He’s Not Giving This Bowl Game Any Credit

With football’s bowl season approaching and Iowa headed for the Capital One Bowl, Mike Hlas of the Cedar Rapids Gazette got to thinking about how some bowls have distinctly better names than others.

“You have the Alamo Bowl, named for a landmark in U.S. history,” Hlas wrote. “There’s the Orange Bowl, named for a famous fruit. The Sun Bowl is named for the sun, a very important part of sustaining life. (If dogs ever hold a postseason football game, the Water Bowl would be a good name for it.)

“Now we have a bowl game named for a company that peddles credit cards and helps drive people deeper into debt. Come to their football game in Orlando and put it on their card. They’ll settle up with you next month. And the month after that. And the month after that ...

“Until two years ago, the Capital One Bowl was the Florida Citrus Bowl. That game had it all. Oranges, grapefruit, tangerines. All that vitamin C. All those health benefits.

“Gone. Replaced by credit cards. I feel a head cold coming on.”

Trivia time: What two head football coaches, one now in the NFL and the other in the Pacific 10 Conference, were teammates on the 1979 Idaho State team that finished 0-11?

Media-savvy: Ken Livingstone, the mayor of London, was making a pitch the other day for his city to play host to the 2012 Olympic Games when he was asked by a reporter from the Times of London whether he saw any negative aspects in the bid.

“I’m sure that I can’t think of any,” Livingstone replied, “ ... with the exception that your newspaper will probably still be around.”

Prep talk: How unhappy was Tom Benson, owner of the New Orleans Saints, after the team’s 34-13 loss to Denver on Sunday left the Saints at 4-6 and heading nowhere?

It was, Benson said, “the worst performance I’ve seen in 20 years as the owner. They looked like high school kids.”

Cup runneth over: Maybe it was real, maybe not. Either way, it was on EBay, at least until the bidding hit $99,999,999, when wiser heads prevailed and bidding was closed.

What was it? According to the would-be seller from Sterling Heights, Mich., it was the cup tossed by a fan at the Indiana Pacers’ Ron Artest at the Palace of Auburn Hills in the incident now being referred to as the “Malice at the Palace.”

According to the description, “no sports collection will be complete without the addition of this vintage championship collector’s edition beer cup. Simply a must for all Artest fans.”

But who wants to authenticate it?

Tusk, tusk: Hong Kong’s Sunday Morning Post reports that officials at a pair of local golf courses have had to hire security guards to drive golf carts around all night and make noise to scare away wild boars that are rooting up the fairways and greens in search of grubs.

Trivia answer: Marvin Lewis of the Cincinnati Bengals and Dirk Koetter of Arizona State.

And finally: From Jay Leno: “Finally some good news for Mike Tyson. He was drafted by the Pacers.”