Morning briefing

Fans need to save their boos

Padres Manager Bud Black has a bone to pick with San Diego fans.

After ace reliever Trevor Hoffman gave up consecutive home runs to Minnesota in the ninth inning Tuesday, leading to the Twins’ 3-1 win at Petco Park, boos rained down on Hoffman and up went Black’s dander.

“I didn’t like it,” Black told the San Diego Union-Tribune. “This city should be very proud of a player like that for everything he’s done on the field and in the community. I don’t think it’s fair.”

Padres pinch-hitter Tony Clark agreed.

“It’s disheartening, knowing what Trevor has meant not only to the organization but the city, and his level of accomplishment is unmatched in our game,” Clark said.

Hoffman, baseball’s all-time leader in saves (539), had struck out the first two hitters before the Twins’ Brendan Harris and Brian Buscher hit the homers.

Asked about the booing, Hoffman said “I’m not worried about that right now. I’ve got to make a better pitch.”

Trivia time

Where was Hoffman born, and what year did he reach the major leagues?

Fowl trouble

After Wimbledon officials called in marksmen to shoot down pigeons that were swooping down on Centre Court, animal activists swooped down on the tennis tournament.

The move was called “cruel and illegal behaviour” by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, which complained to tournament organizers and the police, Reuters reported.

“Since the use of marksmen to kill pigeons appears to have been carried out as a first, rather than a last resort, and not out of a concern for public health, but rather because the animals were deemed inconvenient by players, you appear to be in clear violation of the law,” said PETA vice president Bruce Friedrich.

The tournament mainly uses two hawks to scare away pigeons, said Wimbledon spokesman Johnny Perkins.

“But unfortunately there were one or two areas where the hawks didn’t deter the pigeons,” he said, “so it was deemed necessary to take a harder approach.”

Center line

Speaking of Wimbledon, Serena and Venus Williams said they would skip the U.S. presidential election Nov. 4 because they are Jehovah’s Witnesses.

“I don’t get involved in politics,” Serena said after both sisters -- who have 14 Grand Slam singles titles between them -- recorded first-round wins at this year’s Wimbledon tournament. “We stay neutral. We don’t vote.”

She added that she was “excited to see [Barack] Obama out there doing his thing” and would vote for him “if it wasn’t for my religion,” the Associated Press reported.

Harried fans

With its soccer team in the European Championship semifinals for the first time since 1984, Spain keeps finding new ways to express its excitement.

The sports daily Marca reports more than 10,000 people have pledged to shave their heads if Spain wins the title. Spain plays Russia in the semifinals today in Vienna.

“The team needs all the support it can get from its fans,” the paper wrote on its website, alongside doctored photos of bald men wearing the national team’s red-and-yellow jersey, the AP reported.

Those signing up took the following pledge: “I, a hardline fan all my life, do hereby solemnly promise, before Marca.com, the country’s fans and the team, to shave every last hair off my Spanish head if the team wins Euro 2008.”

Trivia answer

Hoffman, 40, was born in Bellflower, went to Anaheim Savanna High School and started his major league career in 1993, where he first played with the Florida Marlins before moving to the Padres later that year.

And finally

After the Mets’ Carlos Beltran and new Manager Jerry Manuel were ejected Tuesday for arguing with plate umpire Brian Runge, former umpire Ken Kaiser gave his take on Fox Sports Radio.

People say “these umpires nowadays, they’re too bullish, and guys like Beltran, they never say nothing,” Kaiser said. “I umpired 40 years. I never threw a guy out that didn’t say nothing.”

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james.peltz@latimes.com