We have met the enemy and he is us - surprise

Gazette, The (Colorado Springs), Oct 15, 2003 by JIM BAINBRIDGE

Performing a show called "Visions of World War II," during halftime of a Texas high school football game gave Paris High band director Charles Grissom some small sense of what it's like to be under fire. The fans at Dallas' Hillcrest High were incensed by the Paris band's playing of "Deutschland Uber Alles," the anthem closely associated with Adolf Hitler, and were even less enthralled with a student running across the field carrying a Nazi flag. "We were booed," Grissom told the Dallas Morning News. "We had things thrown at us. We were cursed. We made an error in judgment. Our intent was never to cause any harm, just to put an historically-based show."

Home security: "Over the weekend, they find out that a guy here in New York in a one-bedroom apartment has a 400-pound tiger," said David Letterman. "They crawled up in a window above the tiger, and they shot him with tranquilizer darts, and they were able to put him in a net and carried him out of the building that way. I believe it's the same way that ESPN got rid of Rush Limbaugh."

Kobe who? Guard Brian Shaw has retired after 14 NBA seasons to take a front-office job with the Los Angeles Lakers. "I believe his official title," said Bill Scheft of Sports Illustrated, "is Executive in Charge of Changing the Subject."

The always well-rested Buckeyes: "People ridicule Ohio State because several football players major in Sports and Leisure Studies," said Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle. "But these critics have no idea the work it takes to master hammock safety or the Periodic Table of Tailgate Condiments. That said, Sports and Leisure Studies is the only major where you get extra credit if you miss the final because you overslept."

Reunion in the backfield:

UCLA twin brothers Dave and Mat Ball got to Washington quarterback Cody Pickett at the same time, each getting credit for half a sack. "The count on the play," said Mike DiGiovanna of the Los Angeles Times, "two Balls, one strike."

More and more, we're seeing Clarett as a Raider: Maurice Clarett's suit for early entry into the NFL draft has lots of precedents, says ESPN The Magazine: "Curt Flood v. MLB, Spencer Haywood v. NBA, Doogie Howser v. AMA."

And finally: Don King is planning to start a 24-hour, all-boxing- all-the-time cable channel next year. "Ooh," said Bill Scheft of Sports Illustrated, "I hope I'm not too late with a name: Fix Sports Net."

And finally II: Sebastian Janikowski spends a night in jail after a fight at a bar, "which makes him," said Bill Scheft of Sports Illustrated, "the only Raider who's performing the same as he did last year."

Culled from the international news wires, cyberspace and the corner coffee shop.