A Yankee Saved Him, He’s Paying Them Back

Apparently, it was the hand -- actually, the mouth -- of George Steinbrenner, propelling the Yankees to a 19-8 blowout over Tampa Bay.

That would be the easy way to view the Yankees’ victory Monday night, one day after Steinbrenner’s tirade over his highly paid team’s poor start.

Maybe, though, it also had something to do with the presence of youth sage Patrick McCarthy, the 8-year-old who was pulled out of the path of a truck last week in Boston by Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez.

On Tuesday, CNN’s “American Morning” played a clip of Monday’s visit to the studio by McCarthy and his father Joe.

“When I go there, the Yankees are gonna have a long winning streak,” Patrick said of his plan to watch the game in person.... “I think when I get there, the Yankees are gonna win lots and lots of games.”

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Trivia time: Where was the first “Monday Night Football” game on ABC played in 1970?

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Meddle men: Steinbrenner’s blast got the folks at AOL Sports thinking, and they offered this question for online readers: Who is sports’ most meddling owner?

Not surprisingly, the man in the news, Steinbrenner, led the way with 58% of the votes, followed by Jerry Jones, 19%; Mark Cuban, 12%, and Daniel Snyder, 11%. As of Monday night, there were 19,025 votes in the poll, of course, identified as unscientific.

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Double duo: Those names in tiny type on the results page represented an unprecedented doubles pairing in tennis: Andre Agassi and soon-to-be-inducted Hall of Famer Jim Courier.

Agassi and Courier practically grew up together in junior tennis, played each other 12 times on the pro tour, Courier winning seven times, but they had never combined in doubles in sanctioned action.

Courier came out of retirement to play doubles with Agassi in Houston on Monday night. Martin Garcia of Argentina and Luis Horna of Peru beat them, 6-2, 3-6, 6-1. As usual, though, Courier and Agassi had the best lines in the postmatch news conference.

“After the second set, if I was going to the betting window, I’d have bet on us,” Courier said.

Agassi had the last word, saying, “After the seventh game, the betting window closed.”

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Giving back: Before Monday’s game against the Lakers, his old team, Derek Fisher of the Golden State Warriors presented a check for $700,000 to the athletic director of his alma mater, the University of Arkansas Little Rock. Much of the donation will fund a youth program, “Fisher Fellows,” and the rest will go to the construction of an auxiliary gym.

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Next level: Former USC receiver Mike Williams is considered one of the top two players at his position available in the NFL draft Saturday.

What does Norm Chow, Williams’ offensive coordinator at USC who left the school this off-season to become the Tennessee Titans’ offensive boss, think of his pro chances? “I think he’ll be very successful,” Chow said. “He’s big. He’s strong. He’s talented. The college game was too easy for him. It really was.”

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Trivia answer: Cleveland Municipal Stadium. The original Browns defeated the New York Jets, 31-21.

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And finally: The Minnesota Timberwolves’ Kevin Garnett, on playoff elimination after Sunday’s loss to Seattle: “It isn’t the time to be pointing fingers.... It’s easy to point fingers and easy to jump the fence and go into someone else’s yard and play, but real people stand up tall and deal with what’s in front of them.”