Better to Just Sleep Right Through It in the End

I know you’re not going to believe this, but every time I go near the grandchild these days, she begins to cry.

At first I thought she was just teaching herself to be a UCLA Bruin fan, kicking her feet, screaming and drooling all over herself.

I told her to stop acting like Jack Haley and began to worry about our relationship, which had been just swell until I had to leave her home with her mother and father more than I would have liked the last few weeks.

I hummed a few bars of “Conquest” to calm her down, shoved some sweet potato mush into her mouth and told her that’s what Reggie Bush ate when he was a baby.

Then I had her mother check the 7-Eleven Kid’s diaper, before sitting the grandchild down in her “bouncy” to tell her a story.

I told her about a little group of overachievers, overlooked by the really big people, who were obviously more blessed with talent and who call USC their home. I told her the little group of overachievers were from Fresno, and so most of the time they are miserable, but this was their chance to come to the big city and prove to the world they could be good too.

I called the overachievers, “Dogs,” because I know how much she likes animals, then told her father, the Grocery Store Bagger, to bark like a dog, and he did. I told her the dogs were really mutts, and she didn’t hear me because the Bagger was still barking, but after having him stop, I said the small-town people really loved their mutts.

I said they came here to play a game, the mutts versus Best in Show, and the mutts were stealing the spotlight, and no one expected that.

Now I can’t say for sure whether it was the sweet potatoes, or she knew what was coming next, but when I mentioned Bush’s name, a smile came across her face.

I told her the coaches from USC kept taking Bush out of the game, giving the mutts a chance to play.

“But then your Uncle Pete came to his senses,” I told her, “and decided it was time to put a little Heisman pressure on Vince Young and send the mutts back to the pound where they came from. It was beautiful, kid, almost magical.”

She seemed to enjoy the happy ending, and for a moment there I thought granddaughter and G.P. were bonding again, two die-hard Trojan fans until they lose, thrilled that we don’t live in Fresno.

“Two weeks from now our Trojans will be playing UCLA, and that’s really going to be ugly,” I told her, and she started sobbing again.

I sure hope that’s because of the ugly face I made; I’d hate to think it was it’s because I have a little Bruin fan in the family.

*

WHEN NED COLLETTI was hired as Dodger GM, he said when it comes to hiring a manager, “I’m looking for a great leader, someone who has won, someone who knows how to win the last game of the season.”

Then he began talking to Jim Fregosi.

Fregosi has never won the last game of the season -- if that means winning the World Series clincher. The Nolan Ryan-led Angels lost the ALCS in 1979 in four games under Fregosi’s leadership, and Philadelphia lost the World Series in six games to Toronto when he was in charge of the Phillies.

As for someone who has won, Fregosi has more losses than wins -- an overall losing record as a manager with the Angels, White Sox, Phillies and Blue Jays. In his 15 years as a manager, he has finished with a winning record five times.

If Colletti is looking for a great leader, someone who has won and knows how to win the last game, I’m sure he’s just talking to Fregosi to find out if Fregosi knows anyone who might meet those qualifications.

*

KWAME BROWN stands 6 feet 11 and works within only a few feet of the basket, and with Kobe Bryant shooting and missing as often as he did Friday night, I wish someone could explain to me how a guy like Brown could play more than 25 minutes, take only two shots and fail to score a basket.

This is what happens when Devean George is your role model.

*

MIKE SCIOSCIA held a tournament at Lost Canyons Golf Club the other day for the benefit of amateur baseball, and I thought it was that he wanted to help the Dodgers.

At the end of the event, when it came time to auction off a Scioscia Angel jersey for charity, I immediately put up my hand and joined the bidding.

I really wanted the jersey, so I could give it to the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA -- eventually getting it for $1,600, which was quite a bargain when you consider the size of Scioscia’s jersey and the number of blankets you can make out of it for the kids at the hospital.

*

THE TROJANS began halftime festivities with a tribute to Times sportswriter Larry Stewart, showing his picture on the scoreboard, talking about his 35 years in the newspaper business, and then had USC Athletic Director Mike Garrett present him with a Trojan letterman’s jacket for his “fair and honest coverage of USC.”

The Times has a rule about employees accepting such gifts, and while I’m sure Stewart has already returned the jacket, I wonder when it’s my turn to be honored if Garrett will be presenting me with the very same jacket.

*

TODAY’S LAST word comes in e-mail from Doug Diamant:

” ... The Dodgers could have hired God and you would have found a way to talk negatively about the hiring. About the only human more negative than you is my Brother In Law.”

He has the advantage of being married to your sister.

T.J. Simers can be reached at

t.j.simers@latimes.com. To read previous columns by Simers, go to latimes.com/simers.