Retiree Got a Crash Course in Laker Lore

Phil Jackson and Shaquille O’Neal are gone, and now comes word the Lakers have suffered another big loss.

Mary Lou Liedich, the team’s administrative assistant for 32 years, has retired at 73. Her final day was Friday.

In those 32 years, there have been 12 coaches and four general managers.

Liedich came to the organization in 1972 from an accounting firm and knew little about basketball. One of her first tasks was taking a report in shorthand from then-general manager Pete Newell.

“There were these two words that just didn’t make sense to me,” she recalled. “I just couldn’t figure out why Mr. Newell would be using the term ‘hot dog.’ ”

Fortunately for someone, Liedich can’t remember which former Laker Newell was talking about.

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Near-perfect attendance: Bill Sharman was the Laker coach when Liedich joined the organization. She later worked directly with Sharman for 12 years, six when he was the general manager and six when he was the team president.

“In those 12 years, I can’t recall her ever missing a day of work or even being late,” Sharman said.

Liedich says she missed only six days in 32 years, which is not a bad average in anybody’s book.

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Trivia time: Arnold Palmer competed in his 37th and final PGA Championship in 1994. How many times did he win the tournament?

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Stormed out: Rainouts in baseball are commonplace, but the postponement of a television-watching contest because of weather might be a first.

An NBCOlympics.com contest set to begin Friday night at Universal Orlando Resort was postponed because of Hurricane Charley.

The contest involves 22 contestants trying to break the Guinness world record of 50 hours 5 minutes of consecutive television watching.

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Bad hands: George Brett, a guest on Tony Bruno’s radio show, said he never wore batting gloves. Former Kansas City Royal teammate Mark Gubicza, who also was on the show, said, “You should have seen his hands. Pine tar, open wounds, everything in there.

“And the worst thing was, after the game, you know the spread of food in the clubhouse? He’s nibbling in there with those hands.”

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On this day: In 1979, Lou Brock of the St. Louis Cardinals reached the 3,000-hit plateau with an infield hit off Chicago Cub pitcher Dennis Lamp, who played at Bellflower St. John Bosco High.

The hit went off Lamp’s fingers, which, according to brother Kevin Lamp, prompted Dennis to say, “I guess I’ll be sending my fingers to Cooperstown.”

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Trivia answer: None.

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And finally: There are more than 100,000 police and security personnel on visible vigil in Athens, prompting Greg Cote of the Miami Herald to write: “To put that number in perspective, that’s even more than the number of U.S. track athletes who failed drug tests.”

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Larry Stewart can be reached at larry.stewart@latimes.com.