Aztecs Could Be Riding the Curb

If the San Diego Chargers join the Padres in leaving, Qualcomm Stadium might face the wrecker’s ball, writes Nick Canepa in the San Diego Union-Tribune.

And that would leave the San Diego State Aztecs and the Holiday Bowl homeless.

“If the Chargers leave and the stadium is torn down,” Aztec Athletic Director Rick Bay told Canepa, “then I would think football is dead in this city. No NFL, no Division I-A, no bowl game.”

*

Let down: “Don’t you agree that college basketball owes us something here?” writes Shaun Powell in Newsday.

“From November until now, the season has been about as phony as a Fresno State degree.... The entire season came and left without leaving any impression until the scandals hit. Then we all felt like a fire hydrant does after a visit from a few dogs.

“Make that Dawgs, as in Georgia Bulldogs, as in a few Jim Harricks.”

*

Trivia time: Which is the lowest seeded team to reach the Final Four of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament?

*

Mind games: “Around Sacramento,” writes Mark Kreidler in the Sacramento Bee, “you start talking about one team being in another’s head, you’re just begging for a complete amateur psychoanalysis, compliments of the Greater Los Angeles Lakers E-Mail Society.”

*

Heat stroke: “I’m about to get numb,” the Miami Heat’s Brian Grant said after his team lost to the Washington Wizards, 89-82, Saturday, the club’s sixth defeat in seven games.

“Early on, you go home and you’re pulling your hair out. Halfway through, you’re kicking stuff. Three quarters of the way through, you’re smacking yourself in the head ... Going home, sleepless nights. [When] you just can’t do it on the court, it’s tough on everybody, man.”

Especially tough, it would seem, on a player’s body.

*

None too tasty: “Seeing [Coach Pat] Riley off to the side of this team,” writes Dan Le Batard in the Miami Herald, “is like finding one of the world’s best chefs sweating behind the grill at McDonald’s. But hey, Riley can’t blame anyone else for this bad taste. The ingredients are his.”

*

John Millionaire: Boston Red Sox pitcher John Burkett stuck a note in the visitor’s clubhouse at his team’s spring-training headquarters offering his 2001 Porsche Twin Turbo 911 for sale, writes Steve Rosenbloom in the Chicago Tribune. The car cost $165,000 new, Burkett, but he’d let it go for only $98,000.

Just another sign of these harsh economic times.

*

Trivia answer: The 1986 Louisiana State team, seeded 11th.

*

And finally: Just in time for the NCAA tournament, BadJocks.com lists its top five signs your favorite college team has a gambling problem:

* 5.) Players are accepting collect calls from their bookies during the game.

* 4.) They have voted overwhelmingly for pre-game pep talks from Pete Rose.

* 3.) This season, more of them seem to be dating middle-aged Vegas show girls.

* 2.) They list their permanent home address as a suite at Caesars Palace.

* 1.) Monte Carlo Night at the athletes’ dorm is now into its third year.

-- Steve Springer