RELATED: Rose accused of sex with underage girl in 1970s
Several years ago, Rose was the speaker for a Boy Scouts breakfast in Dayton. The night before, I attended his private baseball-signing event at the Crowne Plaza. Rose, wearing a shirt with “Hit King” embroidered in the collar, peddled his baseballs and signed some for 50 bucks. How sad, I thought.
RELATED: Rose lawsuit vs. Dowd moves forward
He is the Hit King, no doubt. But he’s no longer the cartoonish uncle who bet on baseball and blurts out jokes that make people laugh. Sometimes nervously. The strangest twist in this story: If Rose had just let John Dowd’s comments from two years ago slide, nobody would be the wiser. Filing a lawsuit against a high-powered attorney has proven to be another bad gamble by Rose.
ESPN College Gameday will be in Bloomington, Ind., on Aug. 31 for a special weeknight edition of the popular pregame show. That's the night the Buckeyes take on the Hoosiers in their season opener. Who will be the guest picker? Probably John Mellencamp. My preference would be Bob Knight, in a triumphant return to IU. He'd probably stuff Desmond Howard into a garbage can.
The first preseason college football poll came out last week and, ho hum, Alabama is No. 1, followed by Ohio State and Florida State. That's expected. I was surprised to see Texas check in at No. 23. Notre Dame was unranked, making Brian Kelly's seat a bit hotter. The Irish received the same number of votes as Boise State.
Los Angeles is in line to host the 2028 Summer Olympics because, well, nobody else wants to go to all the trouble. The Olympics have become a mess of corruption and cost overruns. And can you imagine the traffic in L.A. in 11 years? It's time to build a permanent site for the games. I'd suggest Athens. But then the IOC wouldn't need to put the event up for bid, which would eliminate kickbacks.
Leonard Fournette is a scary-looking man, but the Jaguars' powerful rookie running back is a softy inside. Fournette had 700 of his childhood trophies melted down and turned into weights for a high school in Jacksonville. How cool is that? If I did that with all my trophies, the result wouldn't be heavy enough to challenge a skinny girl doing yoga.
Trending up: Steve Bartman, Gio Gonzalez, Evan Longoria. The Cubs gave a World Series ring to Bartman, whose attempt to catch a foul ball during Game 6 of the 2003 NLCS turned into the biggest case of fan interference since Morganna the Kissing Bandit. It was a nice gesture by the Cubs, but I have some Ditka-like friends in Chicago who still snarl at the mere mention of Bartman's name.
Trending down: Robinson/Benenoch, Ryan Tannehill, Allen Iverson. NFL players A'Shawn Robinson and Caleb Benenoch are being sued by a guy named Richard Harrington, who says he paid their $9,332 bill at a Los Angeles nightclub. The players reportedly tried to pay, but their credit cards were rejected. Again, these are NFL players. Harrington claims that the two men have repaid less than half the tab.
Knucklehead of the Week
Rule No. 1 when you’re an underage kid drinking in a bar is to lay low. UD basketball player Sam Miller did just the opposite during a recent trip to a bar in Beavercreek. According to a police report, he got upset and knocked all the glasses off the bar when a bartender cut him off. Stupid. Police say he got physical, and Miller ended up in jail. Instead of sleeping it off, he apparently got into a scuffle with his cellmate. Miller wasn’t exactly a fan favorite before this story broke. He might be the first Flyer to get heckled by his own student body.
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