THE ELEVATOR

Wednesday, May 3, 2006 | 7:41 a.m.

GOING UP

Doug Mirabelli

Only in America could a backup catcher who is hitting .182 with zero RBIs receive a welcome that was fit for a head of state. On the same day he was traded by the Padres back to the Red Sox on Monday, the Valley High School product was whisked from Logan Airport to Fenway Park in just 25 minutes, in a limousine accompanied by a police escort - all because he is the only man walking the planet who can catch Tim Wakefield's knuckleball on the fly. "Now that's what I call good use of our tax dollars," wrote the Boston Globe's Bob Ryan. "In Houston or Kansas City, he would have been lucky to get to the park by the fifth inning."

Chad Billingsley

Having his name in this space is getting to be a regular thing for the hard-throwing 51s right-hander, who followed up five shutout innings against Sacramento with eight more against Colorado Springs on Friday in which he took a no-hitter into the eighth inning. As I've said before, catch him while you can, at Cashman Field where general admission is only $7.

Craig Whelihan

If you're going to be out at 5 a.m., you might as well make yourself useful. The Gladiators' quarterback recorded his career highlight Sunday morning when he reached inside a car, seconds before it burst into flames, to free a woman who had crashed outside a fast-food restaurant where Whelihan was dining with a friend. Sort of puts that loss to the Utah Blaze in perspective, doesn't it?

GOING DOWN

Home-ice advantage

If the Wranglers and Alaska Aces - or for that matter, the Wranglers and the Idaho Steelheads - knew that the team that plays at home is supposed to win in the postseason, you might be able figure out what is going to happen next in the ECHL playoffs without using Nostradamus' Ouija board.

John Daly

The PGA golfer and frequent Las Vegas visitor said he plans to cure a gambling problem that has seen him lose roughly $50 million (by his count) by switching to $25 slots and setting a "walkout loss number." But if he makes a little bit, "then maybe I move up to the $100 slots or the $500 slots, or maybe I take it to the blackjack table," Daly writes in his new autobiography. "It's their money, why not give it a shot?" Heck, I'd say he's practically cured.

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