Posted on Sat, May. 10, 2008

Noting the sports world:

• Earlier this week, I was pumping gas. I still had a quarter-tank when I started and yet the numbers soon blinked past $50. That was irritating. You know the feeling. But then I forgot about the annoyance when I saw the exact amount registered on the pump when it cut off automatically: $51.51.

That reminded me of Sam Mills, the former Panthers linebacker and assistant coach who wore No. 51 as a player here and remains the only Carolina player enshrined in the team's Hall of Honor. It has now been three years since Mills passed away at age 45 because of cancer. Sam would have loved watching Jon Beason play.

• Speaking of jersey numbers, do certain ones always remind you of certain athletes when you see the numbers pop up in a real-life situation? I think of Roger Staubach when I see 12, Jake Delhomme when I see 17 and Steve Smith when I see 89. E-mail me with your examples of this happening in the real world -- the more specific, the better. I'll publish some of the best.

• I'm sorry to see Bernie Bickerstaff, the former coach and general manager of the Charlotte Bobcats, leave the organization. Bickerstaff was classy, smart and honest. He knew his team was undermanned in the three seasons he coached the Bobcats, but he certainly coaxed more effort out of his players than Sam Vincent did.

Bickerstaff also had a gift for extreme analogies. Asked once about a substitution in which he took out one underqualified Bobcat and put in another equally underqualified one, Bickerstaff said of himself: "They say a drowning man will grab a razor blade."

• I hope the NFL's "Spygate" saga has a little more juice left in it. I still don't think the Patriots were punished enough for their illegal videotaping of opposing coaches' sideline signals.

Former Patriots video assistant Matt Walsh is scheduled to meet with NFL officials Tuesday to talk about the eight videotapes he has handed over to the league. The tapes apparently show the systematic way the Patriots abused the league's videotaping rules for years (Walsh, now a whistle-blower, was once part of the taping).

From media reports, it appears there is no "smoking gun" in the Walsh tapes. But despite some opinions to the contrary, I think they should be enough to make the Patriots forfeit another high draft pick in 2009.

• LeBron James is 8-for-42 in two playoff games against the Boston Celtics entering Game 3 of the Cleveland-Boston series tonight. Meanwhile, a 78-year-old legally blind man from northwest Iowa bowled a perfect game a week ago. This guy could give LeBron some advice.

• Get your boiled peanuts here -- the big race at Darlington is tonight. I'm so glad NASCAR didn't yank its signature series out of Darlington entirely. When you go to that track, you feel the ghosts of NASCAR walking alongside you.