Goux Delivered the Goods When It Mattered Most

“Hey, L.A. Times!” bellowed the boom-box voice years ago from across the compound at Rams Park.

Uh oh.

Marv Goux, the longtime USC and Rams’ assistant coach who died Saturday at 69 of cancer, was a chain-of-command guy who expected level-best performances from his players and his papers.

Mortified of having committed a journalistic gaffe, not uncommon for a young beat writer, I met Goux halfway across the asphalt blacktop.

“I have a problem,” Goux said.

“What’s that?”

“I’m not getting my newspaper on time in the morning,” Goux said.

The guy was serious.

Goux left for work at 6 a.m. and needed the paper before he hopped in the car.

He didn’t smile when I mentioned circulation wasn’t my department.

He reasoned football clubs and newspapers were both teams. Everyone had to hold up their end or the game plan collapsed. If the line didn’t block, the quarterback couldn’t pass, and if the delivery boy overslept it didn’t matter what I wrote.

Goux, of course, was right, and for a fleeting moment I felt what it must have felt like in the USC locker room before one of Goux’s legendary pep talks.

Do your job. Do it right.

Block your man. Get to the end zone.

Get the paper out.

I hope Marv got his today.

If not, somebody may get an earful.

News item: Lance Armstrong wins fourth straight Tour de France.

Second thought: Too bad one of sport’s most unbelievable achievements has to come with minority chants of Dop-AY (doped) along the way. The problem with cycling is that, like boxing, it has become so polluted with scandal you have to be careful about raising up heroes.

But if Armstrong, who overcame cancer and has never tested positive for a banned substance, doesn’t qualify, then neither does Neil Armstrong.

The New Yorker recently reported that Lance Armstrong’s heart is one-third larger than that of the average man.

So who’s surprised?

Viva La Lance.

News item: Baseball’s trading deadline is Wednesday.

Second thought: Word is baseball management, winless against the players in eight previous labor disputes, is looking to shore up its left-handed litigation team for the all-important strike-stretch drive.

News item: Family produces note alleging Ted Williams wanted to be frozen after death.

Second thought: Let’s see if we have this straight: A baseball signed by Ted Williams would be encased in glass for protection, yet a critical signature note addressing Williams’ post-life intentions appears to have been stored in the bottom of an oil pan at Jiffy Lube?

News item: Sacramento King forward Chris Webber shoots 191 over par for 54 holes at recent Lake Tahoe celebrity golf tournament.

Second thought: Apparently that’s what you get when you pay $24.95 (plus handling) for the golf video, “Colin Montgomerie’s 191 swing tips.”

News item: Dennis Conner’s yacht, Stars & Stripes USA 77, sinks off Long Beach coast.

Second thought: So hoist up the John B.’s sails. See how the main sail sets. Call for the Captain ashore. And let me go home. Let me go home. I want to go home, yeah, yeah. Well, I feel so broke up, I want to go home.

News item: Dodgers sink in National League West race.

Second thought: “Don’t forget, folks, next Saturday is “Dennis Conner Night” at Dodger Stadium, when all kids 12 and under will receive a miniature replica of Stars & Stripes USA 77.

News item: Costume of Philadelphia Phillies’ mascot, Phillie Phanatic, to hang in baseball’s Hall of Fame.

Second thought: Did anyone solicit former Dodger manager Tom Lasorda’s opinion? Lasorda loathed the Phanatic about as much as he did Dave Kingman performances. In one 1994 game, Lasorda fired a baseball at the mascot after the Phanatic smashed a Dodger helmet.

Gee, and now they’re both in Cooperstown.

You could argue all day over who looked worse in a uniform.

News item: Penn State Coach Joe Paterno gives tryout to female kicker.

Second thought: After two straight losing seasons, Nittany Lion fans gather in quad to wax nostalgic about time when school was referred to as “Linebacker U.”

News item: Former mobster sings like a canary about baseball betting on HBO show “Real Sports With Bryant Gumble.”

Second thought: Michael Franzese, once a member of the Columbo crime family, said some major players in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s got in over their sanitary socks in gambling debts and may have fixed games to make good on bets. The team, if you read between the betting lines, was the New York Yankees.

Franzese may have as much credibility as Enron, yet baseball has no choice but to investigate this story with the tenacity in which it went after Pete Rose, banished from baseball for his gambling ties.

The last thing baseball needs now is somebody sleeping with the Marlins.

News item: John Daly uses Super Glue to close a hand wound during recent golf tournament.

Second thought: The ploy may earn Daly an endorsement deal from a glue company, which must have handlers of Ryan Leaf kicking themselves for not taking advantage of the super sticky stuff. Had the substance been applied carefully to Leaf’s upper and lower lips, who knows, the ex-quarterback might still be a San Diego Charger.

News item: Turner Network signs NBA analyst Charles Barkley to $1.5-million contract.

Second thought: Turner came out way ahead in negotiations when you consider Barkley originally demanded to be paid by the word.

News item: Barkley’s deal includes occasional guest-host duties on CNN.

Second thought: Tomorrow on “Talk Back Live”: NBA players who tossed midgets through windows.

News item: ABC televises golf’s Battle at Bighorn tonight at 5.

Second thought: Another contrived, shameless, money-grubbing, made-for-television event, this year pitting Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods against Lee Trevino and Sergio Garcia.

I wouldn’t miss it for the world.