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OT: Interesting Rumors in Sports

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Plum Street

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Thought this could be a fun summer topic. Sports based stories or rumors we have heard over the years that may very well be true .

First up the Kevin Costner and Cal Ripken jr. spat . As rumor had it , Costner was having an affair with Ripken’s wife . Ripken finds them and gets into a fight with Costner and is unable to play that night . The orioles then stage a fake power outage at Camden yards so Ripken’s consecutive game streak can continue the next day.

What else ?
 
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I once heard that a Knicks game against the Utah Jazz was rained out or something and Anthony Mason returned home to his wife/girlfriend in bed with a famous rapper. The rapper heard him coming and staged it as a robbery and made off with a lot of cash. Bonus points for anyone else that has heard this.
 
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Zak57 said:
Jordan was suspended from the NBA for gambling which is why he went to play minor league baseball.

Draft lottery rigged for Ewing to the Knicks by placing a cold envelope in bucket for Stern to pick.
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Jordan was always in AC during those Knicks playoff series on off days . I don’t think stern would suspend him though .
The Ewing one I believe.
 
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Plum Street said:
Jordan was always in AC during those Knicks playoff series on off days . I don’t think stern would suspend him though .
The Ewing one I believe.
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Story with Jordan was not legalized gambling. He was into the wrong people for big money. Rumor Nike stepped in and settled the debt. They tried to tie the rumor to Jordans fathers murder but never proven.
 
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Not even a rumor, but just as amusing:

Do you know why Purdue is called the Boilermakers?

In 1891, After 5 years of playing intercollegiate football (with a .500 record), the University hired a former All-American Princeton player named Knowlton “Snake” Ames to lead the football program.

Legend has it Snake proceeded to go down to the local Monon Rail Yards and recruit a bunch of burly track workers and enrolled them each in a class or two. Some of the men worked as Boilermakers (meaning they shoveled coal into the train’s engines).

Anyhow, these brutes proceeded to go 12-0 over the next two seasons.

in 1891, the team finished 4-0, winning those games by a combined score of 194-0.
in 1892, the team finished 8-0, with a combined score of 320-24.

The official university explanation for the nickname is this:
>On October 26, 1891, a newspaper in Crawfordsville, Indiana, called Purdue's football team the "Boiler Makers" when writing about their trouncing of Wabash College. Lafayette newspapers soon picked up the name, and in October 1892, The Purdue Exponent, Purdue's student newspaper, gave it the stamp of approval.[134] In the early days of Purdue football, the team was called other names as well, including "haymakers," "railsplitters," "sluggers," and "cornfield sailors."

the point is, those newspaper articles were actually in the context of complaining about Purdue cheating by hiring burly men to play football.
 
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Cramer's DiMaggio Biography had a passage about when a very jealous Joe DiMaggio enlisted the assistance of Frank Sinatra to break into a hotel room where Jolten Joe thought Marilyn Monroe was having sex with another guy. Turns out that Frank and Joe broke into the wrong room where an astonished middle aged couple were sound asleep but awakened by two of the most famous celebrities in the world.
 
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Zak57 said:
Jordan was suspended from the NBA for gambling which is why he went to play minor league baseball.

Draft lottery rigged for Ewing to the Knicks by placing a cold envelope in bucket for Stern to pick.
Click to expand...

#2 is crazy. They wouldn't rig the lottery with a cold envelope.

They bent the corner of the Knicks envelope when it went into the hopper.
 
Zak57 said:
Jordan was suspended from the NBA for gambling which is why he went to play minor league baseball.

Draft lottery rigged for Ewing to the Knicks by placing a cold envelope in bucket for Stern to pick.
Click to expand...
Now these two are very plausible. As a Knicks fan, I hope they are start freezing more envelopes in the future.
 
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batts said:
Cramer's DiMaggio Biography had a passage about when a very jealous Joe DiMaggio enlisted the assistance of Frank Sinatra to break into a hotel room where Jolten Joe thought Marilyn Monroe was having sex with another guy. Turns out that Frank and Joe broke into the wrong room where an astonished middle aged couple were sound asleep but awakened by two of the most famous celebrities in the world.
Click to expand...
Did they at least give the couple their autographs?
 
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kupuna133 said:
Story with Jordan was not legalized gambling. He was into the wrong people for big money. Rumor Nike stepped in and settled the debt. They tried to tie the rumor to Jordans fathers murder but never proven.
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yeah thats what i heard as well, that the wrong persons that he got involved with had his father killed because of his debt.
 
RUPete said:
I thought that one was a known fact. He also had a superstition about eating chicken prepared a certain way before games if I recall correctly.
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Yeah it’s such a well known rumor that it’s pretty much fact at this point. It’s been reported in several outlets.
 
In 2001, Rutgers related there was an equipment manager or something that was a holdover from the Shea years that schiano inherited . One of the receivers wanted new gloves and the guy said something like “it doesn’t matter what kind of gloves you wear, you will still drop passes.”
Schiano then promptly reassigned this guy to the college ave gym or fired him as part of changing the culture . Anyone else hear this ?
 
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A running back that RU had years ago, noted as being very fast, was caught in the locker room with another RU player.... the player did not play much after that
 
My favorite is a scout got lost while looking for a certain recruit asked a local farmer plowing his field for directions. The farmer picks the plow up and uses it to point the direction of the recruit. The scout immediately signed the farmer and forgets about the other recruit. That farmer was Bronco Nagurski
 
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"Big" John Daly got his nickname, not from his big drives or big belly, but actually from his big ####.

Don't ask me how I know...
 
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applesktrack said:
My favorite is a scout got lost while looking for a certain recruit asked a local farmer plowing his field for directions. The farmer picks the plow up and uses it to point the direction of the recruit. The scout immediately signed the farmer and forgets about the other recruit. That farmer was Bronco Nagurski
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From what I’ve read Nagurski would run over people, nothing fancy just brut strength and right at you great player in his day.
 
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Not rumors, but fun stuff:

The Crazy Crab was a mascot of the San Francisco Giants for the 1984 season. As opposed to other mascots, Crazy Crab was meant as an "anti-mascot", satirizing on the mascot craze that was going on at the time. Fans were encouraged to boo the mascot (played by actor Wayne Doba) and manager Frank Robinson appeared in a commercial with the crustacean where Robinson was restrained from attacking him. This encouragement may have worked too well, as Giants fans regularly threw various dangerous objects at Crazy Crab, including beer bottles and batteries, and Crazy Crab's suit had to be reinforced with a fiberglass shell for protection. The crab was so hated, players on both the Giants and even the opposition would throw rosin bags and other objects at the mascot. Doba sued the San Diego Padres after two of their players tackled him, causing injuries.


Candlestick Park was one of the coldest places to watch a baseball game because Southeastern San Francisco is so damned windy - the winds pop up regularly around 4 PM every day from the Spring through the Fall. The Croix de Candlestick was an award pin that was given out to baseball fans as they exited Candlestick Park at the conclusion of a night game that went extra innings. In reference to the ballpark's legendarily cold winds, the pin carried the motto, "Veni, Vidi, Vixi" ("I came, I saw, I survived").
 
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Also not a rumor, but this is one of my favorite sports stories.

When USC guard Gabe Pruitt went up to take his first free throws during the game, he was greeted by the Cal fans with a rousing chorus of "Vic-tor-ia! Vic-tor-ia!" and a phone number. Pruitt went on to miss both free throws. Now, you might be asking, who is Victoria and why would the Cal fans chant out her name? Well, it turns out that days before, members of the Cal Rally Committee IM'ed Pruitt and pretended to be a UCLA co-ed named Victoria. They even sent fake pictures of "Victoria." After going back and forth, the Cal students hooked, lined, and sinkered Gabe into thinking he was going to get the hook up after the game and so he gave "Victoria" his phone number and, well, that's how he found his phone number not only chanted back at him, but held up on signs during the game.

Here's the entire account:

www.yahoo.com

The inside story of Cal's legendary catfishing prank, 10 years later

How a Cal student duped USC's Gabe Pruitt into thinking he had a postgame date with a girl who did not exist.
www.yahoo.com www.yahoo.com
 
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Plum Street said:
Thought this could be a fun summer topic. Sports based stories or rumors we have heard over the years that may very well be true .

First up the Kevin Costner and Cal Ripken jr. spat . As rumor had it , Costner was having an affair with Ripken’s wife . Ripken finds them and gets into a fight with Costner and is unable to play that night . The orioles then stage a fake power outage at Camden yards so Ripken’s consecutive game streak can continue the next day.

What else ?
Click to expand...

Wow. Any truth to any of it?
 
batts said:
Cramer's DiMaggio Biography had a passage about when a very jealous Joe DiMaggio enlisted the assistance of Frank Sinatra to break into a hotel room where Jolten Joe thought Marilyn Monroe was having sex with another guy. Turns out that Frank and Joe broke into the wrong room where an astonished middle aged couple were sound asleep but awakened by two of the most famous celebrities in the world.
Click to expand...

Poor Joe, Frank was helping hide the Kennedy boys having their way with Marilyn.
 
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wheezer said:
A running back that RU had years ago, noted as being very fast, was caught in the locker room with another RU player.... the player did not play much after that
Click to expand...

Rutgers FB Anti-gay in this day and age? I don't believe that would happen - unless it was quite a while back.
 
Not a rumor, but a funny example of something going viral in the 1980s.

In the mid-1980s, Lawrence Taylor left a paystub somewhere (rumor was a cab) and it just got copied and physically distributed around. (A guy would get a copy and take it to work and people would make copies of that.) I think most of the adult males in northern NJ saw it.

While Lawrence Taylor's salary was public knowledge, the amount of the actual paystub was pretty eye popping.
 
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Plum Street said:
In 2001, Rutgers related there was an equipment manager or something that was a holdover from the Shea years that schiano inherited . One of the receivers wanted new gloves and the guy said something like “it doesn’t matter what kind of gloves you wear, you will still drop passes.”
Schiano then promptly reassigned this guy to the college ave gym or fired him as part of changing the culture . Anyone else hear this ?
Click to expand...
An equipment manager was selling the gear of Rutgers players as a side hustle. He would switch out their gear for cheaper versions. He was caught and fired.
 
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applesktrack said:
My favorite is a scout got lost while looking for a certain recruit asked a local farmer plowing his field for directions. The farmer picks the plow up and uses it to point the direction of the recruit. The scout immediately signed the farmer and forgets about the other recruit. That farmer was Bronco Nagurski
Click to expand...
He turned out pretty good for a farmer.
 
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The immaculate reception. 70s steelers raiders playoff game Terry Bradshaw throws a pass, hits of Frenchie Fuqua bounces backwards with Franco Harris catching the deflection and running down the sidelines to score a touchdown near the end of the game and steelers win. The officials new the play was illegal and went over to head of security and informed them if we throw and a flag and call back the touchdown these fans are going to kill us. How many security guards or cops can you get us to exit the field and stadium? The person in charge said 6. The officials said 6 cops, well 6 points for Pittsburgh. No flag thrown and steelers win and I believe go on to win superbowl. Replay takes it out of onsite officials and call would have been overturned.
 
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rujheyl said:
The immaculate reception. 70s steelers raiders playoff game Terry Bradshaw throws a pass, hits of Frenchie Fuqua bounces backwards with Franco Harris catching the deflection and running down the sidelines to score a touchdown near the end of the game and steelers win. The officials new the play was illegal and went over to head of security and informed them if we throw and a flag and call back the touchdown these fans are going to kill us. How many security guards or cops can you get us to exit the field and stadium? The person in charge said 6. The officials said 6 cops, well 6 points for Pittsburgh. No flag thrown and steelers win and I believe go on to win superbowl. Replay takes it out of onsite officials and call would have been overturned.
Click to expand...

What was illegal about the play?
 
John Daly won pga championship and was so hammered he didn't remember a single shot or winning it.
 
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