Brad Rock writes a column, Rock On, in the Deseret News of Salt Lake City. The other day, it included this item: “Faced with declining revenue and high maintenance costs, some golf courses are allowing a new game called ‘footgolf.’ Participants kick a soccer ball down the fairway and into a 21-inch hole. Rock On will pass on that. He’s waiting to cash in on the swimboxing craze.” . . . Hey, Rogers Sportsnet, it’s about those digital ads that show up on the hitters’ background on your Blue Jays telecasts. How about dumping them? They really are misleading because that isn’t what the hitters are looking at. Besides, it‘s not as though there aren’t enough ads in the ballyard and on the telecasts already. . . .

If you missed it, Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Matt Scott lost his cookies and then threw a touchdown pass during his club’s NFL preseason opener. Column contributor Bill Littlejohn wonders if that’s “a puke-six?” . . . “A woman found IKEA bags in a Swedish church that were filled with ancient human skulls and bones,” reports RJ Currie of SportsDeke.com. “And dozens of odd little wrenches.” . . . One more from Currie: “Knicks star Carmelo Anthony says he wants to be a facilitator. Imagine Nero saying he wanted to be a firefighter.” . . .

You know you’re having a bad season when you have a toy-truck giveaway and one of the trucks has a different team’s logo on it. That’s what happened to the New York Mets. One of the trucks that was given away actually had a Philadelphia Phillies logo on it. . . . In case you don’t think young players copy what they see on TV, consider this note from Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle: “I watched five minutes of the Little League baseball regionals. Every batter steps out of the box after every pitch. One kid drew in the dirt with his bat, crossed himself, twitched, dug in and gave the ump the big ‘Wait!’ hand. After every pitch, the kid stepped out and refastened his batting glove. Stop that!” . . .

Astronaut Barry Wilmore is a happy camper these days, because NASA has agreed to provide an SEC Network feed to the space station so that he can watch some college football. There may be a downside, however. As Reggie Hayes of the Fort Wayne News Sentinel pointed out: “I’m guessing he’ll have a pretty long wait for the cable guy if he loses his signal.” . . . A wildlife note from Vancouver comic Torben Rolfsen: “Sharks kill 10 people annually. Hippos kill 2,900. When is Hippo Week?” . . . Rolfsen, again: “Smoke signals herald a new pope; baseball owners elected Rob Manfred as MLB’s new commissioner and tobacco spit gushed out of the building.” . . .

“Forty years ago (last) weekend, Nixon resigned,” notes Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe. “The younger generation may find it hard to believe, but there actually was a time when we were shocked to learn that our leaders could be crooks.” . . . One more from Hough: “Tiger Woods has taken himself out of Ryder Cup consideration. Guess I should take myself out of consideration to be George Clooney's girlfriend.” . . . Hough, again: “The prosecution in Bob McDonnell’s trial has rested. They said the former Viriginia Governor and his wife took more than $165,000 in illegal gifts. And down in Louisiana they’re thinking ‘Amateurs’.” . . .

In case you missed it, Canada’s men’s soccer team is down four spots to No. 122 in FIFA’s latest rankings. Canada now is one spot ahead of Guinea-Bissau. . . . Headline at TheOnion.com: Johnny Manziel Forced To Wear Cleveland Browns Jersey In Cruel Rookie Hazing Incident. . . . You wonder how long it will take PTI’s Michael Wilbon to get over it when he realizes that Tiger Woods now is just another guy on the PGA Tour. . . .

Aunt Jemima’s great grandson is reportedly suing various product makers for $2 billion in royalties. “He claims they have been using her image and recipes without compensation since 1937,” notes Richmond blogger TC Chong. “Following this case closely are families of Sara Lee, Betty Crocker and Tony the Tiger.” . . . There are a whole lot of junior hockey teams into training camps already, and a whole lot more will join the crowd this week. It’s all about school, you know. Gotta get the players who won’t be on the roster back home in time to start school. Except in B.C., of course, where going to school is just a distant memory. . . .

Cam Hutchinson of the Saskatoon Express has a question for TV watchers: “Would anybody else like to hear that Wendy’s pretzel-bun woman and Trivago Man are shacking up in a cheap motel?” . . . Here’s Hutchinson, again: “In Ontario, the provincial curling finals will be known as the Recharge with Milk Tankard. Somewhere Paul Gowsell must be shaking his head.” . . . A head-nodder from comedy writer Alex Kaseberg: “The NFL announced it is placing tracking chips in players’ shoulder pads to measure how far and fast they run in a game. This from the league that still measures first downs with three guys, two sticks and a chain.”

(Gregg Drinnan is a former sports editor of the Regina Leader-Post and the late Kamloops Daily News. He is at gdrinnan.blogspot.ca and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears here on weekends, except when it doesn’t.)

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Ron Judd of the Seattle Times admits that he’s giddy “with excitement to see Steve Ballmer, who gave the world Windows 8.Huh?, realize a lifelong dream of joining the disorganized-crime syndicate that is the NBA. And anything he can do to keep its back-stabbing scalawags away from Seattle is welcomed.” . . . More from Judd, as he named his Entrepreneurs of the Decade: “Record executive Jimmy Iovine and Beats co-founder Dr. Dre, who conned Apple into paying $3 billion for their business, which markets the equivalent of $29 Radio Shack headphones to young-sucker consumers for $299 a pair. God bless America.” . . .

If you missed it, the air-conditioning unit malfunctioned at the arena in San Antonio so things got a little warm during Game 1 of the NBA final on Thursday night. The San Antonio Spurs beat Miami by 15 points, with Heat star LeBron James cramped up and unable to finish. The Spurs, Richmond, B.C., blogger TC Chong noted, “now are planning to install heated benches for the visitors in Game 2.” . . . On Twitter, someone sniped at Gatorade because of James’s problems. Gatorade’s Twitter account responded with: “The person cramping wasn’t our client. Our athletes can take the heat.” . . . James’s endorsement deal is with Powerade. . . . Gatorade later apologized. . . . Mike Lupica, in the New York Daily News: “The reaction to James’ cramping, in the sports media and social media, was so patently ridiculous you actually felt yourself getting dumber just trying to follow it all. In the end, it was noise. But then, more and more, that’s the object of the game, isn’t it?” . . .

Here’s Lupica, again: “Is that a new hairstyle for Lady Gaga or a science experiment gone horribly wrong?” . . . And one more from Lupica: “Edge of Tomorrow is supposed to be Tom Cruise’s greatest action flick since he was jumping up and down on the edge of Oprah’s couch.” . . . “Is it true,” Chong wonders, “that matchmakers in Dallas are being inundated with requests from Cowboys fans to hook up V. Stiviano with Jerry Jones?” . . .

“Jacques Cousteau’s grandson is going underwater for 31 days starting next week,” reports Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe. “It will be a record for the longest time anyone has spent down in the depths. Well, other than the Chicago Cubs.” . . . Hough, once again: “After 90 years, WGN radio has decided not to carry the Chicago Cubs anymore. So have they decided to go with programming that’s more likely to have a happy ending, like opera?” . . .

Chad Greenway, a linebacker with the Minnesota Vikings, dove into Lake Minnetonka the other day and helped rescue two boaters, one of whom turned out to be a fan of the Chicago Bears. “Good thing he told me that afterward,” Greenway told Minneapolis TV station KARE. . . . “John Daly estimated he has lost $55 million gambling,” writes Greg Cote of the Miami Herald. “After giving that some thought, he immediately wagered $10,000 on the ‘over.’ ” . . . Contributor Bill Littlejohn claims that ““MLB and Joe Torre have warned Dodger pitchers to pick up their pace, as their games are getting too long. They first became aware when arriving fans at Dodger Stadium started getting there in the first inning instead of the usual third” . . .

So . . . when you were a kid playing road hockey, you always dreamed of playing in overtime of a Stanley Cup final game. Right? But, hey, what’s it really like? During Game 1 of this year’s final, Washington Capitals forward Dustin Penner tweeted: ““The feeling of playing in a game like this is a cross between constipation and explosive diarrhea.” . . . “ESPN tennis analysts said Canadian Eugenie Bouchard plays like a younger Maria Sharapova,” writes RJ Currie of SportsDeke.com. “Well, other than Bouchard being shorter by four inches and quieter by 104 decibels.” . . . One more from Currie: “Cyclist Eloy Teruel pumped his arms to celebrate taking the Tour of California’s seventh stage — one lap too soon. He ended up 56th. A classic case of premature gesticulation.” . . .

In Moses Lake, Wash., a goof trying to rob a convenience story lost out to an 89-year-old woman with a golf club in her hands. As Brad Rock of Salt Lake City’s Deseret News put it: “Otherwise known as the ‘Elin Nordegren manoeuvre.’ ” . . . “It’s Los Angeles versus New York for Lord Stanley’s Cup,” writes James Montgomery in compiling Rolling Stone‘s weekly Everything Index. “Regardless of who wins, you can bet someone will be filling it with an artisanal cocktail.” . . . One more from the Everything Index: “Biebs apologizes after video of him telling racist joke surfaces. He should probably also apologize for that mustache too.” . . . “Little League Baseball, founded in 1939, turns 75 this year,” notes Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times. “Coincidence? Just one year later, the very first Dairy Queen opened.”

(Gregg Drinnan is a former sports editor of the Regina Leader-Post and the late Kamloops Daily News. He is at gdrinnan.blogspot.ca and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears here on weekends, except when it doesn’t.)

There has never been a subscription fee for this blog, but if you enjoy stopping by here, why not consider donating to the cause? Just click HERE. . . and thank you very much.