For Fans, Every Day Became Ball Day

In Tuesday’s Morning Briefing, Steve Garvey took a playful dig at former teammate Bill Russell about his throws to first base. But it was no joke what happened to former Dodger second baseman Steve Sax for about four months in 1983, his second season in the majors.

In a segment on HBO’s “Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel” looking at mental blocks in sports, Sax talks about that period of his career.

Asked by reporter Bernard Goldberg where he was throwing the ball, Sax says, “Section J; popcorn stands; innocent little kids -- I probably winged a few of them.”

Goldberg: “And the more you thought about it?”

Sax: “The worse it got.”

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Trivia time: What was the attendance for Super Bowl I on Jan. 15, 1967, at the Coliseum?

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Adjusted figure: “According to the TV ratings,” said NBC’s Jay Leno, “91 million people watched the Super Bowl. Well, 91 million minus five -- if you count the referees.”

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More on ratings: Leno is apparently excited about the upcoming Winter Olympics. He said the event would provide NBC with “something NBC hasn’t had for four years -- ratings.”

Leno also said, “We will be broadcasting the Olympics here on NBC for two weeks, which will make it NBC’s longest-running show so far this season.”

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Not a bad idea: Jeff Gordon of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch found a website, superbowlmonday.com, that has started a campaign to make the day after the Super Bowl a national holiday. You can go on the site and vote yes or no. Not surprisingly, “yes” votes far outnumber “no” votes.

Possible names for the holiday include Super Monday, American Sports Day, National Football Day, National Recovery Day and Lombardi Day.

“Lombardi Day has a nice ring to it,” Gordon wrote. “That beats, ‘Way Too Much French Onion Dip Day.’ ”

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Welcome to New York: Phil Jackson, who played college basketball at North Dakota, was a second-round draft pick of the New York Knicks in 1967.

On his weekly Sirius Satellite Radio show Monday, Jackson talked about his first trip to the Big Apple.

“[Coach] Red Holzman picks me up at the airport and drives me from Kennedy Airport to the old Madison Square Garden,” Jackson said. “Some kid leans over the overpass on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway and throws a rock through Red’s window.

“Red kind of grimaced and his lips got tight and he said, ‘You know, you’ve got to experience all types of things if you come to live in the city.’ ”

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Looking back: On this day in 1993, former UCLA basketball stars Bill Walton and Ann Meyers were elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.

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Trivia answer: 61,946.

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And finally: Crowds at the Coliseum are a little bigger these days. Total attendance in 2005 was 1,019,954, thanks mainly to USC’s six home football games -- each topping the 90,000 mark.

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