A note from Ron Judd of the Seattle Times: “Two thoughts about Nike, the sports-world’s great Satan, finally dumping vengeful dope fiend and pathological liar Lance Armstrong, then taking his name off a campus building: 1) When even Beelzebub pushes you to the curb, it’s highly probable that you’re not a good person. And 2) Does Nike have any buildings left on its campus with names still on them?” . . . “Last February the Justice Department dropped its investigation of Lance Armstrong because they didn’t have enough evidence to prove that he was a doper,” writes Len Berman of ThatsSports.com. “I have one question. Were they trying? Actually I have another question. Can we taxpayers get a refund?” . . . Richmond-based blogger TC Chong, after Nike dumped Armstrong: “Apparently, they did not like his slogan — ‘Just Deny It.’ ” . . .
Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe, after hearing that Beyonce will provide the halftime show at the next Super Bowl: “Isn’t she too young?’’ . . . So, the New York Islanders will move to Brooklyn in time for the 2015-16 season, if the lockout is over by then. . . . You can bet their fans in Uniondale, the home of the Nassau Coliseum, already are calling them the Dodgers. . . . Islanders brass claims the team will keep its name, but I don’t see anything wrong with the Brooklyn Deckers or Coney Islanders. . . . If you watch TSN or Sportsnet at all, you have to admit that it’s getting awfully painful watching the talking heads trying to find something different to say about the NHL lockout. . . . By the way, that lockout, like winter, is here to stay. . . .
“Has there ever been a better commercial than Midas’ Canadian police chase?” wonders Cam Hutchinson of the Saskatoon Express. . . . The Toronto Blue Jays should sign Don Wakamatsu as their next manager. Why? Because he did a fine job in tough circumstances with the Seattle Mariners — they went 85-77 in 2009 before the Junior Griffey fiasco caused them to implode in 2010 — and he’s also a former catcher. You should know that Bruce Bochy and Jim Leyland, a pair of former catchers, have their teams in the World Series. . . . The other two teams to make the final four, the St. Louis Cardinals and New York Yankees, are managed by ex-catchers Mike Matheny and Joe Girardi. . . . Besides, no one fills out a lineup card like Wakamatsu. If you haven’t seen his handiwork, look it up. . . .
Greg Cote of the Miami Herald, shooting fish in a barrel: “Hitting abysmally and being benched in the ALCS didn’t stop the Yankees’ Alex Rodriguez from reportedly trying to pick up a woman during a game by inviting her to write her number on a baseball and toss it back. Cannot confirm the woman wrote, ‘Sorry. You just struck out again.’ “ . . . Forward Travis Blanleil, a seventh-round selection by the Kamloops Blazers in the 2009 bantam draft, has committed to attend the U of Vermont and play hockey for the Catamounts. Blanleil, 18, is from Kelowna. He played the last two seasons with the BCHL’s Westside/West Kelowna Warriors and now is with the Penticton Vees. . . .
The other night, following the death of his father, NFL analyst Cris Collinsworth of NBC-TV reminisced: “(He) was the principal of my high school, and I used to tell him I loved reading about him on the bathroom walls. . . . He’d get a kick out of it.” . . . Phil Mushnick, in the New York Post: “It took 3:30 to play Game 1 of the World Series, an 8-inning game. Game 7 of the Yankees-Pirates in the 1960 Series, won 10-9 by the Bucs on Bill Mazeroski’s ninth-inning homer — a 19-run, 24-hit, five-walk, nine-pitcher game — was played in 2:30.” . . . One more from Mushnick: “Division III Misericordia (Pa.), in its first year playing football, is 0-7, including two 70-0 beatings and a 67-0 number. Misericordia, in Latin, means pity, compassion, mercy.” . . .
After the NHL cancelled its entire November scheduled yesterday, veteran forward Patrick Marleau of the San Jose Sharks noted: “The league had these games cancelled already in the summer. They are just releasing that info now.” . . . Here’s a tweet from Tampa Bay Lightning veteran Martin St. Louis: “They don’t want to meet and they cancelled all Nov. Way to go Gary you really care about the game!!” . . . The owners, of course, have been muzzled by commissioner Gary Bettman so we don’t know what they are thinking. . . . And we are left to wonder how long before fans start to realize that the start of the 2013-14 season is in jeopardy, too. . . . It says here that the only people who can keep this thing from going over the cliff, a la Thelma and Louise, are the wives of the owners and players. . . . And one more about the disgraced cyclist, this from Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel, who loves predicting the outcomes of sporting events: “Lance Armstrong over Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Ben Johnson and the East Germans by a million lies as the biggest drug cheat in sports history.”
(Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. He is at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca, gdrinnan.blogspot.com and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears Saturdays, except when it doesn’t.)
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