Magic Gets Bird’s Vote for MVP

Chick Hearn said it was all over. “Magic Johnson has clinched the MVP,” he said.

Sounds a little premature, but Larry Bird wouldn’t argue. Here’s what the Boston forward told Peter May of the Hartford Courant before Sunday’s game: “If I had to pick a guy to start a team, there’s no question who I’d choose. Magic’s head and shoulders above anyone else.

“I’ve always said, and I haven’t changed my opinion, that Magic is the best player in the league. Dominique Wilkins and Michael Jordan? They’re not Magic Johnson. They’re dunkers. Michael takes 30 shots to get 30 points. You know, there’s a difference.”

With spring training almost upon us, leave it to George Steinbrenner to fire the first cheap shot.

Alluding to the off-season problems of the New York Mets, he told Tom Verducci of Newsday: “What was it someone was saying the other day? The New York teams are two kinds--the pinstripes and the jailstripes. That’s all over the country. It’s a bad thing.”

Looking back on his 600 wins, North Carolina basketball Coach Dean Smith, a perfectionist, said: “Sometimes I almost felt better when we lost and played well than when we won and played poorly.”

A sheepish smile crossed his face.

“Almost,” he said.

Trivia Time: Ron Widby, who held the University of Tennessee basketball scoring record of 50 points which Tony White broke with 51 Saturday, was better known as what? (Answer below.)

After Henry Aaron said he thought Don Mattingly was more deserving of the American League MVP than Roger Clemens because he was an everyday player, Clemens was quoted by Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post as saying, “If that opinion came from a classy person like Reggie Jackson, I’d take note. My idol was Reggie. But some people will do anything for some cheap publicity.”

Said Boswell: “A year ago, Clemens was an unproven youngster coming off shoulder surgery. Now, he’s calling a man with 755 home runs a cheap publicity hound.”

From the Denver Post: “Darrell Green, the Washington Redskins’ cornerback who blew away the likes of Ron Brown and Willie Gault last year, is no longer the fastest man in the National Football League. They stretched the distance from 40 to 100 yards this year, and Green finished second to Dallas Cowboys running back Herschel Walker. Walker’s time was 9.3 seconds.”

Ouch: From Sports Illustrated, decrying the antics of UCLA’s Reggie Miller: “Spitting at opposing players, slapping away defenders’ hands, disdainfully bouncing balls off their legs on inbounds plays and gesturing at officials with rubbing fingers (the familiar sign for payola) are just a few of Miller’s lowlights this season.

“One West Coast coach says that if a poll were taken of Pac-10 coaches, ‘they would vote 8-2 that Reggie’s an ---- .’ ”

How-times-have-changed dept.: When Jack Fleck beat Ben Hogan in a playoff to win the U.S. Open in 1955, he earned $6,000. When he tied for fifth in the PGA Seniors Championships Sunday, he earned $10,600.

Trivia Answer: In 1968-71, he was a punter for the Dallas Cowboys. He still holds the club record for longest punt at 84 yards.

Quotebook

Phil Zevenbergen of Washington, on Saturday night’s 70-65 win over Stanford: “It was great. The referees let us get away with a lot of pushing.”