Nowhere to Hide When Rockford Is on Your Case

So I’m sitting in the Bel-Air Country Club grill Friday after another grueling day on the job, tired from walking the same ground as Clark Gable and Fred Astaire, and a little nervous because my fairway shot on No. 18 either landed on top of the clubhouse or drilled some old actor in the head.

As you probably know from your own experiences playing at Bel-Air, there are more old actors per square foot here than anywhere else in Hollywood, so for all I knew one of them was lying unconscious just beyond the pro shop and yet to be discovered.

“In all the years I’ve been playing here,” said Jim Mahoney, and that’s a lot of time because he’s the former publicist for people such as Frank Sinatra and Gary Cooper, “I’ve never seen anyone hit a ball up there.”

Now it wouldn’t have been the first time I took a potshot at some actor--we can debate later whether Sylvester Stallone qualifies--but imagine the Saturday morning headline I was looking at: “Sports Columnist Off Target Again, Knocks Old Actor Out Of Afternoon Gin Rummy Game.”

They probably wouldn’t let me play here again.

So I’m sitting there--still a little anxious--with Mahoney, Times’ radio-TV columnist Larry Stewart and some guy named Bob Newhart, who looked really familiar to me.

I BEGAN telling jokes to Newhart, who seemed to have a pretty good sense of humor, when James Scott Baumgarner joined us.

Apparently he’s also known as James Garner, Maverick and Rockford, and according to his Internet bio, he’s “a good-humored American leading man.”

I shook his hand, introduced myself and by the look of anger-terror-disgust in his eyes, I wondered if he knew I was playing with X’d-out Top Flights and now it was his duty as a club member to turn me in.

“Oh, it’s you,” he said, and he was snarling, and I thought maybe it’s something competitive, and he has a thing for Salma Hayak, too.

But on close examination, he was snarling like a hockey fan, and I can’t accurately quote exactly what came next--because it was a tirade. I heard the word, “terrible,” “awful,” and “mean,” and I remember him pausing to take a breath after saying, “I read two of your columns, got just so far and said, ‘yup,’ stopped and I haven’t read it again. And won’t.”

Now I do remember writing two bad columns months ago, and of all the luck those are the two days he picks, and I’m ready to apologize, but he wants me to know, “I know comedy writers, and you’re no comedy writer.”

So that’s why Dharma & Greg haven’t called.

It’s obvious there’s a burr under Maverick’s saddle, and he keeps firing. “Is there anybody you like?” he says, and until five minutes ago

“Have you ever written anything nice about anybody?” he asks, and he’s not waiting for answers. “Your mother probably, huh? . . . I used to enjoy reading that back page (maybe he had me mixed up with Curtis Crayon), but no way anymore. Just garbage. Somebody must like you there because they’re paying you, but I don’t understand it.”

As the slams kept on coming, I found it interesting he thought I was too negative. I tried being nice, telling him--”of all the actors to walk the Raiders’ sideline, you’re my favorite.”

I told him he was my wife’s favorite actor--I didn’t think it was a good time to split hairs and tell him he was really second behind Jimmy Stewart, well third, behind Stewart and Richard Gere.

But nothing I said made any difference with the “good-humored American leading man,” and I got to thinking, just how much worse would it have been had I plunked him in the head with that wayward X’d-out Top Flight?

AFTER BAUMGARNER left, Judge Richard C. Hubbell, who presided over the recent Raiders-NFL lawsuit in L.A., took his place. The judge was very nice, laughing at my written suggestion earlier that I had seen him napping during the trial and then telling a funny story about his wife dropping by the courtroom one day and finding only one open chair--next to Al Davis.

Newhart seemed to really get a kick out of that, and I’d think with all the old actors around here, if any of them gets another TV show, they’d want this guy Newhart in the audience. He’s got a great laugh.

A JUDGE ruled the World Wildlife Fund is entitled to the initials WWF--and the World Wrestling Federation must stop using them.

The initials XFL are available.

IT’S TIME for McKay Christensen to apologize to Dodger Manager Jim Tracy for whatever he did wrong--because there can’t be any other explanation for platooning Marquis Grissom and Tom Goodwin. The two combined are hitting below .200 since the end of June, while Christensen, a better defensive outfielder than either of them, is hitting .349.

SAN FRANCISCO Chronicle columnist C.W. Nevius, writing about the A’s Saturday, called on F.P. Santangelo as an expert witness.

“I feel like I’ve died and gone to heaven,” Santangelo said, “especially after being [dumb] and signing with the Dodgers last year, which was the dumbest mistake I ever made in my life.”

Santangelo is hitting .167 for the A’s.

I TUNED into the Dodgers’ game on the radio in time to catch the top of the ninth inning, and with a never-say-die attitude, I was counting on our heroes overcoming the Phillies’ lead, when I heard Ross Porter’s voice.

I’m thinking a hit here, the Phillies botch Eric Karros’ double-play grounder, and we’re in it. But Ross tells me right away: “The Dodgers are 0-39 when behind after eight, and the Phillies are 55-0 when ahead.”

Click. At least the guy on the “Gardening Show” won’t depress me.

TODAY’S LAST word comes in an e-mail from Tom:

“As a columnist, don’t you think your readers look to people like you to provide information and details on events like the UFC?”

I think it’s pretty well understood readers don’t expect much from me.

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T.J. Simers can be reached at t.j.simers@latimes.com .