Curse Has Become a Mouthful for Guillen

Ask Chicago White Sox Manager Ozzie Guillen, whose team posted the best first-half record in franchise history, about the Curse of the Black Sox and he might give you a curse-filled reply, as he did recently to Stan Grossfeld of the Boston Globe.

“You want to know my honest answer? It’s a bunch of ... people come up with,” Guillen said.

The White Sox won the 1917 World Series, but four years later eight members of the team were given a lifetime ban from baseball for allegedly throwing the 1919 World Series against the Cincinnati Reds. Since then, the White Sox have been to the World Series only once, losing to the Dodgers in 1959.

Guillen had plenty more to say, but not much that we can repeat here.

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Trivia time: What was the first U.S. team to win the Stanley Cup?

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A pattern here? Larry Brown’s weekly schedule for the upcoming NBA season, as proposed by Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle:

* “Monday: Welcoming news conference, Brown swears this is the last team he will ever coach this week.

* “Tuesday: Rumors surface of Brown talking to another team.

* “Wednesday: Angry denials, team confusion, losing streak.

* “Thursday: Team morale sags, Brown undergoes emergency surgery.

* “Friday: Brown returns, looking even tanner from his stay in the hospital, and the team rallies.

* “Saturday: In a timeout huddle, Brown tells players he loves ‘em.

* “Sunday: Team owner, stung by Brown’s disloyalty, buys out his contract. Brown says he didn’t want to leave, but now he’s moving on to his dream job, and how many opportunities like this present themselves?”

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Ringing it in: Albert Lucas, 45, broke yet another world juggling record -- he currently owns 11 -- when he juggled seven rings with one hand in Myrtle Beach, S.C., last week, the local Sun News reported. Wrote Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times: “Lucas’ plans for his next stunt, we assume, are still up in the air.”

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Looking back: On this date in 1994, Kenny Rogers became the first American League left-hander to pitch a perfect game as Texas beat the Angels, 4-0.

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Owning up: Jason Giambi, poster boy for baseball’s steroid scandal because he was honest with the BALCO grand jury, deserves some respect, according to Jim Armstrong of the Denver Post, who wrote: “Go ahead, rip him for cheating, for disrespecting the game, but give him one thing. He has faced thousands of reporters and hundreds of cameras since then, and never once has he lost his composure.

“Your thoughts, Kenny?”

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Trivia answer: The Seattle Metropolitans, who won the Stanley Cup in 1917, defeating the National Hockey Assn.’s Montreal Canadiens, three games to one. The NHA was dissolved that year, replaced by the newly formed National Hockey League.

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And finally: Gaylord Perry recently had his number retired by the San Francisco Giants. Wrote Tim Kawakami of the San Jose Mercury News: “When his statue goes up, it’ll be in his spitting image.”