Doug Flutie Meets Someone in Boston He Can Look Up To

Bob Woolf, the agent for Doug Flutie, lives in Brookline, Mass., next door to another client, Larry Bird.

Bird dropped by to help out last week while Woolf and Flutie were working on the quarterback’s contract with the New Jersey Generals.

“Larry was giving Doug pieces of advice about the professional sports world,” Woolf said. “It was really something to see Larry Bird talking to Doug.”

Hopefully, Doug didn’t get a stiff neck.

Trivia Time: Bill Russell, Lenny Wilkens and Billy Cunningham were NBA All-Stars who went on to coach teams to NBA titles. What did they have in common as players? (Answer below.)

Idle Thought: Wonder if Wilt Chamberlain can suppress a laugh when he reads that the Boston Celtics will run out of gas because they basically are playing only six men? In 1961-62 with Philadelphia, Chamberlain averaged 48.5 minutes a game. He played every minute of every game, plus a few overtimes.

All-in-the-family dept.: Playing on courses 3,000 miles apart, Larry and Lauri Rinker both shot three-under-par 69s Sunday to move up the ladder and boost their earnings. Larry tied for second in the Crosby Pro-Am at Pebble Beach and earned $37,333. Sister Lauri tied for fourth in the LPGA tourney at Turnberry Isle, Fla., and earned $8,667.

Maricica Puica and Mary Decker Slaney will run in different events Saturday night in the U.S. Olympic Invitational at the Meadowlands, but Puica told New York writers she isn’t afraid of Slaney.

Puica, Olympic gold medalist for Romania in the women’s 3,000 meters, said the spill that knocked Slaney out of the race was Slaney’s fault, not Zola Budd’s. She also said, if she had fallen, she would have gotten up and continued. Slaney said at the time she was unable to get up because of a hip injury.

Even if Slaney hadn’t fallen, Puica said she (Puica) would have won the race.

“Mary Decker is in shape only in January and February every year,” Puica said. “In May, she is finished.”

Nobody thought to ask Puica about the 1983 world championships in Helsinki where Slaney won both the 1,500 and 3,000 meters. The meet was held in August.

Eric Dickerson, on the subject of NCAA investigations, told Danny Robbins of the Dallas Times Herald: “Some schools are overlooked. I say they overlook Texas. My senior year (in high school), an NCAA guy talked to me. He wanted to know what schools were violating rules. I told him some schools and said Texas (was one).

“He said, ‘Texas doesn’t have to do that. They’re just Texas.’ I said, ‘Say what?’ That just goes to show you they don’t look at Texas.”

Julius Erving of Philadelphia, on the Twin Towers of Houston, Ralph Sampson and Akeem Olajuwon: “One of them must assert himself as a center. There’s an aura about centers in this league. If you establish yourself as the man on your team, there is a certain style you are permitted to play, certain concessions that are granted to you by the referees.”

Trivia Answer: They were left-handed.

Quotebook

Phyllis Merhige, American League public relations director, assuring everyone she wasn’t offended by off-color remarks at a baseball banquet: “I don’t shock easily. I read the umpires’ reports.”