Clients Will Live It Up, He’ll Be a Greek Ruin

There’s $1 billion in advertising at stake in the Athens Olympics and important clients can expect royal treatment.

They’ll arrive in private Learjets or customized Boeing 777s. They’ll stay on magnificent yachts or at gaudy estates. They’ll commute to events in helicopters, have cocktails at the Acropolis, party in museums and schmooze with athletes.

The best of everything in Athens costs about $20,000 per person for a four- or five-day stay, but the senators, congressmen, CEOs and titans of Hollywood, Madison Avenue and Wall Street figure to have a heck of a time.

That won’t be the case for Vic Garvey, who arranges these Olympic fantasies.

“For me, it’s about a month of no sleeping,” he said. “I am not there for me. My staff is not there for themselves. Our clients party, we don’t.”

Trivia time: The Cincinnati Bengals have retired only one uniform number. What number is it and who wore it?

Take a nap: Dan Warren of BBC Sport has crowned darts as the quintessential slacker sport.

“Darts is so unconcerned with matters pertaining to fitness and effort that it actually holds its world championships in a bar,” he wrote. “Indeed, the sport’s most successful exponent, Phil ‘the Power’ Taylor, actually appeared to lose some of his talent when he slimmed down, suggesting it is fatness rather than fitness which darts players need.”

Warren says golf doesn’t qualify, because you have to walk a little bit. Fishing and bowling didn’t make the cut, because “quite frankly, I couldn’t be bothered to find out anything about them.”

Famous faces: The Carolina Panthers’ 384-page media guide includes photographs of team seamstress Jackie Jackson and electrical assistant Ong Xiong.

Book deal? Annika Sorenstam will be back playing with the boys in the Skins Game in November. Promoters hope the decision to replace Tiger Woods with Sorenstam will boost television ratings. At the least, it should provide fodder for Sorenstam’s diary, which she started keeping this year.

She also saved press clippings and letters she received when she became the first woman in 58 years to compete in a PGA Tour event this year at the Colonial.

“I’m saving all that and will hopefully put together something like a scrapbook,” she said.

Bet you won’t find a picture of Vijay Singh in there.

Brief grief: Count Washington Redskin linebacker LaVar Arrington among those who aren’t bemoaning the departure of defensive coordinator Marvin Lewis, who is now head coach of the Bengals. Asked by Maxim magazine whether he would miss Lewis, he said, “No. I wasn’t much of a Marvin Lewis fan. I wish him the best, but I didn’t appreciate being used out of position.”

Trivia answer: No. 54; center Bob Johnson.

And finally: Jim Armstrong, in the Denver Post: “Before his NCAA suspension, Maurice Clarett had been installed by Las Vegas bookmakers as a 5-1 favorite to win the Heisman Trophy. In a related development, Clarett is 9-1 to win MVP of the Ohio Penal League.”

-- John Weyler