It Pays to Be Nice to Voters

Rick Telander in the Chicago Sun-Times on Sammy Sosa, the National League’s most valuable player:

“Yep, Sammy annihilated his moodier, less talented foes in the MVP voting, beat them the way a triple beats a single.

“He left home run king Mark McGwire so far behind in the voting that McGwire might want to call Bob Dole and commiserate. . . .

“Until he started his once-a-series group interviews this year, McGwire could be downright surly when asked the simplest of long-ball questions.

“Is behavior important in the MVP voting? Ahem, when the voters are the guys who do the interviewing and the cowering, it sure is.”

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More McGwire: After Sosa was voted the MVP award, Art Spander of the Oakland Tribune wrote:

“The baseball establishment should create a special award for McGwire, not that he seeks one, for saving the game.”

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Trivia time: Which NFL team holds the record for most penalties in a season?

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Naked innocence: Katarina Witt, when asked if her posing nude in Playboy would have an impact on her status as a role model:

“My photos have some kind of innocence to them--as innocent as you can be when you are naked.”

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Bound to happen: Michael Ventre of MSNBC: “Ted Turner says he might run for the presidency. Most likely the Atlanta Braves’ owner will spend the most money, surround himself with the very best people available, and lose early in the primaries.”

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Double KO? George Foreman on his geezer fight with Larry Holmes on Jan. 23: “When the bell rings, I am going to throw punch after punch until I faint or get knocked out or [Holmes] faints or gets knocked out.”

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The real world: Golden State Warrior guard Bimbo Coles in an interview with Jesse Barkin of the San Jose Mercury News:

“My friends don’t understand what’s going on between the owners and the players. They tell me they won’t make in a lifetime what I make in one year, and they can’t believe we can’t come to some kind of agreement.”

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Gooey loss: New York Post headline after Coach Bill Parcells blasted his Jets for their second-half collapse against the Indianapolis Colts: “TUNA MELTDOWN.”

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Suckers beware: Philadelphia Eagle wide receiver Irving Fryar, on what the 2-8 Eagles must do to salvage their season:

“I just want us to show some fight. I want to know who is going to be in there, fighting for a win and who is going to accept losing, like suckers do.”

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Trivia answer: The Raiders, in both incarnations. The L.A. Raiders of 1994 and the Oakland Raiders of 1996 both had 156 penalties.

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And finally: Baltimore Raven quarterback Jim Harbaugh: “I’ve taken so many doses of criticism, I’ve become immune to it. It’s like a virus, if you take enough of it and it doesn’t kill you, you become immune.”