In Case You’ve Forgotten, Image Is Everything

Mark Purdy of the San Jose Mercury-News, writing on a solution to the Casey Martin-PGA Tour controversy:

“Instead of riding in a golf cart, Martin should be permitted to use an electric scooter--the same sort of single-seat scooter that many disabled people use when they go shopping, or for a ‘stroll’ around their neighborhoods. But the mental picture of a golf cart vs. an electric scooter is far from subtle.

“The image a golf cart sends: Here is your out-of-shape Uncle Ernie who wants to ride while he plays so he can be halfway lazy and drink beer during the round.

“The image an electric scooter sends: Here is a person who really needs help to get around and is someone we should applaud for his guts in dealing with everyday life.”

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Trivia time: Who holds the Pacific 10 Conference record for rebounds in a men’s basketball game?

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Swinging door: New York Coach Jeff Van Gundy, on the state of the Knicks: “We can’t guard anybody off the dribble. We just can’t guard anybody. Guys are going by us, around us.”

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Closed door: Fans at Gund Arena in Cleveland acknowledge the defensive prowess of 7-foot-3 center Zydrunas Ilgauskas by yelling: “Zee-fense, Zee-fense.”

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Best gagger: Jorge L. Ortiz in the San Francisco Examiner, on his choice for most overrated player in the NBA: “Alonzo Mourning, Heat. This $100-million package of snarls and swagger has yet to find a big game in which he couldn’t choke.”

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Ice drama: Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle, after checking out the sweepers in the sport of curling: “If this is an Olympic event, vacuuming should be at least a demonstration sport.”

As for the luge, he said: “It’s the only sport in which dead people can compete.”

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No business like . . . : Art Spander in the Oakland Tribune: “CBS is going to do to the Winter Olympics what NBC did to the summer, transform it into a soap opera, sort of ‘As Michelle Kwan Turns.’

“The Olympics are as much about television and show business as they are sports. It isn’t the points from the German judge that count, at least in the U.S., it’s the ratings points from the TV audience.”

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Looking back: On this day in 1966, USC’s John Block scored 45 points in a men’s basketball game against Washington, which is still a school record.

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Trivia answer: Swede Halbrook of Oregon State, with 36 against Idaho on Feb. 15, 1955, when the league was known as the Pacific Coast Conference.

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And finally: Tom Powers of the St. Paul Pioneer Press on novelist Tom (“The Hunt For Red October”) Clancy’s attempt to buy the Minnesota Vikings:

“As the first promotion of the new era, all season-ticket holders will be given free kits with which to assemble their own submarines. Nuclear warheads not included.”