Insider misinformation
Much has been made in college baseball circles about how Miami coach Jim Morris was told by a “friend” Monday the Hurricanes didn’t make the NCAA Tournament. On Thursday, Morris didn’t hesitate to expose the identity of that friend – ESPN baseball commentator Harold Reynolds. It was late in the NCAA selection show that Miami’s regional appearance was announced. “When they threw our name up to go to Lincoln, Neb., I was the happiest guy in the room because I didn’t think we were getting in,” Morris said. “(Reynolds) called me back and said he was sorry he had bad information. I called him back and told him I was going to kill him.”
Call it a real Conn. job
Tommy Smyth will be an analyst on next week’s ESPN/ESPN2’s World Cup games. But he won’t be near a stadium. He won’t even be in Germany. He will call the action from ESPN’s studios in Bristol, Conn. “You provide your own energy,” Smyth said. “You take off your headset after a game, go to the ESPN cafeteria and nobody’s celebrating. It’s just weird.” Smyth said he needs to be a “bigger expert” with monitors, because “you have to imagine what’s happening off-camera.” And you can’t use binoculars to double-check who’s who. But, Smyth said, that’s not a problem: “I can tell a player just by the way he’s scratching himself.”
No fire in firing lately
“It’s just a down year for firing.”
Steve Spurrier, South Carolina coach, on the fact every Southeastern Conference football coach has kept his job after last season, which hasn’t happened since 1988
Seems like old-timers
San Francisco coach Nino Giarratano apparently wants to see an old-timers game break out when his Dons (38-21) face the Miami Hurricanes (36-21) today in an NCAA Division I regional baseball game in Lincoln, Neb. “Miami has had 34 years in a row in a regional, so we thought it would be fair if we played some of the guys from Miami’s very first regional team,” said Giarratano, a native of Pueblo. “That might give us the best chance.”
