It’s no stretch to call him a foul shooter

Shaquille O’Neal is getting plenty of buzz for 5,000 missed free throws. However, Shaq is still a 52.5% shooter from the free-throw line for his career.

For purists, the worst free-throw shooter of this era is four-time All-Star Ben Wallace.

Wallace, in his 13th NBA season, has never shot 50% from the charity stripe for an entire season. As a rookie with Washington, Wallace shot 30% from the line. His best? Wallace was a 49% free-throw shooter with Detroit in 2003-04.

This season for Cleveland, Wallace is a reliable 42.9%.

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Trivia time

Tiger Woods has won 14 golf majors. If you combine the majors won by Phil Mickelson, Padraig Harrington, Vijay Singh and Ernie Els, do they top Tiger?

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Augusta leaderboard

Woods is hitting only short irons as he begins his comeback from knee surgery. But betED.com already has Woods as the favorite to win the Masters next spring. Woods is listed at 7-4, followed by Mickelson at 8-1, Sergio Garcia at 12-1 and Harrington at 15-1.

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Role reversal

Former Heisman Trophy winner and USC star Matt Leinart is a backup quarterback for the Arizona Cardinals, while his Trojans understudy, Matt Cassel, is an emerging star for the New England Patriots.

Here are their passing stats going into the final regular-season games. Cassel: 321 for 508, 63%, 3,615 yards, 21 touchdowns, 11 interceptions, passer rating 89.1. Leinart: 10 for 21, 48%, 181 yards, one touchdown, one interception, 73.7 rating.

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Trivia answer

Woods beats them. The Mickelson-Harrington-Singh-Els tag team has won 12 majors (three each).

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And finally

A week ago in New Jersey, point guard Devin Harris got some revenge against the Dallas Mavericks, the team that traded him last season for Jason Kidd. Harris scored 41 points with 13 assists in the Nets’ 121-97 win.

When Harris was taken out of the game, Mavericks owner Mark Cuban, sitting near the Dallas bench, heard a chant from Nets fans, “Thank you, Cub-an,” wrote Jan Hubbard of the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. “That was really funny,” Cuban said later. “I thought it was hysterical.”

This is funnier: Harris, 25, seems a lock to make his first All-Star team with career-best averages of 24 points and 6.8 assists, while Kidd, 35, is scoring a career-low 9.1, with 8.3 assists.

-- Barry Stavro