Remember, There’s an ‘I’ in Third Person

Imagine if everyone followed the lead of famous and not-so-famous athletes and spoke about themselves in the third person. It could get truly silly.

Most of the time, it’s best to ignore such crimes against language, but today we couldn’t resist. After all, Morning Briefing has to do what is best for Morning Briefing.

Martin Kelner of the Guardian, a British newspaper, recently was watching boxer Ricky Hatton in a one-on-one interview on television when he was inspired to write his own version of a famous line.

Kelner wrote: “Ricky was busy telling [interviewer] Adam Smith what Ricky Hatton was about to do in the ring, and how ‘the big fights will happen for Ricky Hatton because Ricky Hatton wants them’ and so on, when it struck me. There are, I thought, to paraphrase the late Princess of Wales, three people in this interview.”

Indeed, it was Princess Diana who, speaking of the relationship between Prince Charles and Camilla Parker Bowles, once said that there were “three people” in her marriage.

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Trivia time: How many managers have the Mariners had since Major League Baseball returned to Seattle in 1977?

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Husky blues: Washington’s football program appears to be a shell of its usual self this season. The Huskies are 0-4 for the first time since 1969. Now, what to do? Linebacker Scott White has an idea.

“I made a declaration to the whole team,” he told the Seattle Times. “ ‘If you’re ready to fold, don’t come back. I’ll be here and whoever wants to be with me as we do battle to get our first win against San Jose State, I’ll posse with you.’ ”

Go get ‘em Sheriff White.

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Blues, part II: Things aren’t much better in San Francisco. Maybe the posse better stop by to lend a hand to the 49ers.

On top of the team’s 0-4 start, a stadium name change has led to all sorts of conclusions: “It was a rough Sunday night for the 49ers in their first game at Monster Park, named in honor of the creature that crawled out from under Terry Donahue’s bed one night and ate all his cap money,” San Francisco Chronicle columnist Scott Ostler wrote.

“Incidentally, the Monster people did a great job with the new stadium, taking great pains to recapture the signature decrepit character and charm of the old 3Com Park.”

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Odd couple: The National Post of Canada spoke to the Toronto Blue Jays’ Carlos Delgado about his friendship with former teammate Shawn Green of the Dodgers: “He’s quiet; I’m a little louder. He’s a white Jewish kid; I’m a black Puerto Rican kid.

“I was the one who always remembered the scouting report. He always forgot the scouting report. He’d come up to me and say, ‘What does this guy pitch?’ I’d say, ‘Well, last time he got you out with this or that.’ ”

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Trivia answer: Twelve. Whoever replaces Bob Melvin, who was fired Monday, will be No. 13.

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And finally: Asked by reporters whether he felt he did all he could, Melvin said: “Yeah, I do. We led the league in meetings.

“When I challenged them not to lose 100 [games], they responded. Give them more of the credit for that.”

Instead, they lost 99.