Piazza Could Pile High His Statistics There

Woody Paige of the Denver Post urges the Colorado Rockies to acquire Mike Piazza, figuring his tenure with the Florida Marlins will be short.

“Check these incredible stats: In five previous seasons and two games so far this year, as a visitor in Denver, Piazza has hit .417 with 14 home runs and 49 runs batted in.

“Since the Rockies moved to Coors Field, Piazza has batted .442 with 11 homers and 34 RBI in 21 games.

“At that pace over an 81-game home schedule, Piazza would finish with about 47 home runs and 134 RBI--and that’s not counting the other 81 on the road.

“The deal makes complete sense, which is why the Rockies will never make it.”

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Trivia time: Who holds the NBA playoff record for most steals in a seven-game series?

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Outraged: Dan Le Batard in the Miami Herald before the Marlins traded five players for Piazza and Todd Zeile:

“I’m out of adjectives. Obnoxious. Disgraceful. Poisoned. Appalling. The Sports Tragedy Formerly Known As The Florida Marlins is all of those things squared.”

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Golf blackmail: Former San Francisco 49er tight end Brent Jones, on his new job as a pro football analyst for CBS:

“I have discovered that it’s a great tool for getting [other NFL players] to your golf tournament. It tells them that if they mess with me, I’ll just rip them on national TV.”

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Just wondering: From the Vent column in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “If Stanford is such a good school, why does Tiger Woods always say, ‘I played good,’ instead of ‘I played well?’ ”

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Old update: From the Gallery column in the San Diego Union-Tribune: “Recheck of birth records found that John Ball was 16 not 14 when he won the British Open in 1890.

“Who cares? Well, 130 years after the fact, Tom Morris Jr. has another record. He won the 1868 British Open at 14 years, four months and four days, making him the youngest winner of a major professional championship.”

Whew, glad that was finally cleared up.

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Tired routine: Pete Rose celebrated the 20th anniversary of his 3,000th hit by appearing on a home-shopping network to peddle his autograph.

Said Phil Mushnick of the New York Post: “Rose has sold so many of his autographs, the only thing more worthless is the NHL’s regular season.”

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Looking back: On this day in 1992, the Chicago Bulls, in a playoff game against Cleveland, made 19 of 19 free throws, the 100% tying a record held by several teams.

More impressive was the 28-for-28 free-throw shooting by Phoenix against Golden State in 1989.

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Trivia answer: John Stockton of the Utah Jazz, 28 against the Lakers in 1988.

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And finally: Bernie Lincicome of the Chicago Tribune on the endless farewells surrounding both Michael Jordan and “Seinfeld”:

“Doesn’t anybody just leave a note on the pillow anymore?”