Knight Before Christmas Is His Real Big Wish

The family always complains it doesn’t know what to get me for Christmas, telling me about wasting hours and hours in the local 99 Cents Store before giving up.

But there it was Monday, the ideal gift listed on Page D8 of The Times’ sports section: “Others who have shown interest in the USC [basketball] job include former Iowa State and Chicago Bull coach Tim Floyd ... and Texas Tech Coach Bob Knight.”

Bob The Bully! Tell me that wouldn’t be the perfect gift for someone who writes a Page 2 column. I’ve trained my whole life for something like this, spending ugly time with Jim McMahon, Kevin Brown and female tennis players.

I’m not complaining, of course. It’s already been a great week, what with Karl and Kobe going at it and now Shaq coming to town -- and from experience, you know his big round belly is going to be shaking like a bowl full of jelly.

The Dodgers have been very helpful, too, in hiring Paul DePodesta to keep the Kevin Malone/Dan Evans’ Page 2 tradition alive, but Knight is in a class by himself, and there’s no way you could skip a USC basketball game if he was on the sideline. (Right now, I skip them all.)

I was so excited at the chance of Knight’s coming, I agreed with Rick Majerus that a change at USC was long overdue. Given the chance to land Knight, I can’t believe Majerus was here as long as he was.

I went to Majerus’ farewell news conference, thanked him for the memories, ah, memory, and then bumped into Uncle Pete. I asked him how we looked in practice, and told him what a great Christmas it’d be if I got Knight.

“You might want to take a look at our sideline at the Orange Bowl,” Uncle Pete said. “I’ll just tell you this, Bob Knight is coming to the Orange Bowl.”

That probably explains why Knight had an interest in USC, but I’d like to think there’s still a chance Knight and Mike Garrett will be exchanging grumbling pleasantries on a regular basis.

Garrett and I, of course, go way back as buddies -- to three weeks ago when he was on the father-daughter radio show and told some jokes, and we laughed.

When I mentioned the newspaper report that Bob The Bully was interested in USC, Garrett playfully tapped me in the chest four times. Two or three weeks ago, before we had laughed at his jokes that really weren’t that funny, he might have slugged me in the chest, but that’s how far we’ve come.

“Wasn’t that the greatest?” Garrett said of the newspaper report. “I like Bobby Knight, I really do.”

I’ll stop taking days off if Knight comes to town, and so I asked whether there was any chance of hiring The Bully.

“I don’t know,” Garrett said, “but if we do, I’ll send him right to your office.”

Who would’ve thought that Garrett would have a better idea of what to get me for Christmas -- than anyone in my own family.

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BAD NEWS update. The inside chatter has USC hiring Floyd -- like anyone could care. Garrett said, “[Majerus] was our dream guy,” so why not dream on, and wait and see what shakes loose at the end of the season?

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I WENT to the Lakers’ game Monday night along with Renee Zellweger. (She was sitting only 20 feet away.) Zellweger colored her hair black and didn’t look very good. Compared with the Lakers, though, she looked great.

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RADIO HOST Dan Patrick recently asked self-proclaimed NBA expert Stephen A. Smith -- and I apologize because that should’ve been the signal to turn off the radio -- what he expects when Kobe and Shaq meet Christmas Day.

Smith said, if the cameras aren’t there, he’d expect a physical altercation.

Bryant said, “I don’t think so. I don’t see something like that happening. I don’t know if Shaq will come out to center court for the captains’ meeting [with the officials], but when it comes to the jump, it’s a home game and I’ll go over and shake his hand. It’s the right thing to do, and I think he’ll do it.”

I predict we’ll see knuckles to knuckles (instead of knuckles to face).

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I’M TOLD Sam Roth was a basketball player back at NYU, which is hard to believe looking at his sons, Michael and Richard. But after getting to know Michael and Richard the last few years, and yet never getting the chance to meet Sam, who passed away recently, he must’ve been one special father.

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THE HOLLYWOOD PARK Jockeys Race For Kids’ final score: Page 2 Jockeys 34, Lyons The Loser 21, the Mattel Children’s Hospital at UCLA $3,000, St. Margaret’s Center $2,000.

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THE LOS ANGELES Angels got better with the signing of shortstop Orlando Cabrera, although fans will be upset with the loss of David Eckstein. Cabrera got four years and $32 million. THIRTY-TWO MILLION -- oxygen, please, for The Boston Parking Lot Attendant.

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BOB MIESZERSKI, The Times’ horse racing handicapper, finished second among newspaper pickers at the year’s first meet in Southern California, which should have been cause for celebration and investigation. But then Misery went on to claim first place in the final four meets, which tells you how bad the other newspaper handicappers must be.

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HOWARD STERN, speaking through a translator on his radio show to Miss Universe, who is from Russia, asked if she would consider spending some intimate time with Shaq. She replied, “Who is this [Shaq]?”

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TODAY’S LAST word comes in e-mail from Mike Atkins:

“You just made the San Diego most-wanted list along with the Mannings.”

I’m not surprised. San Diego could use better columnists and quarterbacks.

T.J. Simers can be reached at [email protected]. To read previous columns by Simers, go to latimes.com/simers.