Keeping Score

These days, there is no bigger story, nor one that is more tiring, than the saga of Green Bay Packers quarterback Brett Favre. . . . Here’s Sam Farmer, in the Los Angeles Times: “Who could have dreamed Joe Montana would finish his career with Kansas City, Franco Harris would end his in Seattle, Johnny Unitas in San Diego. But Favre? The greatest Packers icon this side of Vince Lombardi? Oh yes, Lombardi. He ended his career as coach of the Washington Redskins.” . . . I’m expecting any day now that Dev Dley, this province’s newest judge and the area’s biggest Packer backer, will issue a ruling on Favre’s immediate future. . . . After the Packers invited Favre to return, but as the backup QB, Rick Morrissey of the Chicago Tribune wrote: "This is the football equivalent of deciding Elvis will give up singing to play the tambourine." . . . After the Tour de France experienced yet another doping scandal, Bob Ryan of the Boston Globe, during a recent appearance on ESPN’s Sports Reporters, uttered: "I'm shocked! . . . Next thing you're going to tell me is Brett Favre is coming back."

In 1993, four regular-season box seats with parking for New York Mets’ games would have set you back $5,837. When the Mets move into their new facility, Citi Field, next season, that package will set you back $60,000. . . . John Blanchette, in the Spokane Spokesman-Review: “Dana Torres has all my admiration, but when the Olympic Games give us a 41-year-old female gymnast, then I’ll be really impressed.” . . . Torres, of course, is the 41-year-old swimmer who made the U.S. Olympic team. . . . She also is the mother of a two-year-old daughter by a fertility doctor who was treating her and her now ex-husband. . . . “Believe me,” Dr. Itzhak Shasha, the ex-husband, told the Palm Beach Post, “I have achieved many significant things in my life, and none of them was being married to her.” . . . One more from Blanchette: “Bag on soccer all you want, but at least play is never stopped so that a referee can spend five minutes with his head buried under the tent of the instant replay gizmo.”

So far this week, I have received two e-mails notifying me of lottery winnings — $2 million in one, $2.25 million in the other. As well, Lady Jenny Brooks, a dear, dear friend who is dying of cancer, e-mailed to let me know she is leaving me $2.5 million in her will. . . . And how was your week? . . . Rick Reilly of ESPN.com tries to analyze Charles Barkley’s golf swing: “Technically, it's not even a swing. It's a lunge. Scientists study it. He gets to the top, starts down and then — 2 feet from impact — just stops! Totally freezes! He looks like a man waiting for a rattlesnake to pop up so he can kill it. It's the only swing in the world with an intermission." . . . It’s not often that I’ve been in a movie theatre where the audience broke out into spontaneous applause but that’s what happened the other night at the end of The Dark Knight. And, yes, you should believe everything you have heard or read about Heath Ledger’s performance as the Joker.

Scott Ostler, in the San Francisco Chronicle, commenting on the LZR Racer, the Nike swimsuit that will dominate Olympic news next month: “If you wonder why mankind can't cure cancer or solve the energy problem or climate crisis, it's because all the world's scientists have been diverted into R&D of the swimsuit." . . . Well, not all of them. . . . It seems researchers at the U of Miami are working to learn if Viagra helps cyclists improve performance at high altitudes. "The study,” wrote Greg Cote of the Miami Herald, “is an indication that evidently all diseases have been cured and scientists have officially run out of important things to research." . . . Jeff Schultz, in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: “The signing of Marty Reasoner officially gives the Thrashers 27 fourth-line centers, a franchise record.”

How strong is Cincinnati Reds’ slugger Adam Dunn? So strong, according to former pitcher Ron Darling, now an analyst on TBS, that “he blows bubbles with beef jerky.” . . . You’ve got to think that Mickey Mouse was involved in doing up the NHL schedule. Who else would have the Boston Bruins playing their home-opener against Sid the Kid and the Penguins on Oct. 20 at the same time that the New England Patriots are entertaining the Denver Broncos on Monday Night Football? . . . The New York Rangers and Tampa Bay Lightning will open the NHL season with a doubleheader in Prague. When that deal was cut, the Rangers had Jaromir Jagr and Martin Straka, a pair of Czech veterans, on their roster, but both have since signed to play in Europe. . . . Craig Bonner, the Kamloops Blazers’ new GM, has done more building and rebuilding in the last three months than a kid on Christmas morning with a new bucket of Lego. . . . A birdie whispers that Blazers management offered two free season tickets to former shareholder (and former season-ticket holder) Bernie Deys who, you will recall, wintered in the Phoenix area and missed out on the buying back of shares. Deys response, I’m told, was “thanks, but no thanks” or something similar.

The gang at Fark.com is ready for next month’s Beijing Olympics. Here’s a headline from the other day: Olympians: On your mark, get set, cough.” . . . If you haven’t seen the confrontation Danica Patrick tried to have with fellow IRL driver Milka Duno, find it and give it a look. And the next time Patrick does that we can only hope she brings along her bodyguards, or the West Ham hooligans who brawled in Columbus last weekend. . . . Steve Rosenbloom, at ChicagoSports.com, on the Chicago Bears’ quarterback situation: “You watch, every detail of every play, every pass, every drop, every day will be reported and then a decision will be made by (Lovie) Smith and (Jerry) Angelo, two guys who couldn’t find a quarterback in Gisele Bündchen’s apartment.”. . . By the way, these days, while Bears’ fans pray for Favre’s arrival, it’s Rex Grossman versus Rex Orton. . . . And here’s Rosenbloom, commenting on Grossman’s confidence level: “Grossman said his mind-set is that he wants to be the best quarterback in the NFL. Me, too. And I want to be an astronaut and a heart surgeon and Mick Jagger.”

Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. He is at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca. Keeping Score appears Saturdays.