ERIN GO BRAU

Man, I like Ireland. And St.Patty's Day. What other nationality has a huge day named for them? And if there are, they surely don't have parades and parties like the Irish. Being Irish, along with English, German, and a touch of Native American, I guess my biggest claim to being Irish is my last name. So I've always thought that that was my main nationality.

And when people talk about the war in Ireland, I'm reminded of a great play I saw in London. It was called A Beautiful Game and it was by Andrew Lloyd Weber. I don't know if it ever made it to the States, but it was centered around a soccer game in quarreling Northern Ireland. It was a great depiction of war in the Emerald Isle.

Also when I think of Ireland, I think of Dublin and Duke's Irish Pub. I've been there twice and sat the same table. It's a traditional Irish pub where they serve the best Irish stew. We once walked around for over an hour looking for it. Courtney and Caroline and I had passsed it several times in our walk, but fortunately returned to the right place.

Whatever you do on this great day, remember that for today everybody's Irish and be sure to give a pinch to someone not wearing green.

HAD ONE OF THOSE DAYS

Yesterday. No golf. But a nice day in the Southwest.

After a morning of honey do's, I spent some quality time with Ol Sol in the hot tub. The wind would cool me off when I emerged even my chest, but the sun always feels good. Well, this time of year anyway(s).

Two mile walk followed. Not brisk, but not my usual walking pace which is quite slow. Signs of Spring. Birds signing a little more on key today. Workers trimming off dead frost kills on shrubs. Not much chance of any more cold.

Suns vs. the upstart (my Gosh, it's about time) Clippers. At the Purple Palace. No, I didn't go, but I knew where I'd be at 7:00. I offered to take the bedroom tv for viewing, but my wife made the sacrifice, knowing I probably wanted the bigger screen. She was watching The Great American Race and The Idol. I was watching a slaughter--126-95. Go Suns!

And supper. You probably wondered when I was tying in the pizza ball picture. Well, that might have been even better than the Suns. There are three great pizza places that we love and about four others we almost love. Last night it was Pizza Piccaso, "where pizza is art." Passing on the salads which are also quite good there, we ordered our own small pizzas.

In the late '60's I spent a semester at Illinois State and my next door buddy from Kuwait introduced me to anchovy pizza. Not just anchovies on a pizza, but only anchovies on a pizza. While most think I just like anchovies to be different, I really do like them. I don't order them a lot, because most people don't like them and as a result, restaurants don't stock good anchovies or they get stale/spoiled. Not at Pizza Piccaso. What a great pizza!! It also included garlic, two kinds of cheese, and tomatoes on top. Scrumptious.

If you come out here, look me up and we'll go anchovying. If you can't make it here, and I've enticed you to try anchovies, Mama Cassales in Bloomington may be your second best bet.

MARCH MADENSS AND NCAA PICKS

So what does this 1950 scorecard have to do with this year's NCAA picks? Number one, it's a beautiful scorecard (but I've written before about how they used to include the game starters with current averages printed in the box score.) Number two, despite the WBC and NCAA, mid-March is still Spring Training where even the cub fans have hope. One writer in the Arizona Republic states that it is the best time for cub fans, for when the season starts, the reality sets in. Or right now, the cubs may be the apple of your eye before they turn into the Alpo of your eye. Enough. Number three, you have to keep track of your picks and how you are doing, so what better way than to keep your picks inside a great looking scorecard?

Ok. The last one was a stretch. But to today's blog.
A Phoenix sports anchor, Kevin Hunt, made his NCAA selections like millions of other fans. Then he took poker chips numbered with appropriate teams and regionals and put them into a plastic cup. He took his numbered chips and cup to the Phoenix Zoo where he had two monkeys pick one chip at a time to determine the winners of the games. Well, at least according to the monkeys. They'd select a chip, see that it wasn't food and drop it to the ground.

Of course, the tv crew was there to film and interview passerbys who all thought the monkeys would outpick the sportscaster. It was fun to watch. I just hope they rewarded the monkeys with some chow after having worked them so. I hope they beat Hunt, too.

And if you want to cut to the chase and pick this year's National Champions? It's Texas A& M. For Apes and Monkeys?

BALL FOUR: JIM BOUTON'S WEIRD WORLD

Somehow now it seems so tame. The 1969 season of the Seattle Pilots and their exploits. Moe Drabowski ordering a pizza from the bullpen. But so much more worth remembering came from New York Yankee memories of one time 20 game winner, Jim Bouton.

They called it an expose or worse back then. Bowie Kuhn, who liked to hide everything--I have a memory of him sitting in a very cold stadium for the World Series. He was coatless and acting like the season and playoffs and series were the perfect length, and it really wasn't that cold in late October. Anyhow, Bowie hated the book and denied that players might have popped a "greenie" or amphetamine to mask a hangover or to get pumped up for a much too long season with much too much travel.

Even one of the more famous scenes of Yankee players staying at a Washington, D.C. hotel tiptoeing on the roof peeping into windows, seems tame for 2006. But Bouton let the air out of the heroes helium pedestal (how's that for mixing metaphors?) And , actually, that was probably pretty good. We can admire them for what they do. But it should end there. Unless their out-of- sports activities such as the Pujols Foundation or LaRussa's ARF are worthy Then we can admire them on another level.

Bouton has called his year with Seattle a "Brigadoon." The Pilots became the Brewers after only one season. No one there talks about them or remembers them fondly. If he's right, then look for Seattle to have another franchise in 2069.