This May Be One Time to Be Patient With Woods

The Miami Herald’s Greg Cote is fed up with those who pressure premier athletes to be social commentators.

A prime example Cote cites is Tiger Woods coming under fire for not speaking out on social issues. He has declined, Cote writes, overtures from Jesse Jackson to meet regarding Woods’ “role.”

According to Cote, Dr. Charles Farrell of Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH Coalition said:

“Tiger has been disappointing. Here is a man who has redefined what a black athlete is. Why doesn’t he use that forum to make some statements?”

Asks Cote: “What if he has no ‘statements’ he cares to make? What if, at age 25, his ‘social conscience’ needs a while to mature? Isn’t that all right?

“What if the statement most on his mind right now is: ‘I need to read the greens a little better.’ ”

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Trivia time: Who holds baseball’s record for multiple-home run games?

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Wait a minute! Bob Smizik of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette recently compared Pirate pinch-hitter Craig Wilson to Babe Ruth.

He called Wilson “the most prolific power-hitting pinch-hitter in Pirates’ history--the most exciting power-hitting prospect in years, capable of 40-home run seasons.”

Wednesday, Wilson hit his seventh home run, his fifth as a pinch-hitter.

Smizik: “He hit it on his 50th at-bat. He’s averaging a homer every seven at-bats. Babe Ruth didn’t do that.”

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All about minutes: Here’s the spin from Tom Boswell of the Washington Post on the umpires/strike zone flap:

“This is baseball, where it took 125 years to realize you could mow pretty designs into the outfield grass instead of just cutting it in a straight line.

“The umps got so upset you would have thought somebody had set fire to their chest protectors. The size of an ump’s personal strike zone is as private and sacred to him as the amount of cash an owner can hide in remote accounting corners where players can’t find it.

“Baseball wanted umpires to call enough strikes to lower the average number of pitches in a game to around 270. Not the current 285. Why? To address the sport’s two most important problems: Games that are too long and scores that are too high.

“The consequent lower scores would have led to quicker games. So the net effect of 270-pitch games might have been a saving of more than 10 minutes a game.”

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Trivia answer: Babe Ruth, 72.

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And finally: Cincinnati Red broadcaster Joe Nuxhall, never one to criticize players on the air, made an exception recently when shortstop Barry Larkin botched a play.

Transcript:

“The first pitch is swung on--a bouncing ball to Larkin. He fields, throws and--I hate to say it, Barry is losing it, folks. It hurts to say that, but Barry Larkin makes that play. Not anymore.”