Dodgers Good for a Laugh

Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post admits the Dodgers could be transformed by their off-season deals, but that didn’t stop him from having some fun with the franchise that once boasted the league’s most respected farm system.

Boswell: “Now, they’ll take anybody. Provided you have a $900,000-a-year salary. And bone chips in your elbow or a wing named after you at the Mayo Clinic. Mike Davis wrecked his knee kicking a dugout-area wall last year. Jay Howell is coming off arm surgery. Kirk Gibson once had four disabling injuries in one year. Don Sutton was throwing curveballs when the Dodgers were still in Brooklyn.

“Somewhere, Don Stanhouse is laughing. Back in 1980, the Dodgers swore on a stack of season tickets they’d never do this again. Never pay millions for flaky free agents before kicking all the tires. Never gamble on other team’s suspect fading stars.

“Now, this is how you become a Dodger. You sit in the general manager’s office on a Friday afternoon and refuse to go away. You wait until they turn off all the lights in the lobby. You sit in the dark. Then, when Fred Claire finally decides to lock up the joint and call it a week, you jump out of the shadows and beg for a job.

“That’s how Rick Dempsey did it. And, now, he looks like the backup catcher. Sleep tight, Branch Rickey.”

Quick now, who was the winner of the Cy Young Award in the National League last year? If you’ve forgotten it was Steve Bedrosian, so did all the sponsors.

“The only commercial I was offered was from a friend who wanted me to do a public service spot on neutering pets,” he said.

Then there was the player who did such a spot and told people to have their dogs “sprayed or neutered.”

Quick again, who are Gordon Waldespohl, Denny Felton, Al Kelley, Doug Dalziel and Agim Barhda? They are 5 of the 45 golfers who finished ahead of Arnold Palmer in the Senior tournament at Wood Ranch Golf Course.

Can the Army ever recover?

From long-hitting but not always straight-hitting Joey Sindelar, winner of the Honda tournament: “I’m basically a par-eagle-double bogey player.”

Trivia Time: What team leads the National Basketball Assn. in victories by a margin of at least 10 points? (Answer below.)

Robin Givens, wife of Mike Tyson, on when they can tell he’s in fighting trim: “We know he’s ready when he’s got six washboards.”

Those are the stomach ripples that Tony Tubbs long ago ceased to see when he looked in the mirror.

Add Tyson: Fans in Tokyo are charged $16 to watch his workouts, and the Associated Press reports that scalpers are getting five times that amount.

“One spectator said he waited 11 hours to get a ticket,” AP said.

Tickets for the fight Sunday are priced from $23 to $787, and are almost all gone, according to organizers.

Ugh Dept.: Answered the Boston Globe to a reader who asked about the unusual diet of John L. Sullivan: “Sullivan enjoyed eating uncooked beefsteak for breakfast. During his fighting career, he also drank a pint of blood from the slaughterhouse every day.”

Trivia Answer: The Detroit Pistons, with 27.

Quotebook

Bill Reynolds of the Providence Journal-Bulletin: “Would you let Dr. Ferdie Pacheco--the so-called ‘fight doctor’--operate on you?”