Winning Is Nice, but Lyon Thinks Tiger Needs More

Bill Lyon in the Philadelphia Inquirer: “It is time now. It is time for Eldrick Woods to begin pulling the sword from the stone.

“He nods. He knows what you mean. He agrees.

“Those winning streaks, all that money, the intimidating of the rest of the field . . . that’s all well and good. But what he needs to start playing for now is history and his place in it.

“Now and here is a good place to start. The now is the U.S. Open and the here is Pebble Beach.”

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More Tiger: Art Spander in the Oakland Tribune: “The Open is the tournament that wrenches wrists and wrecks minds, that beats you down and beats you up, where accuracy counts more than distance and persistence counts more than anything.

“And perhaps more than anything Woods is persistent.”

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Trivia time: Who is the only player to lose three U.S. Opens in a playoff?

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Cold and hot: Ron Rapoport in the Chicago Sun-Times: “Cowboy merchandising featuring Deion Sanders is 50% off at some stores in Dallas. ‘I’m glad I’m not sitting on a bunch of Deion stuff,’ a store owner told the Dallas Morning News. ‘Maybe we’ll have a goodbye-good riddance sale.’

“The demand in Washington, meanwhile, is huge, even though vendors aren’t expecting Sanders jerseys until next month.”

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More Rapoport: “Tennis fans know what they like, and it isn’t Mary Pierce beating Conchita Martinez and Gustavo Kuerten whipping Magnus Norman.

“TV ratings for the finals of the French Open were down nearly 40% from the 1999 matchups of Steffi Graf-Martina Hingis and Andrei Agassi-Andei Medvedev.”

All about gagging: Mike Ashley in Sportsnote.com: “The Cincinnati Bengals are putting a ‘gag order’ clause in their players’ contracts now about negative comments.

“Hey, the Bengals have been making their fans gag for nearly a decade.”

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Looking back: On this day in 1999, Maurice Greene smashed the 100-meter world record with a time of 9.79 seconds. The previous mark of 9.84 was set by Donovan Bailey in the 1996 Olympics.

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Looking back again: On this day in 1988, the Detroit Pistons defeated the Lakers, 104-94, in the fifth game of the NBA finals.

The Lakers, however, won the sixth and seventh games to win the title, four games to three.

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Trivia answer: Arnold Palmer.

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And finally: Tom FitzGerald in the San Francisco Chronicle: “Ken Griffey Jr.’s old digs in the Seattle suburb of Issaquah are on sale, listed at $2.3 million.

“The Seattle Post-Intelligencer got hold of a flyer sent to area real estate agents that reads: ‘This 4.6 acre estate provided sanctuary for Ken Griffey Jr. and his family during his acclaimed time with the Mariners.’

“ ‘The approximate 5,000-square-foot home is wrapped in its manicured setting where nature harmoniously coexists with the creature of its inhabitants.’

“Coexists with the what? A family pet? A ghost? Who wrote this--Stephen King?”