Both of Them Will Have Had Checkered Careers

Woody Paige of the Denver Post is wondering which Nick Van Exel will play for the Denver Nuggets this season:

“Nick Van Excel or Nick Van Exit? Nick Van Exalted or Nick Van Expletive? Saint Nick or Sap Nick?

“There was a new Nixon, so we were told, and we gave him another chance and elected him president, and he turned out to be a lot like the old Nixon.”

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Trivia time: Who holds the NFL record for safeties in a career?

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Same old story: Dan Shaughnessy of the Boston Globe, bemoaning the fate of the Red Sox after Cleveland took a 2-0 lead in their best-of-five playoff series:

“Just what is it about October, New England’s best month, that brings out the worst in the Red Sox? The list of Sure Things In Life now includes death, taxes, bad movies by Kevin Costner, and Red Sox collapses in the 10th month.”

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Faltering favorites: Jim Armstrong in the Denver Post: “Just the fax: The Broncos before the season started were 5-1 favorites in Las Vegas to win the Super Bowl. According to the boys at Las Vegas Sports Consultants, who would know, they’re now 120-1.

“But that’s nothing. The Falcons, the Broncos’ victims in Super Bowl XXXIII, opened at 8-1 and have jumped to 150-1. Other than that, it’s business as usual in the NFL.”

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No sandbox, either: Ed Bouchette in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: “The 49ers, after embarrassing publicity, no longer make their office staff wear those fake 49er jerseys on Fridays before home games. They’re now permitted to dress like grown-ups.”

More Bouchette: “Already awash in Flutie Flakes, is the American cereal-eating sports public ready for . . . Peyton’s O’s? They’re a honey-nut toasted cereal marketed for Colt quarterback Peyton Manning.”

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Smashing act: After a five-year absence from the skating world, Tonya Harding has been invited to compete in a skating event later this month in West Virginia.

Observed comedy writer Jerry Perisho: “She’ll perform the triple axel, the double lutz and her world-famous single tire iron.”

Will the Brits laugh? Justin Leonard, of the Ryder Cup-clinching putt, was asked recently by Jay Leno for a reaction to the furor overseas about the Americans’ celebration.

“I’m seeking therapy for that,” Leonard quipped. “I’m on several experimental medications.”

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Silent Sox fans: Steve Rosenbloom in the Chicago Tribune: “A girls’ soccer league in Cleveland has banned cheering. It’s being hailed as precedent-setting. Like they haven’t done that for years at Comiskey.”

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Trivia answer: Ted Hendricks, four, while playing for the Baltimore Colts, Green Bay, Oakland and the L.A. Raiders.

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And finally: Boris Becker, on Serena Williams’ request--since denied--to play in a men’s tennis event: “If she is going to play, lots of men will go the other way and ask for wild cards into women’s competitions, and you’ll see some strange winners of women’s Grand Slams.”