Columnist Ron Kantowski: Football still best when played outdoors

Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2003 | 10:10 a.m.

Ron Kantowski's insider notes column appears Tuesday and his Page One column appears Thursday. He can be reached at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

For the second time in eight years, I threw my hat into the Arena Sunday.

It must have fallen over the eyes of the head linesman, who missed all those obvious offsides infractions.

Other than Arena Football being marginally more accepted by the sporting public and having some games shown on NBC, not a whole lot has changed since the Las Vegas Sting folded after two seasons in the mid-1990s, ultimately to be replaced by the Las Vegas (nee: New Jersey) Gladiators.

To me, football in a hockey rink is kind of like Marcel Marceau on CD -- it just doesn't translate.

I'm sure there are some nuances I don't understand, but in Arena football, speed seems irrelevant. So does strategy. And there's simply not enough room for the players to maneuver. I kept waiting for Gladiators quarterback Jay McDonagh to tell the Los Angeles Avengers (who were playing without Diana Rigg) to "spread out," like Moe used to tell Larry and Curly.

Call me the Fourth Stooge, but I still think football indoors is best placed by pre-pubescent boys when their parents aren't at home.

That said, take my advice. If your mom has a curio cabinet, a football made of Nerf is preferred over one of those miniature ones with the hard plastic coating -- especially when your intended receiver zigs at the Ottoman instead of zags at the floor lamp.

It isn't exactly like Jack Nicholson or Harrison Ford sitting courtside at the Lakers, but Arena Football at Staples Center also has been known to attract a celebrity fan or two.

Seated among the announced franchise record crowd of 14,827 at Sunday's Gladiators-Avengers game was none other than Melissa Rivers.

And come to the think of it, I wasn't all that impressed by what she was wearing.

NASCAR champion Tony Stewart didn't punch any photographers during last week's Winston Cup test session at Las Vegas Motor Speedway, as he did after last year's Brickyard 500 at Indianapolis.

But according to sources, the NASCAR bad boy and reigning Winston Cup champion did get in the face of at least two LVMS officials and a third in the credential office for allowing too many people to look into his garage from a distance.

True, there were more fans than working media sporting official access wristbands in the paddock. But the ones I saw were respectful of Stewart's space and thus tried to stay out of it.

While I find Stewart's willingness to tell it like it is -- or at least the way he thinks it should be -- refreshing in this politically correct era, it's possible to be controversial without being confrontational.

One of these days, I'm sure Stewart will figure it out. But he still flashes Mad more often than Alfred E. Neumann, and so we've got an office pool going regarding his next meltdown.

Unfortunately, I drew Atlanta -- the fourth race of the season. If Stewart gets through Speedweeks at Daytona without stripping somebody's gears, I'll be amazed.

Mike Tyson took some abuse from the local press because he had the "audacity" to confuse actress Meg Ryan with actress Melanie Griffith when the former showed up at Golden Gloves Gym last week to take his picture.

Hey, since Meg straightened her hair, I have trouble telling her and Mel apart -- and I'm sure I go to a lot more irrelevant movies than Tyson does.

Instead, Tyson deserves credit for knowing that Tippi "The Birds" Hedren is Griffith's mother, and that she is involved in an animal rescue fund, as Iron Mike noted in an attempt to impress Ryan, thinking that she was Griffith.

I'll wager that nobody else in the gym knew that. Because if they had, they could have gently nudged the ex-champ and spared him the embarrassment he didn't deserve.

Every time I read a story about how an injured Tiger Woods is going to impact this tournament or that tournament by his absence, I remember what Las Vegas Invitational director Charlie Baron told me when I asked the same question a few years ago:

"Ron, I've got news for you. Ben Hogan isn't coming, either."

If you're a struggling musician having trouble settling on a name for your rock band, don't call Casey Kasem. Instead, visit your local fly fishing job, because they're loaded with them.

According to Barb Henderson's hunting and fishing column that appeared in last Friday's Sun, some of the more popular flies include Wooly Bugger, Hare's Ear Nymph, Turks Tarantulas, Henryville Special, Royal Humpy, Trico Spinner and Body Scuds, who I believed opened for Billy Idol at the Cow Palace in '85.

AROUND THE HORN: Because of a previous concert booking, the Las Vegas Gladiators were forced to move their Arena Football home opener from Sunday afternoon Feb. 16 to Monday evening Feb. 17. So it'll be Phish on Sunday and Phumble (judging from the Gladiators' turnover-plagued fourth quarter in a 60-48 season-opening loss at Los Angeles) on Monday. ... Two things I wish I could take back: that Barry Manilow boxed set I bought on sale at Best Buy and a prediction I made in this space three weeks ago, that the Rebels would not only win the Mountain West Conference regular-season championship, but would easily qualify for the NCAA Tournament. ... And finally, prep basketball phenom LeBron James is tooling around town in a $50,000 hummer with a Liberace starter set around his neck, yet he winds up getting busted for wearing a throwback Wes Unseld jersey ? Isn't that sort of like Al Capone getting nailed for income-tax evasion?