Just another day at the races for jockey
And you thought you were having a bad day?
Pat Ferris found himself in the middle of a drunken jockeys melee at Cambridge Raceway on Sunday when a woman took off her top and started hugging him at a postrace barbecue, the New Zealand Herald reported, and things only got worse from there. Ferris’ girlfriend, caught in the crossfire, wound up with two black eyes, then disappeared when a second melee broke out.
The jockey hopped in his car in search of his girlfriend - only to get pulled over for DUI.
He refused to give a blood sample, got into it with the cops, wound up getting strip-searched at the police station and will probably have his driver’s license revoked.
On the bright side, though, Ferris did start the day with two riding victories.
Touchdown Tebow
“If Tim Tebow were a school instead of just Florida’s quarterback,” noted Fred Kirsch of the Norfolk Virginian-Pilot, “he’d rank 33rd in the country in team scoring by himself.
“The Gators’ do-everything QB and scoring machine has accounted for 46 touchdowns this year - more than 86 of Division I’s 119 teams.”
Relish the thought
Anyone up for the hot-dog days of summer in Cleveland?
“So Mr. Flip sees the headline ‘Indians sign Kobayashi,’ ” noted the Baltimore Sun’s Flip Side column, “and the first thing he’s thinking is - come on, you know it - ‘Wow, this guy can probably really eat up innings.’ ”
Alas, it was just closer Masahide Kobayashi, not competitive-eating champ Takeru Kobayashi.
Clearing the water
Finally, some good news for Barry Bonds.
That massive spill in San Francisco Bay, cleanup crews have confirmed, is not flaxseed oil.
High on the dog
The U.S. Attorney’s Office, wanting to be sure there’s money set aside for the care of Michael Vick’s former fighting dogs, filed a restraining order in Richmond, Va., listing the cost so far as $928,073.
Auditors suspect there’s a lot of T-bone steaks padding those dogs’ expense accounts.
Quoth the mavens
• Dan Daly of the Washington Times, after IOC officials declined to award Marion Jones’ vacated 100-meter Olympic medal to runner-up Katerina Thanou, another confirmed drug cheat: “If this keeps up, the committee might have to award the medal to somebody who lost a quarterfinal heat in the Belgian Olympic trials.”
• Jon Solomon of the Birmingham (Ala.) News, on Vanderbilt - leading rival Tennessee 24-9 in the third quarter - coming unraveled after a roughing-the-kicker penalty: “It’s Vandy being Vandy.”
• Headline in the San Diego Union-Tribune, after the St. Louis Cardinals got sued for allowing a text message to appear on their scoreboard suggesting that a 17-year-old girl in attendance had a sexually transmitted disease: “Whatever happened to ‘Happy birthday, mom’?”
• Snooker legend Alex Higgins, during an interview with BBC Northern Ireland: “I swear on my mother’s life, my late mother’s life.”
Sultan of Swat Dept.
A can of bug repellent used in the Yankees’ dugout during that memorable midge swarm at Cleveland’s Jacobs Field in the American League playoffs is up for auction at MLB.com.
You can tell it’s authentic, all right: Instead of instructions printed on the side of the can, it’s the infield-fly rule.
Dwight Perry: 206-464-8250 or dperry@seattletimes.com