The Lakers Really Threw This One Away

Now it can be told. When the Chicago Bulls defeated the Lakers in the 1991 NBA Finals, they had some inside information, according to Phil Jackson, who was then the coach of the Bulls.

He said on his Sirius Satellite radio show this week that Mike Dunleavy, then the coach of the Lakers, and his staff would diagram plays on a notepad, tear the pages off and throw them underneath the bench.

“Our ball boy, who was actually 65 years old, brought them to an assistant coach I had, Johnny Bach, and said, ‘Is this any value to you?’ ” Jackson said.

The Bulls had lost Game 1, and after an assistant coach deciphered the notes, some strategic changes were made, Jackson said. A key one was having Scottie Pippen guard Magic Johnson. The Bulls won the next four games and their first title.

Just goes to show that one man’s trash can be another man’s treasure.

Trivia time: The trophy that is presented to the winner of the NBA championship was created in 1977. When David Stern became commissioner in 1984, he named it the Larry O’Brien Trophy after the league’s third commissioner. Who was the trophy named after from 1977 to ‘84?

How about Jason Terry? Jay Leno dispatched a young man named Mo Rocca to Dallas to cover the NBA Finals for the “Tonight Show.” After Rocca asked Mavericks owner Mark Cuban to spell Dirk Nowitzki, Cuban totally messed up his first try and then came up with: “D-i-r-k N-o-w-i-t-i-z-k-i.”

“Wrong!” Rocca said.

Said Cuban: “I should know how to spell his name since I sign his checks.”

He has a shot: Former UCLA quarterback Tommy Maddox’s football career was resurrected in 2001 when he led the L.A. Xtreme to an XFL title. Now, having been released by the Pittsburgh Steelers in March, his football career again appears to be over.

Maddox, though, hopes to make it as a pro golfer on the Nationwide Tour. According to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, he has a plus-1.8 handicap.

Dirk Hartman, a golf professional who plays with Maddox in his hometown of Roanoke, Texas, told the newspaper, “Most players have false dreams and think they can make it. Tommy’s dreams are real.”

Looking back: On this day in 1989, Arantxa Sanchez-Vicario, 17, became the youngest French Open champion and the first Spanish woman to win a Grand Slam event by dethroning Steffi Graf, 7-6 (6), 3-6, 7-5.

Trivia answer: Walter A. Brown, who founded the Boston Celtics in 1945 and helped create the NBA in 1946. He died in 1964.

And finally: Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle, in Germany for the World Cup, wrote: “Between the Paul Bunyan beers, the fat-sodden plates of food, the cigarette vending machines, the 8,000 varieties of sausage and lunchmeat, and the Hansel-and-Gretel bakeries on every corner, my guess is that the average life expectancy in Germany is 12.

“But maybe all that stuff is counterbalanced by the benefits of public nude sunbathing and the stress-reduction effect of a 48-ounce brewski for lunch.”

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