The Predictor-in-Chief Going With a Real Upset

It has been an exhaustive day, this paid professional search for anything interesting that someone might have to say about the Super Bowl.

I attended a news conference featuring Jerry Rice and a pair of large walking noses, a cholesterol news conference where I had to give blood to listen to Joe Montana, Bill Parcells and Brian Griese, and a two-hour Miller Lite news conference featuring I don’t know who--because frankly I got a little too involved in testing the free product.

Let me make it perfectly clear, however, that I had not started testing the free product before seeing the two noses walking around with Jerry Rice.

Earlier in the day I had taken a bus to the Giants’ hotel to chat with the guys, and learned that New York General Manager Ernie Accorsi had once been a sportswriter for the Philadelphia Inquirer and had broken the story about Wilt Chamberlain being traded to the Lakers. When I asked him to talk about it, he was so boring I’m guessing he wrote the same way, which explains why he had to get a job in football.

I took another bus to the Ravens’ hotel, got lectured by Shannon Sharpe for not knowing that Ray Lewis is really a swell guy when there’s no blood on his clothes, and never had the chance to suggest that maybe Ray and O.J. might want to pool their efforts to find the real killers.

I returned to the media headquarters to find 147 pages of printed quotes from the Ravens and Giants, and while I realized I could have stayed in L.A., had the quotes faxed to me and covered this week of blabber from my living room, one of our editors said the real reason The Times sent five of us to Florida for this game is to save electricity for everyone else in California.

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AFTER SIFTING THROUGH the 147 pages of quotes from players and coaches, if you eliminated anything having to do with Lewis, I believe there were 23 pages remaining--13 with Raven defensive lineman Tony Siragusa trying to convince people he weighs only 341 pounds and 10 with the edited Siragusa obscenities from the previous 13 pages.

Now as it happens here, you never know who you are going to run into, and with the search still on for a worthy quote to report, I talked to CNN’s Fred Hickman. I asked what he thought about the Kobe Bryant-Shaquille O’Neal feud.

“I don’t think there is a feud,” he said, “but then what do I know?”

Well, not exactly new ground being turned there, so now what?

I happened to notice a copy of the St. Petersburg Times, and a quote so shocking, so outrageous and so unbelievable, that I just knew I had my story, so long as I could confirm it.

So I called the White House.

I wanted to know if the story under the headline “Celebrity Prediction” was true, which noted that “President Bush is a sports-savvy sort who once owned part of the Texas Rangers baseball team, and so who’s his choice in the Super Bowl? ‘The Dallas Cowboys,’ press secretary Ari Fleischer said.”

I suppose some people might jump to the conclusion the guy isn’t very bright, but I’m not judgmental like that so, of course, I contacted the White House.

A recording told me I could leave a message. I fell for that trick last time with USC’s president, so I knew better, and kept on pressing buttons until I got to Harry Wolff, who identified himself as a White House press assistant.

“Could you help me out?” I asked. “If I were to watch ‘West Wing,’ which one would you be?”

What are we, four or five days into the new term, and I’m already asking the tough questions. “I’m trying to figure that out myself,” Wolff said.

But he was very helpful, listened to what I wanted to confirm, and while I’m sure he already knew Martin Sheen would never say something so ridiculous, he had to check to see if President Bush had.

A little while later, Vickie McQuade, White House executive assistant, called and said, “I just talked to Ari, the president’s press secretary, and yes, that’s what the president said--he will be rooting for the Cowboys in Sunday’s Super Bowl.”

It’s a good thing two countries aren’t squaring off in a war somewhere Sunday and the big guy has to send in the troops. Who knows where they might end up.

I know it’s a busy time in Washington and Baltimore is 39 miles up the road and news travels slowly, but to get a better understanding about the new brain trust and what everyone’s talking about around the White House water cooler, I wondered who McQuade might be rooting for in the Super Bowl.

“That’s a tough one,” she said, and don’t I know that now.

“My husband is from New York and I can’t really go against him,” she said, and my fellow Americans, for a minute I thought I could sleep well tonight.

“But New York is playing the Cowboys,” she said, “and since the president is rooting strongly for them . . .”

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SPEAKING OF POLITICIANS, the rental of a single-family home this week for the Super Bowl in nearby Seminole Heights--with the promise that there will be a “stocked fridge,” costs $10,500, and an additional $3,000 to rent a stretch limo to get to the game. Zev Yaroslavsky, president of the Los Angeles Coliseum Commission, told me he had plans to come to the Super Bowl, but I had no idea . . .

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HAD L.A. CONSUMMATED a deal to secure an expansion franchise rather than Houston, Michael Ovitz’s L.A. team would have been given 396 Super Bowl tickets to do with as he pleased for this year’s game, compared with the 12,600 each given to the Ravens and Giants, the 6,012 to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers as host team and the 792 to the other 28 NFL teams.

I’m guessing Michael Eisner wouldn’t have gotten a ticket.

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TODAY’S LAST WORD comes in an e-mail from Chuck:

“How about next year I get an all-expenses-paid trip to the Super Bowl, have my lame article appear on Page 2 and you stay here and do my job?”

That’s what happens when you’re a pro-- everybody thinks he can write a lame article.

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T.J. Simers can be reached at his e-mail address: t.j.simers@latimes.com