Just Don’t Blame the Bambino for This One

Watching Arizona Diamondback fans celebrate their World Series victory over the New York Yankees, Dan Shaughnessy of the Boston Globe said he felt one thing: Jealousy.

“It’s been 83 years since the Red Sox won a World Series, which means there are only a handful of people still living who can remember what it was like to root for Babe Ruth and friends back in 1918 ...

“The hardball gods aren’t playing fair when the Sox continue to struggle while a four-year-old franchise wins the World Series.”

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Trivia time: When did UCLA defeat USC in football for the first time?

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Straight shooter: Rick Morrissey in the Chicago Tribune: “Want to hear one of the theories on why Penn State recruiting has slipped in recent years? Prep coaches say it’s because of Joe Paterno’s honesty. He refuses to tell high school seniors they’ll play right away, and he refuses to guarantee they’ll play their favorite positions ...

“In that sense, the game has passed him by, going 150 mph. He needs to learn to lie.”

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He said what? Jerry Greene in the Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel: “NBA quote of the week from Milwaukee’s Anthony Mason when asked about Miami Coach Pat Riley: ‘Last year he disrespected me--and then he showed [a] lack of respect.’ Now that’s piling on--disrespect plus lack of respect. It doesn’t get more redundant than that.”

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Grand ‘old’ game: David Barry of the Miami Herald, introducing baseball to the uninitiated: “Each team sends nine players onto the field except for one team, which sends one--the ‘batter’--plus two elderly retired players called ‘coaches,’ who constantly touch themselves on various parts of their bodies to communicate, via Secret Code, the message: ‘Tobacco juice has corroded my brain into a lump of dead tissue the size of a grape.”’

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Easy, Mark, easy: Mark Kiszla in the Denver Post: “The Denver Broncos have developed into a cheap-shotting, chop-blocking bunch of losers. Denver is now a team of horse’s rears.”

Comment from Tom FitzGerald of the San Francisco Chronicle: “Now, there’s a logo idea for the Broncos.”

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Clarification: The term “gutty little Bruins” is often used in this section, reportedly referring to undersized, overachieving UCLA football teams of the past.

USC’s famed track and field coach, Dean Cromwell, originated the phrase in the 1940s when he would refer derisively to UCLA’s track and field teams as “[Coach] Ducky Drake’s gutty little Bruins.” Cromwell’s reference was to UCLA’s underdog status, not physical prowess.

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Looking back: On this day in 1932, USC defeated Oregon, 33-0, at the Coliseum.

The Trojans would finish the season with a 10-0 record, including a 35-0 Rose Bowl victory over Pittsburgh, in winning the national championship.

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Trivia answer: 1942, 14-7, enabling the Bruins to play in the Rose Bowl game for the first time.

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And finally: When Duke’s football losing streak reached 21 games, even the school’s marching band was adversely affected.

“It gives us no incentive to put on a good show,” flutist Jenny Green told the Charlotte (N.C.) Observer.