Sideline Chatter
That's one way to pump fans

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Here's a ballpark promotion that just might grow on you: Steroid Night.

Random fans among the 1,500 who attended last night's Clinton (Iowa) LumberKings game were handed urine-sample cups, and any fans who said their name was Jose Canseco, Ken Caminiti or Lyle Alzado got reduced-price tickets for just $2.

"We're having fun with a very serious subject," Ted Tornow, general manager of the Class A team, told the Des Moines Register. "It's an ongoing problem in not only baseball, but about everything else — from the Olympics on down.

"I'm sure I'll hear about that (invoking the name of Alzado, whose death was precipitated by steroid use). But if we get one person that thought about steroids and doesn't do it — that's fine with me."

One fan did return his cup — filled, he said, with Mountain Dew.

They took his word for it.

Too hot to Vandal

Joe Vandal, the University of Idaho mascot, is about to be replaced.

As student Danielle Rainville told The Associated Press: "The size of Joe's head sometimes frightens small children and attracts rude comments."

Saying he never intended to frighten anyone, Joe is reportedly seeking asylum with Idaho's football team.
 
Must be sweeps week

Colleen Jones, Canada's star skip, says there aren't enough curling fans to justify splitting the world championships into separate men's and women's events next year.

"The women are going to have to curl naked to get people out there," she told the Calgary Herald. "I'm not kidding. You're going to have to hope for an Anna Kournikova to come along and really jazz it up."

Not that Kournikova isn't qualified, having won equal numbers of tennis and curling titles.

Turn down that Mike

No truth to the rumor that Mike Tyson has a broadcasting gig lined up.

Turns out his prospective partners feared he'd talk their ears off.

Talking the talk

• NASCAR driver Robby Gordon, to the Detroit Free Press, on wrecking his car during a race while talking on the radio with crew chief Chris Andrews: "Our conversations have shortened up since then."

• Cubs manager Dusty Baker, to the Chicago Tribune, on his 5-year-old son's reaction to the onfield rant that earned Dad a one-game suspension: "Darren called me and was laughing at me for getting a 'timeout' for a temper tantrum. He said he hadn't even gotten one in school yet."

It's Dollar Bill in the stretch

News flash: A federal judge says it's OK for jockeys to make like NASCAR drivers and wear advertising logos on their racing duds in the Kentucky Derby.

Don't know how the race shapes up, but Shane Sellers is the 7-5 morning-line favorite to win the coveted jockey-shorts endorsement.

— Dwight Perry, The Seattle Times