They Find That Nobody Cares Who They Are

Would you believe that former Super Bowl coach Bill Walsh and troubled running back Lawrence Phillips have something in common?

During separate incidents recently, both were reported to indignantly have said, “Do you know who I am?”

Walsh said it before he was punched in the mouth by a man who believed Walsh was peeking at his hole card at a Lake Tahoe casino. Phillips allegedly said it to a woman who refused to dance with him at a nightclub in Plantation, Fla.

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Trivia time: Who is the only golfer to have won the U.S. Amateur and U.S. Amateur Public Links championships?

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Fond memories: Bonneville Salt Flats veteran Burke LeSage recalls the day 40 years ago when the late Roy Rogers visited the flats and took a 130-mph ride with Bill Shandoff in a high-powered Chrysler. After the Singing Cowboy chatted with racers that night at the old State Line Hotel coffee shop, the management honored the moment with an inscription on the back of a swivel stool: “Roy Rogers sat here.”

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The short of it: Boston Celtic Coach Rick Pitino, on why he didn’t pick up a $480,000 option on former UCLA star Tyus Edney, a 5-foot-10 guard:

“It’s Roster Reduction I. Also, I don’t think we need to have three guards who are 6 feet and under.”

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Hero worship: The Chicago Cubs’ Sammy Sosa, asked by Larry Whiteside of the Boston Globe to name his hero: “My hero is God. He’s the one who spurred me and gave me all the opportunities and ability that I have.”

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No earaches: Before next year’s Toyota Grand Prix of Long Beach, tapes of CART champ car engine noises will be played inside the new Aquarium of the Pacific to acclimate the fish to the sounds of cars that will be racing just outside their tanks.

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Not so chipper: Chipper Jones may be the National League’s all-star third baseman, but the Atlanta Brave knows when he has met his match. After the Braves lost three of four games to the New York Yankees, Jones said:

“They’re better than we are. You feel like you can play with the best in the game--then you get taken out behind the woodshed and are given a nice beating.”

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Bragging rights: California schools won 17 NCAA championships last year, 11 of them in Division I. Only three other states had as many as two champions in 1997-98. Stanford, with five, had the most of any individual institution.

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Trivia answer: Billy Mayfair, who won the Publinx title in 1986 and the Amateur the next year.

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And finally: Tampa Bay shortstop Kevin Stocker was chasing a pop fly in foul territory when he ran into 220-pound umpire Tim Welke. The collision flattened Stocker.

“I was going to catch it until the attack of the phantom umpire,” Stocker said.