Sports Facts

Former basketball great Will Perdue of the Chicago Bulls wears a size 22EEEEEEE shoe.

One baseball statistician has noted that at one point in August 1971, the Pittsburgh Pirates became the first professional team to field nine players who were either black or Latino. Coincidentally, this was the same year that they won the World Series.

In 1904, May Sutton Brandy became the first American woman to win the ladies singles championship at Wimbledon.

The first professional football team to sport an insignia on their helmets was the Los Angeles Rams in 1950, who hand painted yellow horns on their blue, leather helmets.

A copy of Basketball Digest costs $7.50 in Antigua.

Lou Boudreau of the Cleveland Indians once blew a game when he blew his nose, forgetting that the "steal" sign was putting a towel to his face.

In 1897, the Washington Senators became the first baseball team ever to introduce "Ladies' Day."

In 1917, Lucy Slowe became the first black woman tennis champion in the United States after winning the women's singles title at a tournament in Baltimore.

Referees of the American Football League wore uniforms of red and white stripes.

Florence Griffith-Joyner, once an employee relations worker for Anheuser-Busch, ran 10.49 in the second heat of the 100-meter dash at the 1988 Olympics, breaking the pre-existing record of 10.76.

Karim Abdul Jabar collects rugs.

According to a study at Florida State University, people spend more money on refreshments at tractor pulls than they do at football games.

Duluth used to have an NFL team. They were called the Eskimos.

If you did the Peppermint Twist after scoring a touchdown in professional football, depending on the referee, your team could be hit with a 15 yard penalty.

Soldier Field is the oldest field in the NFL.

A scrum is rugby's equivalent of a hockey face-off, except that it involves all those playing the position of forward on both teams.

The first Japanese baseball team to play in the U.S. was in 1905.

The Brooklyn Dodgers (who later became the Los Angeles Dodgers) did not get their name because of their sporting ability. The term "dodger" was a shortened form of "trolley dodgers," which was first used to describe Brooklynites for their ability to avoid being hit by trolley cars.

In the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles, Joan Benoit won the first Olympic marathon for women.

According to Time magazine, Super Bowl Sunday is the second largest avocado eating day of the year in the United States. The first largest day is Cinco De Mayo.

There's no firm evidence that golf started in Scotland.

Gertrude Ederle became America's first women superstar swimmer on Aug. 6, 1926, when she successfully crossed the English Channel. The first woman and only the sixth person to swim the Channel, she also set a new time record: 14 hours 31 minutes.

Former Boston Celtics player Tony Lavelli used to play his accordion at half time.

In her time, Mildred Ella "Babe" Didrikson, born in Port Arthur, Texas in 1911, was second perhaps to only Jim Thorpe as an all-around athlete. In 1930, an era when men's basketball teams averaged 25 points per game, she averaged 42 points per game and led Employers Casualty to the 1930 Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) women's championship.

Al "Grandpa Munster" Lewis used to be a college basketball recruiter.

The first woman jockey was Alicia Meynell of England. Her first race, which lasted four miles, was against Captain William Flint on Aug. 25, 1804. The outcome of the race is unknown.

All umpires wear black underwear.

The first women's bicycling marathon took place on January 6-11, 1896 at Madison Square Garden in New York. Frankie Nelson won the race after travelling 418 miles.

According to one source, late baseball great Billy Martin had 21 fights.

During the player introductions before the 7th game of the 1992 National League playoffs, Jose "Chico" Lind of the Pittsburgh Pirates said something that sounded like "the chicken runs at midnight."

Patricia McCormick became America's first woman bullfighter when she entered the arena in Cuidad Juarez, Mexico on Jan. 20, 1957.

According to one baseball statistician, players with brown eyes are better hitters than those with blue eyes. Darker eyes make it easier for them to spot the baseball (a white object) despite glare from the sun.

Ex-dictator Idi Amin was heavy weight boxing champ of Uganda for nine years.

Fishing licenses in Colorado would be rounded off to the nearest dollar except the state adds on an extra 25 cents to help fund search and rescue missions.

On March 16, 1876, Nell Saunders defeated Rose Harland in the first U.S. women's boxing match.

In 1903, driving his famous "999" built by Henry Ford, Berner Eli ("Barney") Oldfield became the first man to achieve 60 miles per hour, a speed many doctors of the day claimed would cause deafness.

The L.A. Lakers are really popular in the Bahamas.

Dock Ellis of the Pittsburgh Pirates claimed to have been on LSD when he pitched his no-hitter against the San Diego Padres in 1970. The only known documentation of that fact in a pop song is by L.A. musician Darius, who included it in "There is No Cure."

Bo Jackson has killed pigs several times.

Roman Gabriel once played the bit part of a cannibal on Gilligan's Island.
Mr. Smarty Pants gets his information from books, magazines, newspapers,
the internet, radio, and television. He also includes facts he has overheard at parties.
 All contents--Copyright 2008 Smarty Pants Productions