’Net Junkie
Athletes turn garbled
quotes into art formOnce, when queried if he preferred grass over Astroturf, dippy left-handed baseball reliever Tug McGraw answered "I dunno. I never smoked any Astroturf." Good one. For more stupid, er, classic sports quotes, log onto www.sportshollywood.com/dumbquotes.html
Here's a choice line from ex-fielder Tito Fuentes: "They shouldn't throw at me," he said, after getting beaned. "I'm the father of five or six kids." Atlanta Braves shortstop Darrel Chaney had a solution to keeping his team on its toes. "Raise the urinals," he said. Then there was pitcher Don Sutton, who played for the Los Angeles Dodgers, Houston Astros, Milwaukee Brewers, Oakland Athletics and California Angels, who called himself "The most loyal player money can buy."
What was more ridiculous than the Anaheim Angels' Rally Monkey? How about this laugher by Dominican pitcher Joaquin Andujar, who said "There is one word in America that says it all, and that word is, 'You never know.' " He tried to explain away his utterances by saying "That's why I don't talk. Because I talk too much."
Fellow Dominican Pedro Guerrero was a phenomenal slugger for the Dodgers and St. Louis Cardinals, but few of his at-bats were as on-the-mark as this quote on sportswriters: "Sometimes they write what I say and not what I mean."
Or take this gem from Charles Shackleford, former center for North Carolina State's basketball team: "Left hand, right hand, it doesn't matter. I'm amphibious." Twenty years ago, there wasn't anything funny about the hapless New Orleans Saints, except for this line from running back George Rogers: "I want to rush for 1,000 or 1,500 yards, whichever comes first." Said former University of Houston wide receiver Torrin Polk, on his coach John Jenkins, in 1991: "He treats us like men. He lets us wear earrings."
But leave it to the boxing world to give us the punchiest lines of all. "[He] called me a 'rapist' and a 'recluse.' I'm not a recluse," said Mike Tyson, on writer Wallace Matthews. "Sure there have been injuries and deaths in boxing," admitted British middleweight Alan Minter, "but none of them serious."
Don't even get me started on Don King. You don't have the time and I don't have the column space.
’Net Junkie drops every Monday.
Contact Shawn "Speedy" Lopes at slopes@starbulletin.com.
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