The Iron Horse

Golf Quiz: Name the current top ten in the world rankings. Hint…five are Americans. Answer below. 

Lou Gehrig’s Farewell Speech 

I’m proud to sponsor Lou Gehrig’s page on baseballreference.com and when you get a moment, just glance through his career to remind yourself how incredible he was…the 493 homers, 1995 RBI, .340 batting average. 8 top fives in the MVP balloting. 13 straight seasons with 100 RBI and 100 runs scored; an incredible 10 seasons with over 120 ribbies, and 9 with over 130 runs scored. Five seasons with 40+ roundtrippers. 

But by spring training 1939, Gehrig had weakened considerably. Ray Robinson notes in his biography (“Iron Horse: Lou Gehrig in His Time”) that Lou had trouble even tying his shoelaces. 

On May 2, Gehrig told Yankees manager Joe McCarthy that he was benching himself after a miserable 4-for-28 start at the plate. He was diagnosed with A.L.S. in June and less than two years after his farewell, Gehrig was dead at the age of 37. 

Jonathan Eig, who wrote the 2005 biography “Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig,” called the Iron Horse’s farewell speech, just two months after being diagnosed with A.L.S., “baseball’s most tragic moment, its greatest speech and probably the game’s most humane moment, too, when baseball became a lesson in life.” 

“Especially back then, we tended not to think of players as human beings,” Eig adds. “We didn’t have the same celebrity culture we do now. If a player got sick or had a personal problem, it was private. Gehrig was really one of the first to go public. He could’ve retired into anonymity, but he told the world how he felt about dying. It was unusual. He celebrated his life with the speech instead of dwelling on the terminal diagnosis.” 

“With his teammates from the ’39 club and many, including Babe Ruth, from the 1927 ‘Murderer’s Row’ watching, Gehrig initially refused to speak after collecting gifts and trophies and listening to the speeches made about him. Eig writes that there was a ‘big blast of noise from the crowd. ‘We want Lou!’’ Gehrig turned toward the dugout and workers prepared to haul everything away, but McCarthy spoke into Gehrig’s ear, Eig says. 

“Gehrig followed his manager’s directive and moved toward the microphone. Then came the quiet…. 

“When Gehrig spoke, he never looked up…but he delivered an eloquent address. Several biographies note that Gehrig and his wife, Eleanor, had prepared some remarks the night before, but Gehrig used no notes. 

“Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about the bad break I got. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of this earth. I have been in ballparks for seventeen years and have never received anything but kindness and encouragement from you fans. 

“Look at these grand men. Which of you wouldn’t consider it the highlight of his career just to associate with them for even one day? Sure, I’m lucky. Who wouldn’t consider it an honor to have known Jacob Rupert? Also, the builder of baseball’s greatest empire, Ed Barrow? To have spent six years with that wonderful little fellow, Miller Huggins? Then to have spent the next nine years with that outstanding leader, that smart student of psychology, the best manager in baseball today, Joe McCarthy? Sure, I’m lucky. 

“When the New York Giants, a team you would give your right arm to beat, and vice versa, sends you a gift – that’s something. When everybody down to the groundskeepers and those boys in white coats remember you with trophies – that’s something. When you have a wonderful mother-in-law who takes sides with you in squabbles with her own daughter – that’s something. When you have a father and a mother who work all their lives so you can have an education and build your body – it’s a blessing. When you have a wife who has been a tower of strength and shown more courage than you dreamed existed – that’s the finest I know. 

“So I close in saying that I may have had a tough break, but I have an awful lot to live for.” 

As reported to Ray Robinson, broadcaster and baseball historian Bob Costas “has reflected on Gehrig’s legacy as a role model.” 

“His qualities as a person were always admired,” Costas said. “But that admiration grows when contrasted with the graceless, self-regarding personas of so many present-day public figures.” 

I didn’t have time to explore the details on The Poster last time, but photographer Bruce McBroom’s story is a good one. Back in Aug. 2006, Baltimore Sun reporter Rob Hiaasen recalled the then 30th anniversary of the Farrah poster. 

McBroom had already taken some shots of Farrah for Noxzema and Wella Balsam, and she had not yet signed on to play Jill Munroe on Charlie’s Angels when he was hired again to photograph her. 

“Two Ohio brothers had come up with the idea of the poster. (Their company, Pro Arts Inc., is defunct after making a mint from Farrah, the Fonz, the Coneheads and Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders posters.) They asked McBroom to shoot the 29-eyar-old Fawcett in a bikini. Assignment in hand, the photographer drove to the Bel Air, Calif., home of Fawcett and her then-husband, actor Lee Majors. The front door opens, and she’s in a red, one-piece suit. 

“ ‘She said, ‘I don’t have a bikini I like. What do you think of this?’’ McBroom remembers. ‘I was speechless, breathless.’ Ah…yeah…I like it very much. He managed something like that. 

“Fawcett did her own hair. It took her about 15 minutes using big rollers, working those natural cowlicks. She was in a rush because she wanted to play tennis. They walked out back by the pool. All he needed was a backdrop, something to match the red in her suit. McBroom went back to his truck and grabbed an Indian blanket covering the worn upholstery. It was a match…. 

“The rolls of film were sent to the poster guys in Ohio who weren’t thrilled about the one-piece. But Fawcett had chosen the suit, and she picked the frame that would become the biggest-selling poster. 

“ ‘I didn’t think we had anything that would make a poster,’ says McBroom. ‘I give her all the credit.’ 

“Months after the shoot, he was at a car wash in Hollywood when he spotted a box of rolled Farrah posters. McBroom, who was paid $1,000 for the assignment, bought a $3 poster for himself at the car wash.” 

Even if you’re not a fan of Michael Jackson’s and think the coverage of his death is overkill, you can’t help but observe just how incredibly stupid his last moments were, specifically the reaction of Dr. Conrad Murray and others in his presence. Like this from the Daily News: 

“Michael Jackson’s doctor scrambled for 30 minutes to find a working phone to call 911 as the superstar lay dying….one of the doctor’s lawyers revealed Monday. 

“The landlines in the rented mansion were all shut down for ‘privacy reasons,’ and Dr. Murray didn’t use his cell phone to get help because he didn’t know Jackson’s address, the lawyer said. 

“Murray called for security, but no one answered. The doctor finally had to run downstairs to get a chef to summon help for the dying King of Pop. 

“ ‘This entire time, with the exception of him running downstairs, he was performing CPR on Michael Jackson,’ Edward Chernoff, the lawyer, told CNN.” 

But then there is the issue of just where Murray was treating Jackson. As the New York Post reported: 

“Dr. Conrad Murray found Jacko on the floor…and put him in a bed, (a) source said. 

“Medical experts say that compressions for cardiopulmonary resuscitation must be performed on a hard surface. 

“ ‘Michael was on the floor first, and they put him on the bed, and then started compressions on the bed,’ said the source, who had spoken to a Jackson relative. ‘What kind of doctor is that?’” 

You’ve all heard the 911 call. The unidentified person seeking help says Jackson is “on the bed.” The dispatcher says, “OK, let’s get him down to the floor.” 

Lawyer Chernoff, though, told the AP that Murray found Jackson in his bed with a faint pulse. Regardless, we all now know where he should have been treated. I just found this incredible. 

Heck, I was reading a Post story on the death of pitchman Billy Mays when I saw this. 

“In a 911 tape released yesterday, a frantic woman, believed to be Mays’ wife, Deborah, says she found him cold and unresponsive. 

“When the operator instructs her to get Mays on the floor to start CPR, a second person gets on the phone and says, ‘We can’t get him up…He’s gone.’” 

At least all of us should take comfort from the fact dispatchers seem to know what they’re doing. I also imagine all of you reading this will now know how to act if confronted with this kind of emergency. 

Meanwhile, the great rock historian Robert Hilburn of the Los Angeles Times had some of the following thoughts. 

“Michael struck me as one of the most fragile and lonely people I’ve ever met. His heart may have finally stopped beating Thursday afternoon, but it had been broken long ago. 

“During weekends I spent with him on the road during the Jacksons’ ‘Victory’ tour in 1984, I learned that he was so traumatized by events during his late teens – notably the rejection by fans who missed the ‘little’ Michael of the Jackson 5 days – that he relied desperately on fame to protect him from further pain. In the end, that overriding need for celebrity was at the root of his tragedy. 

“I first met Michael in the early days of the Jackson 5 at the family home in Los Angeles, and the memory that stands out is that Michael, as cute and wide-eyed as an 11-year-old could be, was eager to get through the interview so he could watch cartoons before having to go to bed. 

“When I caught up with him a decade later, his personality had changed radically. That happy-go-lucky kid was nowhere to be found. 

“Michael’s sales had fallen off dramatically in the mid-1970s, and by the time he reemerged with the hit ‘Off the Wall’ album in 1979, he was scarred emotionally…. 

“Sitting at the rear of the tour bus after a triumphant concert in St. Louis in 1981, Michael was anxious, frequently bowing his head as he whispered answers to my questions. In contrast to the charismatic strutting figure on stage, he wrestled with a Bambi-like shyness. Despite the resurgence in his popularity, he complained of feeling alone – almost abandoned. He was 23.” 

In August 1977, the late rock historian Timothy White interviewed Jackson at a restaurant in New York City. Also at the table were a PR person from Epic Records, and her husband. 

“Jackson tucks his linen napkin deeper into the collar of his charcoal T-shirt, and then shrinks from the maitre d’s solicitous main-course inquiries – ‘Some excellent chicken cordon bleu? Or escargot? Quiche lorraine?’ 

“No reply. Around the table, there is a long moment of overlapping miscomprehension. Finally, Michael fills the silence with a breathy, barely audible question: ‘What’s qweech?’ 

“A previously ordered wedge of the cheese-and-custard pie is rushed to the table. Michael, stabbing his fingers into the steaming wedge, gathers up a gooey hunk and ingests it in one hasty gulp. ‘It’s like ham and eggs!’ 

In their 1977 interview, Michael told Timothy White about the Jacksons’ appearance on Ed Sullivan in 1970. 

“I’ll never forget the day I was walking the halls at the Ed Sullivan Theater. I walked past his dressing room – see, I’m always known for just looking around and seeing what each place is like; I always do that. And he calls me in, and he says he saw our rehearsal that day, and said, ‘No matter what you do, never forget to thank God for your talent.’ He looked me in the eyes. He was unique, he was really kind. Such a nice man.” 

Jackson got along well with Paul McCartney before their collaborations and Michael talks of going to McCartney’s parties, which evidently were highly structured. This is 1976-77, and you had Chuck Norris putting on a karate show, the Broadway company of “The Wiz” performing (Jackson was filming the movie version with Diana Ross at the time of the White interview), and John Belushi giving his Joe Cocker imitation. Sounds like a blast. 

Jackson to Timothy White: 

“We were the first young group out there with that style, making hit records. There was nobody out there at our age. We came across it, and then all of a sudden along came the Osmonds, the Partridge Family. 

“Now you have groups like the Sylvers! The Sylvers have the same producer that wrote all our hits, Freddie Perren. That’s why they sound so much like us. [Ed. The Sylvers had the #1 “Boogie Fever” and #5 “Hot Line”.] 

“A lot of people that worked with the Osmonds said they would have videotapes on us and study us. They really patterned themselves after us, because they were singing barbershop on ‘The Andy Williams Show.’ They never were recording jams, poppin’ soul, then – boom! – they were. 

White: I heard ‘One Bad Apple’ several times before I found out it wasn’t you people. 

Jackson: “I know! One lady walked up to me and said, ‘I got your new record.’ I said, ‘What?’ She said, ‘‘One Bad Apple.’’ I said, ‘Lady, why don’t you read who’s on the label?’ 

Jackson: “They sang it, and it was a smash – #1….They sounded so much like us. I don’t mind if somebody takes it and go farther with it. The only thing I hate is they take it and make like they started it. It’s like a dog-eat-dog type of situation. I think it’s aw-ful. 

“At least the Beatles did mention where they were influenced. They were great writers, on their own, but they did study black music.” 

White: You’ve certainly got the power to make yourself happy….Do you think you’ll use it well? 

Jackson: “Okay. For starters, there’s nothing inside of me that wants to come out but don’t know how. I just let it all come out. 

“I’m looking forward to writing lots of songs and good material and putting it out and just doing my best. 

“So nothing’s bothering me, because I got things that I want to do, and I know I can do them. There’s nothing inside killing me.” 

[Source: “Rock Lives: Profiles and Interviews” by Timothy White] 

This week the Johnny Depp film “Public Enemies” opens. I know if I don’t get to see it in the theater, I’ll definitely buy the video later. The vast majority of reviews I’ve read thus far have been glowing, with Rolling Stone calling it “movie dynamite.” 

When I saw the movie was being released this summer, though, I was kind of amused because it’s based off the book “Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-34” by Bryan Burrough. I purchased this book when it first came out in 2004 and have barely cracked it open. So now I get to use it! 

Depp plays John Dillinger. Dillinger was born in Indianapolis on June 22, 1903, the son of a grocer, John Wilson Dillinger, and his wife, Mollie, who died following a seizure when John was four. 

“The Dillingers were well off. John Dillinger, Sr., owned his own store, ferried bags of groceries around their neighborhood, and put away enough money to invest in real estate, buying four houses.” 

But in working long hours, the elder Dillinger showed little interest in his son. John Jr. was thus really raised by his sister, Audrey, who was thirteen years older. She married in 1906, with the couple living with John Sr., until he remarried in 1912. 

Young John couldn’t stand his stepmother, “a feeling that appears to have deepened as she and his father began having children of their own.” John Jr. was increasingly rebellious and did awful in school, with the report card full of D’s and F’s. The father was none too happy. 

“By the sixth grade, Dillinger was the nominal head of a group of rowdy boys who called themselves the Dirty Dozen Gang. Their idea of mischief was snatching watermelons from a farmer’s field or stealing buckets of coal they sold to neighbors. At one point, Dillinger was arrested for a coal theft but got off with a lecture from the judge. His father was less forgiving. According to John Toland, who interviewed several of Dillinger’s boyhood friends in the early 1960s, the elder Dillinger chained his son to his grocery wagon for a time in an effort to rein him in. A firm hand only stoked Dillinger’s rebelliousness. One friend told Toland that Dillinger embarked on a series of petty crimes as a teenager, stealing whisky and terrorizing another boy with a buzz saw.” 

At sixteen, Dillinger dropped out of school as the family moved to a farm outside Mooresville, fifteen miles southwest of Indy. The place bored Dillinger to tears. “Avoiding farmwork, he spent his days hunting squirrels or handling second base on a sandlot baseball team, his nights shooting billiards at the Idle Hour poolroom or similar haunts….Like Pretty Boy Floyd, he met and befriended older men at the pool halls, hard men he strove to emulate.” 

Turning 20 in 1923, Dillinger had no idea what he wanted to do with his life. He then signed up with the Navy and was assigned to the U.S.S. Utah, a battleship anchored in Boston Harbor. But he grew homesick and went AWOL. Dillinger was court-martialed, returned to the Navy, and then went AWOL again, and was court-martialed a second time. Then he fled for good, was listed as a deserter, and had a $50 price put on his head. 

By the time Dillinger showed up at the family farm in Mooresville, he convinced them he had received a medical discharge. John tried marriage, a 16-year-old named Beryl Hovious, but this didn’t change him and he went back to hanging out in pool halls. 

Then on Sept. 6, 1924, after going out drinking with a 31-year-old pool hall buddy, Ed Singleton, an ex-con, they decided to mug an elderly Mooresville grocer named Frank Morgan, a friend of Dillinger’s family; Dillinger had been told Morgan carried cash home after work. 

“Morgan was walking home that night when Dillinger stepped out of an alley by the Mooresville Christian Church and struck him over the head with a large bolt wrapped in a handkerchief. When Morgan fell and began shouting for help, Dillinger pulled a pistol. It went off. Dillinger ran. Singleton, waiting in a car nearby, drove off, abandoning him.” 

The next day a deputy sheriff arrested Dillinger at the family farm. A prosecutor suggested John plead guilty and apologize and Dillinger went along (not even bothering to hire a lawyer). “It was a fatal misjudgment. Judge Joseph W. Williams decided to make an example of him, sentencing Dillinger to a jaw-dropping sentence of ten to twenty years in a state reformatory.” Singleton, meanwhile, hired an attorney and ended up serving just two years. 

Sister Audrey recalled, “When we got the word, my dad just about keeled over. It liked to kill him. I think he died of a broken heart. And when John got that sentence, it just seemed like he went from bad to worse.” 

Immediately, Dillinger tried to escape from the reformatory. Then he became friends with Harry “Pete” Pierpont and Homer Van Meter; two hardened criminals from whom Dillinger learned the tricks of the trade. When those two were transferred to the state prison at Michigan City, Dillinger asked to be transferred there too…request granted. 

Pierpont convinced Dillinger that the life of a bank robber was the perfect career and gave him a list of banks he thought Dillinger could knock off. Pierpont and another associate figured if Dillinger could escape prison and rob the banks, he’d have enough money to have guns smuggled into the prison for them to use. 

But on May 10, 1933, Dillinger was granted parole. Three months later he fulfilled his promise to Pierpont and smuggled the guns into Michigan City. The escape went off without a hitch, but now Dillinger found himself back behind bars and was slated to remain there for 20 years. 

Then on October 12, Dillinger was sitting in a Lima, Indiana lockup, with Sheriff Sarber and his wife relaxing inside. 

“(At 6:25 pm, the) jail’s outside door opened and three men in suits stepped in. Mrs. Sarber, buried in her puzzle, didn’t bother to look up. ‘Whaddya need?’ Sheriff Sarber asked the first man, who wore a dark gray suit, an overcoat, and a light-felt fedora. 

“ ‘We’re from Michigan City,’ said the first man. ‘We want to see John Dillinger.’ 

“ ‘Here’s our credentials,’ said the first man. His piercing gray eyes were probably the last thing Jess Sarber saw before the man raised a pistol and fired straight into his chest.” 

Pete Pierpont and his band, having escaped the night of September 26 from Michigan City thanks to Dillinger’s help, returned to take care of his friend, having robbed a bank in the interim on Oct. 3.  

Sarber died that night and a huge manhunt ensued through the streets of Lima. 

“Dillinger faced a crossroads. He could have left the gang and fled to parts unknown. Instead, he decided to stick with his friends and become a full-time bank robber.” 

And so that’s the beginning to the flick “Public Enemies,” if I read the reviews right. You’re on your own from here. 

–Houston Rockets’ center Yao Ming’s broken left foot could be a career-threatening injury. What a shame. He has suffered all kinds of foot and leg fractures in the past, but the crusher this time is it’s pretty apparent he overextended himself in representing China in the Beijing Games. True, he played in 77 regular season games thereafter before breaking the foot in the playoffs, but he’s been running himself ragged. [Yao’s responsibilities in China are massive…mainly because Yao refuses to turn anyone down. You want me here? I’ll be there. You want me there? No problem.] No one represents his nation better than Yao. 

–Not for nothing, but St. Louis’ Albert Pujols really is a solid Triple Crown threat this year. Through Tuesday’s play, Pujols leads the N.L. in homers, 30, and RBI, 77, and trails David Wright by just 13 points in the batting race, .345 to .332. 

–Did you see the score of the California League baseball game on Sunday between the High Desert Mavericks and the Lake Elsinore Storm? Try Lake Elsinore 33…High Desert 18, the highest-scoring game in league history. Actually, the game ‘only’ took 4 hours 10 minutes. As Lynn Zinser of the New York Times points out, the Yankees’ 14-11 victory over the Boston Red Sox in Aug. 2006 was the longest nine-inning major league contest ever and it took 4:45. 

—1969 Mets, continued…. 

June 27…The Pirates come to Shea for three and take the first, 3-1, as Pittsburgh hurler Steve Blass (8-4) goes 8 1/3. Jerry Koosman (5-5) goes 7 and strikes out 9. Fred Patek clubs his 2nd homer of the year for the Bucs. 

June 28…Pirates win 7-4 behind Jim Bunning (7-5), with Joe Gibbon picking up the save a second straight game. Gary Gentry (7-6) went 7, allowing just 3 runs, but Tug McGraw was shelled in relief. Cleon Jones had 3 hits, including his 9th homer, and is back up to .355. Ed Kranepool hit his 7th. For Pittsburgh, Jose Pagan had 3 hits and 2 RBI. 

June 29…Mets win 7-3 behind Tom Seaver (12-3) who goes the distance, fanning 10. Bob Veale (4-9) allowed all 7 runs, as Ed Charles had 3 hits and 2 RBI, Donn (sic) Clendenon drove in 3, and Cleon Jones, 2. For Pittsburgh, Carl Taylor hit his 2nd homer and drove in all 3. I forgot that this was Taylor’s big year as a reserve outfielder-first baseman. He hit .348 (77-221). 

June 30…Mets travel to St. Louis for five games. In the opener, New York wins 10-2 with Jim McAndrew (2-2) going all the way as the Mets shelled starter Nelson Briles (6-7) with 6 runs in the first. Jerry Grote had a 3-run homer, his 1st of the year, while Art Shamsky clouted his 5th. McAndrew himself drove in 2. 

July 1…Twi-night doubleheader with the Cards winning the first, 4-1, behind a complete game effort by Steve Carlton (9-5) who allowed just 3 hits. Mets starter Nolan Ryan (3-1) went 5 2/3, giving up 3 runs on 3 hits, but walked 7 while striking out 4. 

July 1…In the nightcap, the Cards prevailed again, 8-5, as Mike Torrez (2-4) picked up the win despite giving up 5 runs in 7 innings. Joe Hoerner recorded his 8th save for St. Louis. Mets starter Jack DiLauro (0-3) was hit hard. Wayne Garrett and Donn Clendenon drove in 2 apiece. 

July 2…Mets defeat the Cardinals 6-4 in 14 innings. Jerry Koosman was cruising along with a 4-0 lead until the 8th, when with two outs and the bases loaded he was removed for Ron Taylor who proceeded to give up a pinch-hit grand slam to Vic Davalillo, sending the game into extra innings. Tug McGraw (5-1) then pitched 6 innings in relief for the win, scattering 7 hits, walking 4, while striking out 8. [Man, that must have been a high pitch count…for a reliever!] Wayne Garrett drove in 4 for the Mets. 

July 3…Mets slam Cards 8-1 as Gary Gentry (8-6) goes the distance, while St. Louis starter Mudcat Grant (4-9) is shelled.   Tommie Agee hits No. 11. New York is now 42-34 and remains 8 behind the Cubs. 

–‘Sup with Jack Clark? The former slugger, with 340 home runs in a career spanning 1975-92, went on a St. Louis radio show the other day and blasted the New York Mets of the mid-80s. Back then, the Mets had a fierce rivalry with the Cardinals, with whom Clark played from 1985-87. But all these years later, Clark can’t let it go, calling the Mets cheats and showboats, as reported by Ken Belson of the New York Times. 

Clark said the animosity ran so deep he refused to fraternize with the Mets that were on the All-Star teams with him. 

“I wanted to let them know I wasn’t glad to be there with them and their teammate, didn’t want to be on any team or be a teammate with them, and we were going to battle.’ 

Then Clark said of Gary Carter, the Mets’ catcher in that era, that he “talked his way more into the Hall of Fame than deserving it.” Carter craved the spotlight, said Clark, which was “pretty sickening and disgusting to everybody else.” 

No doubt Gary Carter was as full of himself as anyone who ever played the game and not the most likeable, even among his own teammates, but for crying out loud, Mr. Clark, Carter was one of the great catchers of all time…period. 

But Clark wasn’t finished…again, this all happened 20+ years ago. He said Mets slugger Howard Johnson cheated in using a corked bat. Other players had made that claim, as well as Cardinals manager Whitey Herzog, though in 1987, one of Johnson’s bats was X-rayed and they were negative…a fact Clark seems to have forgotten. “(If Johnson’s) was corked, I’m sure a few other guys’ over there were corked, also.”  

Someone stick a cork in Clark’s mouth. 

–Speaking of angry men, here I told you to catch HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” the other night and then I missed it myself, as I was anxious to see a segment with Jim Brown and Bill Russell on the social activism in their playing days. 

Well, it seems that Brown blasted Tiger Woods for not doing enough to effect social change, describing Woods’ failures in this regard as “terrible, terrible.” Brown added, “Because he can get away with teaching kids to play golf, and that’s his contribution.” 

This is the furthest thing from the truth, and with Tiger hosting this week’s PGA Tour stop outside Washington, D.C., he was forced to respond at a press conference on Tuesday. 

“I think I do a pretty good job as it is with what we’re trying to do with the foundation,” said Woods. 

He sure has. The Tiger Woods Learning Center in Anaheim, Calif., for example, has nothing to do with “teaching kids to play golf,” as Brown, clearly clueless, put it. 

The Washington Post’s Michael Wilbon rushed to Tiger’s defense. 

“(Jim Brown’s) recent comments to HBO that Tiger’s social contributions are inadequate are way off base, even inaccurate…. 

“Brown should check out the list of courses kids can take (at the Tiger Woods Learning Center), such as engineering, robotics and marine biology…. 

“The scope and effectiveness of this learning center ought to be praised, not wrongly dismissed as ‘teaching kids to play golf.’ And the learning center is just one part of Tiger’s efforts.” 

Woods’ program “has produced 25 scholars…The foundation funds those students for up to four years. All 25 have mentors and internships guaranteed…Jim Brown might want to know they’re not on golf scholarships.” 

At least 20,000 have gone through the doors of Tiger’s Anaheim center; overwhelmingly children from poor and working-class homes. 

“Brown has to realize that the expression of social consciousness isn’t a matter of people singing the same song. Jim Brown took on the Crips and Bloods, and a lot of other demons. Tiger Woods attacks the problem as he sees fit, through education, which has always been at the root of Brown’s preaching anyway. And because men such as Brown and Earl Woods fought the toughest, bloodiest battles for decades, Tiger’s approach to activism ought to be different. 

“Plowing the exact same ground would suggest Brown and Earl Woods made no progress, which we know isn’t the case.” 

It also needs to be noted that one of the primary reasons why Tiger decided to host a tourney in the D.C. area is because of the presence of the military community, “which is the life Tiger grew up in and includes men and women he genuinely adores,” as Wilbon added. Tiger was also asked if a conversation with Brown might be productive. 

–Update: I guess I have to apologize for surmising that Billy Mays died from complications resulting from his being hit on the head by debris during a rough landing in a US Airways flight the afternoon before he passed away. A Florida medical examiner said heart disease was the cause. But the fact is Mays was complaining of not feeling well before he went to bed that evening. 

–We note the passing of the comic Fred Travalena, who followed in the footsteps of impressionists such as Frank Gorshin, Rich Little, and John Byner. Travalena, though, not only mimicked the voices of hundreds, but he could sing in the exact tone as well.  

“At least 35 people including eight children were killed after they were struck by lightning in the adjoining eastern Indian states of Bihar and Jharkhand, officials said… 

“Earlier this month nine people from villages in the Vadodara region died on a single day after a series of lightning strikes…. 

“In the state of Orissa, about 250 people lost their lives to lightning each year… 

“Globally, about 100,000 people are injured and 10,000 people are killed by lightning – more than the number killed by floods, hurricanes or tornadoes – the British weather bureau says. 

“The U.S. National Weather Service says the odds of a person being struck by lightning are one in 5000.” 

The odds of my Mets making the playoffs the remainder of my lifetime are one in 10000. 

–A story from near here… “A substitute coach from a Berkeley Heights youth baseball team was arrested late last week and charged with aggravated assault for head-butting a rival coach after a game, Westfield police said…. 

“The alleged attack took place during the traditional, post-game hand-shakes between the teams, a symbolic expression that connotes good will and sportsmanship.” 

–Jeff B. is having a huge problem with geese up at his New Hampshire weekend home. He arrived to find the dock “an absolute disaster, covered with goose crap.” Jeff and neighbor John S. are now pulling out all the stops; slingshots, Roman candles…its all-out war. I mailed a bazooka but it may not get there in time. 

–From the New York Post: “Anna Kournikova got into a fight Saturday night in Las Vegas after an unidentified woman threw a drink at the tennis ace…. \’It was a big fight,\’" the spy said. Huh. Kind of wish I was on the other side of the bar just taking it all in from a safe distance, know what I’m sayin’? 

—Bruce Springsteen received rave reviews for his shows in the London area the past week or so. 

“As he headlined the Hard Rock Calling weekend in London last night, the pressure was on Bruce Springsteen to match his triumphant Glastonbury debut on Saturday, when his curfew-busting 25-song marathon stretched well beyond two hours. The London show proved even more epic, a revved-up three-hour power drive through Springsteen’s America.” [London Times] 

—Simon Cowell has been earning $36 million for each season of “American Idol,” but with the program taking in $900 million for its five-month run, Cowell wants to take $144 million for his own. No problem here. It’s his show. 

–The initial sales figures are coming in for Michael Jackson’s music following his death and the Wall Street Journal reports 415,000 albums by M.J. were sold in the first four days, according to Nielsen Co.’s SoundScan. About 10,000 copies had been sold in the previous full week. By comparison, following Kurt Cobain’s suicide in April 1994, sales of Nirvana’s four albums were 68,000 the week after. 

Top 3 songs for the week 7/5/75: #1 “Love Will Keep Us Together” (The Captain & Tennille) #2 “The Hustle” (Van McCoy) #3 “Listen To What The Man Said” (Wings)…and…#4 “Wildfire” (Michael Murphey) #5 “Love Won’t Let Me Wait” (Major Harris…..uhh….uhh…) #6 “Magic” (Pilot…this song has aged surprisingly well) #7 “I’m Not Lisa” (Jessi Colter…no, you’re Jessi) #8 “When Will I Be Loved” (Linda Ronstadt) #9 “One Of These Nights” (Eagles…still my favorite of theirs) #10 “Please Mr. Please” (Olivia Newton-John) 

Golf Quiz Answer: Top ten in the world rankings through June 28… 

1. Tiger, USA 10.28
2. Phil Mickelson, USA 8.44
3. Paul Casey, Eng 6.91
4. Kenny Perry, USA 6.42
5. Sergio Garcia, Esp 6.19
6. Henrik Stenson, Swe 5.96
7. Geoff Ogilvy, Aus 5.93
8. Steve Stricker, USA 5.34
9. Jim Furyk, USA 4.98
10. Vijay Singh, Fiji 4.92