BASEBALL : DAILY REPORT : DODGERS : Griffin Is Subject of Puckish Humor

By BILL PLASCHKE

Aug. 14, 1991 12 AM PT

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Alfredo Griffin took ground balls before Tuesday’s game wearing a hockey mask, which he will use to protect his broken right cheekbone until a specially designed mask arrives for him at the end of the week.

“Some of the guys were calling me the first Dominican hockey player,” Griffin said with a smile. “I play baseball 12 years and it takes something like this to finally get popular.”

“Look,” teammate Roger McDowell said, “there’s Alfredo Gretzky.”

Bob Ojeda’s right side required icing after Monday’s start, but he said it will not force him to miss any starts. “It’s fine, it’s not affecting me at all,” Ojeda said. Since the injury, Ojeda hasn’t given up an earned run in 13 1/3 innings.

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Bill Plaschke

Bill Plaschke, an L.A. Times sports columnist since 1996, is a member of the National Sports Media Hall of Fame and California Sports Hall of Fame. He has been named national Sports Columnist of the Year nine times by the Associated Press, and twice by the Society of Professional Journalists and National Headliner Awards. He is the author of six books, including a collection of his columns entitled “Plaschke: Good Sports, Spoilsports, Foul Balls and Oddballs.” Plaschke is also a panelist on the popular ESPN daily talk show, “Around the Horn.” He is in the national Big Brothers/Big Sisters Alumni Hall of Fame and has been named Man of the Year by the Los Angeles Big Brothers/Big Sisters as well as receiving a Pursuit of Justice Award from the California Women’s Law Center. Plaschke has appeared in a movie (“Ali”), a dramatic HBO series (“Luck”) and, in a crowning cultural moment he still does not quite understand, his name can be found in a rap song “Females Welcome” by Asher Roth.