ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, July 22, 1996 TAG: 9607220164
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-4 EDITION: METRO
COLUMN: OLYMPIC NOTES
DATELINE: ATLANTA
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK STAFF WRITER
The kind of things you learn at an Olympiad:
The inaugural Olympics softball venue, Golden Park in Columbus, is an old baseball park made new by Olympic construction and required renovations by the same Professional Baseball Agreement that pushed a new park in Salem.
Since Golden Park opened on the site in 1926, many major-league greats have played on the site along the Chattahoochie River. One of them was New York Yankees Hall of Famer Johnny Mize.
So it was kind of neat Sunday when in the first Olympic women's softball game, Lisa Mize came in to pitch for Puerto Rico against the victorious United States. The younger Mize is a U.S. citizen, San Diego native, San Jose resident and Fresno State graduate - and a cousin of the former Yankee great, whose name is listed among the former stars on the Golden Park wall.
One difference. Lisa Mize pronounces her surname the Spanish way - Mee-zay. Different generation, different pronunciation.
CAN'T TOP ALI: Whatever happens in the remaining 14 days of the Atlanta Games, it's going to be difficult to top the stunner of Opening Ceremonies, when Muhammad Ali lit the Olympic cauldron by wire.
It was the idea of Billy Payne, chief of the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games (ACOG). And, it was a great one.
On Sunday, Olympic visitors were still talking about the appearance, which surprised even President Clinton, and brought many tears, including one Olympic champion boxer, who as a kid watched the then-Cassius Clay.
Atlanta resident and former heavyweight champion Evander Holyfield said Ali's hush-hush assignment made him cry.
``And I'm not a very emotional person,'' Holyfield said after the ceremony. ``I don't think there could have been a better candidate. What a great time, at this point in his life, to be rewarded like that.''
Ali's appearance, particularly in Olympic venue only several blocks from the home of the late Rev.Martin Luther King, was even more striking when other history is recalled.
After his own Olympic triumph in Rome in 1960, the boxer returned to the U.S. and threw his light heavyweight gold medal into the Ohio River in his hometown of Louisville, Ky., in protest of racial discrimination.
MUSICAL CHAIRS: The choice of music at some venues has been interesting. After the first round of the women's 10-meter air rifle competition Saturday at Wolf Creek Shooting Complex, the public-address system began blaring, ``I Shot the Sheriff.''
FOOD FIRE: The heat index exceeded 100 at the softball venue in Columbus on Sunday, but that isn't the only place it's been hot at the Atlanta Games.
On Friday, three Atlanta firemen rushed past the working media on the third floor of the Main Press Center in downtown Atlanta, and four fire trucks appeared outside.
It was only a doughnut burning in a microwave at the media snack bar.
* The much-heralded Info '96 computer system, provided by IBM for the Games, already has lost about half of its stored information, only two days into the Games.
On Sunday, you couldn't call up Saturday's basketball scores, many athletes biographies were suddenly missing and hours after some events, the results that are supposed to be available within minutes weren't compiled for hours.
* For the second straight day Sunday, the Georgia Tech Aquatics Center was packed for swimming. Media members had to stand, or sit in a cramped sub-press center where they couldn't see the pool.
Even the swimmers themselves can't find a place to sit when they're not in the water. The American's 57-member delegation got only 33 seats.
* U.S. heavyweight wrestler Mark Henry couldn't show for his scheduled news conference Saturday, after weighing in at 414 pounds for the Games a few days ago.
Henry's excuse. He said his feet were tired and sore after marching in the Opening Ceremonies.
* If you're flying to the Atlanta Games, you might want to get out of town early on your return home. Hartsfield International Airport officials say 253,000 passengers will go through the world's busiest airport on Aug.5, the day after the closing ceremonies.
The record for the Atlanta airport is 250,000 for the 1994 Super Bowl. There's a huge difference for the Olympics. Hartsfield has 18 security points. It had only eight for the NFL title game.
LENGTH: Medium: 81 linesby CNB