Columnist Ron Kantowski: Racer critical after facing primal rage

Wednesday, March 9, 2005 | 9:02 a.m.

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

As a longtime competitor on the NASCAR Winston West circuit, St. James Davis courted danger virtually every weekend, but nearly always managed to avoid it. At 62, he was just settling into a life of leisure away from the track.

Then last week he was maimed by chimpanzees.

Davis, who had three top-10 finishes in 136 starts in various NASCAR touring series and last raced at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in 1998, was visiting the chimp that he and his wife LaDonna had raised like a child. Somehow, two other monkeys escaped from their cages and attacked the couple at an animal sanctuary near Bakersfield, Calif.

LaDonna McClain had her thumb bitten off. Her husband fared much worse. St. James Davis lost all of his fingers, part of his nose, cheek, lips and part of his buttocks. One of his feet was mutilated and his genitals were mauled. He remains hospitalized in critical condition.

"I had no idea a chimpanzee was capable of doing that to a human," a stunned paramedic who was first on the scene told the Los Angeles Times.

The Jameses were attacked after presenting Moe, the chimp they had raised in their West Covina, Calif., home, with a cake on his 39th birthday. An expert on chimpanzee behavior said the monkeys that attacked Davis and his wife may have been jealous of the attention being shown to Moe.

Aggressive behavior in chimpanzees is fairly common. Moe was taken from the Davis home in 1999 after biting off part of a woman's finger.

Before that, Moe was quite the celebrity. St. James Davis even taught the chimp how to drive a go-kart, but apparently not how to stop it. When Moe was through driving, he would jump off the cart and it would careen around the back yard until it crashed.

Apparently, Moe was quite the athletic chimp, as he also appeared on "Bowling for Dollars," according to a report on the Racing West Web site.

On a lighter note, there was a time when primates and NASCAR drivers used to get along famously.

Tim Flock, one of the early legends of stock car racing and a member of the International Motorsports Hall of Fame, once used a monkey as a co-driver. Nicknamed Jocko Flocko, the monkey rode shotgun with Flock for eight races before he got loose and began choking Flock, forcing an unscheduled pitstop.

After Jocko died and children asked about him, Flock explained that he had to let the monkey go because he couldn't sign autographs.

Judging by the final two minutes of Friday's Gladiators game, it would appear that I'm not the only one who doesn't understand the nuances of the Arena Football League.

Neither, it would appear, does Ron James, which would be fine and dandy were he not the Las Vegas coach.

Actually, James' bonehead decision in the Gladiators' 42-41 loss to the Austin Kutchers had nothing to do with kicking the ball off a net or any of the other rules quirks inherent to the AFL. Ahead 40-35 inside of two minutes to play, James elected to kick an extra point instead of go for two after the Gladiators' final touchdown.

Obviously, math wasn't one of his better subjects.

My advice to James is to get one of those little "When to Go for 2" cards that Pop Warner coaches carry in their billfold next to their Blockbuster card.

It has been 17 years since auto racing promoter and pioneer Mickey Thompson and his wife Trudy were gunned down in their driveway by assailants, and the case still hasn't been solved. But at least a resolution seems possible as a judge in Pasadena, Calif., has declined to dismiss charges against the man charged with the double murder, Thompson's former business partner Michael Frank Goodwin.

I'm sure Thompson's son would be pleased. I remember having a conservation with Danny Thompson, a driver for the factory Chevrolet team in the stadium off-road series his father founded that used to attract capacity crowds to Sam Boyd Stadium, and how frustrated he was that the authorities seemed reluctant to follow leads that pointed to Goodwin.

I guess justice is sort of like off-road racing at Baja. Sometimes it takes a while but it's always better late than never.

Other than a few complaints about the price of a hotel room from the fans up north, who apparently were expecting room service at Motel 6 prices, the state basketball tournament made a triumphant return to Las Vegas after a 16-year hiatus from Southern Nevada, at least according to its potential biennial landlord.

"It totally exceeded my expectations," said Orleans Arena director Steve Stallworth, noting a near capacity crowd of more than 6,000 fans who turned out to watch Bishop Gorman knock off Palo Verde in the marquee game, the boys' 4A championship. "We absolutely would like to have them come back in two years."

Stallworth said he hasn't spoken with NIAA chief Dr. Jerry Hughes since the portable floor at the Orleans was disassembled into a few more pieces than usual (chips of hardwood kept breaking off and had to be taped back into place) but added that the Orleans would be delighted to join Lawlor Events Center in Reno in the tournament rotation.

"The only negatives were the room issues about the price ($109) and availability," Stallworth said. "We'll talk to our sales guys and see if we can figure out a way to hold some rooms next time."

Some of that criticism about availability and price gouging seem a little unwarranted, because I still would like to know what fans pay for a room at Lawlor. The last time anybody went to sleep there was when Nick Fazekas let his man get behind him for a dunk.

No word yet on whether anybody was upset with the Orleans for failing to reserve bowling lanes for its basketball guests.

The Mountain West's decision to invite TCU to its little party beginning next year will certainly improve the league's thin profile in women's basketball, if that matters to anybody around here.

The Horned Frogs made their final Conference USA appearance a memorable one, defeating Louisville 60-41 in Saturday's tournament championship game and No. 11 DePaul on the way to it to earning an automatic bid to the NCAA tournament.

Luckily for Lady Rebels coach Regina Miller and her MWC siblings, TCU's Sandora Irvin, the Queen of Rejection -- and I mean that in a good way -- is a senior.

Irvin, the niece of former Dallas Cowboys star Michael Irvin, set an NCAA record earlier this season when she blocked 16 shots against UAB. She also is the NCAA career leader in that category.

Note to Claudine Grant, the new weekend sports anchor on Channel 5: It's Wake Forest, not Forest Wake. During her report, the bubble-headed bleach blonde who comes on at five -- actually, Grant has dark hair -- referred to the Deacon Demons -- er, Demon Deacons -- as "Forest Wake."

Of course, everybody knows that Forest Wake was the guy played by Tom Hanks in the movies who ran onto the field and scored a touchdown for Alabama.

If I could give the new kid another bit of constructive criticism, it's that basketball players, unlike rock stars, have two names. While it's OK to say Prince and Sting are appearing at Kool-Aid, where they will be joined on stage by The Edge and Flea, you can't just say "Smith makes a pass to Phillips, who scores on the dunk."

Eleven of the nation's top 15-ranked college golf teams -- including No. 1 Oklahoma State, No. 2 Georgia Tech, No. 3 Georgia, No. 4 New Mexico and No. 5 Forest Wake -- er, Wake Forest -- will join the 18th-rated UNLV men's squad at the Southern Highlands Collegiate Championship here Friday-Sunday.

Too bad there are two NASCAR races in town this weekend and a conference basketball tournament on television.

While I am among those who believe these latest academic reforms being foisted upon the NCAA football and basketball coaches are as flawed as the last bunch, at least one football coach believes they could wind up spawning even more corruption.

"The way these rules are designed right now, they are pushing us to force kids to stay (in school) even if they're homesick or unhappy," New Mexico coach Rocky Long said about a system that, in a nutshell, will take away scholarships from schools who don't keep players in school or witness their graduation ceremony.

"They're opening themselves up to a lot of cheating, if you ask me."

Part of the problem is the NCAA hasn't firmly established the guidelines or sanctions, but is already threatening schools whose athlete-students fall below an agreed upon (by the presidents, at least) score.

"That isn't fair," Long told the Albuquerque Tribune. "I think it can be a good system, but they need to take one or two years to develop the system and make sure everyone understands it."

Judging by those comments, it can be assumed that Long is either smarter than the average college president or is planning to become the Dolphins defensive coordinator by 2007.

With a major league baseball-high seven selections on Baseball America's 16th annual Top 100 prospects list, it would appear the future is bright for the Los Angeles Dodgers and 51s right here in Las Vegas, where many of these phenoms in waiting will hopefully learn how to hit the cutoff man.

Of course, any enthusiasm for these young boys of summer should be tempered by the fact that Edwin Jackson is still No. 30 on the list.

Last year, he was No. 3, and supposedly was going to be the biggest thing since Big League Chew. That was before Jackson spent his summer in Las Vegas getting lit up like Foster Brooks before a Dean Martin roast.

The news release out of L.A. mentions Jackson's 6-4 record in 19 starts for the 51s, but conveniently leaves out his NASA-like 5.86 earned-run average.

The highest-rated Dodgers prospect on the list at No. 5 is 20-year-old shortstop Joel Guzman. Others to watch for (or ridicule next year at this time) are right-handed pitcher Chad Billingsley (19th), first baseman James Loney (62nd), third baseman Andy LaRoche (74th) catcher Russell Martin (89th) and left-handed pitcher Greg Miller (100th).

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