There’s Always the Rookie Game ...

The NBA All-Star rosters are set, and Bernie Lincicome of the Rocky Mountain News isn’t afraid to assess blame for what he says are shoddy selections.

Lincicome writes, “Maybe the blame should go to Utah’s Andrei Kirilenko, an All-Star like a camel is a cobbler, or perpetual coat-holder Sam Cassell of Minnesota, not even Latrell Sprewell on his own team, never mind the league’s face of the future.

“Somebody’s got some explaining to do.

“Most directly are the NBA coaches, who voted not to include either Carmelo Anthony or LeBron James among the official full-sized NBA All-Stars. This is like leaving Janet Jackson out of any Super Bowl chatter.�

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Trivia time: Which four teams played host to UCLA during its first football season, in 1919?

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Forget the All-Star game: From Tom FitzGerald of the San Francisco Chronicle: “This is just my opinion, but this ‘Survivor: All-Stars’ thing would have worked better had the winner been allowed to determine home-field advantage in the World Series.�

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Cheap trick: Rocker Jon Bon Jovi would have preferred that Jackson promoted her new album by more traditional means than exposing a breast during halftime of the Super Bowl.

“It was embarrassing,� Bon Jovi told Jim Rome on XTRA (690/1150). “It’s a PR stunt. Unfortunately, they’ll probably sell more records because of it. You don’t go for the cheap trick. You write a body of material that people like or dislike and ride the roller coaster with it.�

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Slow to catch on: CBS late-night television show host Craig Kilborn called the Jackson halftime incident “so crass and so sleazy that Fox television is launching its own investigation [as to] why they didn’t do it first.�

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Brotherly love: Yale basketball Coach James Jones loves his little brother Joe, but he’ll put those feelings aside tonight when Yale plays Columbia. Joe is in his first season as Columbia’s coach.

“I want to beat the pants off him, just like I want to beat the pants off the Penn team and the Brown team and the game after that,� James said.

James and Joe Jones will become the first brothers in more than 40 years to coach against each other in Division I.

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Varsity blues: Screenwriter Scott Rosenberg has a broken heart, and some fodder for his next script. His former girlfriend, model-actress Bridget Moynahan, is dating Super Bowl most valuable player Tom Brady.

“You’d think 20 years after high school, you’d be safe from losing your girl to the quarterback,� Rosenberg told the New York Post.

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Trivia answer: Manual Arts High, Hollywood High, Bakersfield High and the freshman team from Occidental College all played host to UCLA, and defeated the Bruins.

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And finally: USC football Coach Pete Carroll had a question when it came to recruiting rankings, many of which tabbed his most recent class the best in the nation.

“Are those done by the human poll or the computer poll?� he asked Fox Sports radio’s “J.T. the Brick.�