas City Chiefs weighing a tubby 295 pounds after his release from prison in April. He had been incarcerated since January for violating probation from a conviction on marijuana possession. A front-office worker remarked, “I thought all those guys do in jail is pump iron. What the heck was he spending his time doing?”

*

Three is enough: It is well documented that Ben Hogan is the only player to win the Masters, U.S. Open and British Open in one year, 1953.

He didn’t compete in the PGA championship. The tournament came a week after the British Open and Hogan didn’t think he had time to prepare, what with a long trip home, according to the book “The History of the PGA Tour.”

*

Looking back: Twenty years ago today, Steve Garvey drove in all five runs as the Dodgers defeated the Philadelphia Phillies, 5-2.

*

Darkest moments: Jack Brickhouse, the Hall of Fame baseball broadcaster who died recently, was a beginner at a Peoria, Ill., radio station in the 1930s when legendary stage actor John Barrymore came to town as part of a play.

Barrymore was drunk for a live interview. Brickhouse was a local boy who knew Barrymore only from films. He asked, “Mr. Barrymore, before you got into movies, were you ever on stage?” Barrymore snarled and said, “Ask me that again, young man, and I can promise you my answer will cost your station its broadcasting license.”

*

How about Kirk? In TV Guide’s list of television’s 50 greatest sports moments,No. 1 is Carlton Fisk rooting for his home run to stay fair in Game 6 of the 1975 World Series. Fisk’s blow, leading off the bottom of the 12th, gave the Boston Red Sox a victory over the Cincinnati Reds.

*

FYI: Jim Mora, the coach of the Indianapolis Colts, once served as a student manager for track and field at Occidental College.

*

Trivia answer: Ten, including four against the Chicago White Sox on July 25.

*

And finally: Henry Aaron eclipsed Babe Ruth’s record for home runs in a career, but Aaron’s 755 homers came in 3,965 more at-bats than Ruth.

If Ruth’s homer ratio were carried out over as many at-bats as Aaron had, he would have finished with 1,051 home runs.