When she won earlier this season in Japan, Danica Patrick made sure any comparisons made between her and Anna Kournikova were mute. Like Kournikova, the beautiful Russian tennis player, Patrick has model-like looks. Until she won an IndyCar race on the other side of the world, Patrick was the racing equivalent of Kournikova — all sizzle, no steak.

Because of her win in Japan, Patrick entered last weekend’s Indianapolis 500 as a legitimate threat to win the race. On lap 171, those dreams came to end when Australian Ryan Briscoe wrecked her out of the race during an incident on Pit Road.

As you can see from the photo at the left, Patrick was none too pleased with the situation. She went as far as walking down to Briscoe’s pit stall to confront him about the accident. Fortunately, Indy security got to her before she got to Briscoe. The last thing the world needed to see was Patrick slapping Briscoe and Briscoe fighting back or standing there and taking it.

The IRL bosses need to talk to Patrick and tell her to keep her anger in check. She can’t go slugging everyone who wrecks her out of the race because the men on the circuit can’t fight back. (Now, if it was Patrick and Milka Duno going toe-to-toe, the IRL may be able to sell some pay-per-views for that battle, especially if you had Vince McMahon promote it.)

Still, for acting like a spoiled little brat at "The Greatest Spectacle in Racing," Patrick deserves this week’s Slap honor.

Here is this week’s batch of grades. You can here these live (when I actually show up) on WGEM SportsCenter presented by Hardee’s at 7:15 a.m. on Wednesday on ESPN 1440.

A — Brian Morrell. Any time a local boy does well, you have to like it. Especially if that local boy is helping your alma mater reach the NCAA Tournament. For the second time in a decade, a Quincy kid has helped Eastern Illinois University’s baseball team reach the NCAAs. In 1999, it was current QND baseball coach Chris Martin who helped the Panthers to the NCAAs. This year, Morrell, a former QND pitcher, helped the Panthers win the Ohio Valley Conference Tournament crown by earning a win and a save as the Panthers (27-28) went 4-0 in the event.

B — The PGA Tour’s other stars. When Tiger Woods finally gets done with his therapy from his most recent knee surgery, he may find it tougher than he expected. Several stars have taken advantage of his absence from the PGA Tour. Sergio Garcia and Phil Mickelson have won in recent weeks while Tiger’s been away. It could lead to an interesting Father’s Day weekend at Torrey Pines. (I’ll still take Tiger.)

C — The youth movement in the Western Big Six Conference. If Quincy High School boys basketball coach Sean Taylor already didn’t feel old, he will when he meets up with three of the new coaches in the WB6 next winter. The three vacancies in the league were filled by coaches all under the age of 33. Galesburg tabbed Mike Reynolds, 32, last month. On Tuesday night, East Moline tabbed former star Marc Polite, 30, as its new coach, while Moline turned to Galesburg’s Ryan Webber, 28, as its new coach.

D — Joakim Noah. Considering what Dallas’ Josh Howard had to say a few weeks back about a lot of NBA players smoking a little Mary Jane during the off-season, it shouldn’t come as any surprise that Noah was busted for having marijuana over the weekend in Gainesville, Fla. Noah also earned a couple of traffic citations  — driving on a suspended license and failure to wear a seat belt — during the return to his alma mater. How dumb can you be?

F — Sid the Kid and the Pittsburgh Penguins. If the Stanley Cup finals were supposed to be Sidney Crosby’s coming out party, he didn’t get the memo. In the first two games of the series in Hockeytown USA (or Detroit for you non-hockey fans), the Pens were shut down by the Wings. Detroit outscored Pittsburgh 7-0 in taking a 2-0 series lead. The series shifts back to Pittsburgh tonight. Maybe Crosby was saving his best for the NBC cameras, which will carry the rest of the series.

I — In news only Josh Houchins could love, professional tennis player Ashley Harkleroad has posed for Playboy and will be in the August issue. She’s not Anna Kournikova (well, Harkleroad is like Kournikova in one respect because she’s never won anything, but she’s not like Kournikova in respect to what Playboy is all about). Still, she should get some publicity for this stunt. I’m sure we’ll see more athletes go the Playboy route. Can’t really blame them if the money is good. She’s made just under $80,000 this year. I’m guessing she got more than that from Hef.

I’ll give John Paxson a little bit of credit. The Bulls’ general manager knew he didn’t need to be in attendance on Tuesday night when the NBA held its draft lottery. With a coach to hire and all of a 1.7 percent chance of landing the top pick, Paxson has bigger fish to fry.

But did he have to send this guy?

That guy to the left is Steve Schanwald, the Bulls’ vice president of business operations. The Nets had Jay-Z there to represent them and the Miami Heat had Dwyane Wade. The Timberwolves had "The Mayor," Fred Hoiberg, and some sappy teddy bear in the house. The Kings sent a fan to sit in their spot.

I would have rather seen Kayne West or some type of Bulls super-fan than the super dork sitting in front of the ESPN cameras. All Schanwald was missing was some tape on his glasses, a pocket protector and the Lamba Lamba Lamda pledge pin.

"I thought it was a waste of time," Schanwald said of his trip to New Jersey for the draft lottery. "I was just hoping to have a good meal."

At that point, someone should have shoved a porterhouse into his pie hole. I can only imagine how he earned the trip.

Jerry Reinsdorf: "Hey, Pax. Who are we sending to the draft lottery?"

Pax: "Just send that guy. Who really cares who is there?"

In a matter of minutes on Tuesday, Schanwald became some ordinary dork in a suit to a dork in a suit getting interviewed on national TV about who the Bulls will take with the first pick. Keep in mind, this guy knows about as much about basketball operations as I do press operations. I may work in the same building, but that doesn’t mean I know how it’s done.

Instead, Schanwald plugged the Bulls’ ticket number. He then went on to pose for photos with a dorky smile.

Slap of the week, without a doubt.

Going into Tuesday’s NBA draft lottery the Chicago Bulls had a 1.7 percent chance of landing the No. 1 pick — roughly the same chance of Roger Clemens and Brian McNamee kissing and making up after all of that steroid talk.

Yet, the Bulls were the lucky ones and left the beautiful NBA studios in Secaucus, N.J., with the decision of picking between dynamic point guard Derrick Rose of Memphis and Kansas State power forward Michael Beasley. This pick is a no-brainer.

The Bulls MUST select Rose.

Yes, he’s a Chicago kid and that helps, but that shouldn’t be the overriding factor for their choice. (Remember the last time the Bulls picked a hometown kid? It didn’t work out very well. Or have you forgotten about the blob that was Eddy Curry?)

They should pick Rose because he’s the point guard that can help the team return to its near 50-win level it showed in the 2006-07 season when it pushed Detroit in the second round of the conference playoffs. Rose can dish, shoot and defend. He’s a strong character kid, making it out of the inner city after leading Simeon to two state titles. He was the driving force for Memphis during its Final Four run in March.

Beasley isn’t a bad option, but his past worries me. The kid went to six high schools in five states. He’s not exactly a picture of stability.

If I was John Paxson, here’s my game plan:

1. Sign Avery Johnson as  your coach immediately. His playoff track record as a coach isn’t the best, which is why he’s looking for a job, but he’s the type of coach the players could rally around. He’s been in their shoes.

2. Start trimming the fat off of your roster. Chris Duhon, who was in the doghouse big-time by the end of the season, and Shannon Brown and Demetris Nichols, whom the Bulls got in trade from Cleveland, are all free agents and won’t be back.

3. With Rose coming in, that means Kirk Hinrich or Ben Gordon has to go. Since Hinrich can play the point and shooting guard, he stays and the Bulls ship Gordon off in a sign-and-trade for some more post help or future considerations. It doesn’t help Gordon that he’s a one-dimensional player. He can only shoot and doesn’t play a lick of defense.

Some are saying Rose is a sure-fire Hall of Famer. I’m not so sure about that, but he’s the best choice for a team in need of a quality point guard.

As always, you can hear Matt Schuckman and I break down our Midweek grades at 7:15 a.m. every Wednesday on WGEM SportsCenter Presented by Hardee’s on ESPN 1440. Here is this week’s batch:

A — Jon Lester. Giving an ‘A’ to anyone else this week would be a disservice to the Boston Red Sox pitcher. Just 24, the kid’s already overcome a cancer scare, pitching the clinching game of the World Series and thrown a no-hitter after baffling the Royals on Monday night. It’s no wonder the BoSox didn’t want to give up Lester for Johan Santana during the off-season.

B — San Antonio Spurs. Yes, they went into New Orleans on Monday night and beat the Hornets to advance to the Western Conference finals. I was more impressed that they slept on stalled plane in New Orleans on Monday night because there weren’t any hotel rooms in NOLA. (You’d have to think the Motel 8 had a room or two open, wouldn’t you?)

C — News of the Rams‘ possible sale. I don’t think anyone should be shocked that Georgia Frontiere’s kids want to unload the Rams. They have other interests — Chip Rosenbloom, the team’s new figurehead, is more interested in movies than football. He says the team isn’t going anywhere. Don’t bet on it.

D — NBA betting probe. Busted former ref Tim Donaghy told investigators that relationships among officials, coaches and players "affected the outcome of games." Of course, the NBA denies the charges. As one who has long wondered if the fix was in during NBA games, this once again makes me wonder.

F — Matt Ryan‘s contract. This is one of the reasons why I think the owners are right to ask for a new deal that includes some type of rookie salary cap. Ryan has thrown zero NFL passes yet has been rewarded with a 6-year, $72 million deal. The NFL (and Major League Baseball for that matter) need to have some type of rookie salary structure in place.

I — NFL labor strife. The owners opted out of a deal Tuesday that was supposed to go through the 2012 season. Instead, we’re guaranteed of having football through 2010. After that, who knows? There will plenty of bickering from now until a deal is agreed upon. Hopefully, this move gets the wheels in motion for a new labor deal earlier rather than later.

On the old, award-winning SportsWriter’s Journal program, which used to be broadcast on CGEM on Friday nights until we all got too sexy for TV, we used to occasionally bring out a little puppet we named "Slappy" and talk about people in the sports world who needed to be slapped.

At the end of the year, we’d hand out our "Slappy of the Year" award to the person who was in the most need of being slapped. We called the winners "Slaps."

Every Friday, I plan on giving out my weekly Slap of the Week honor. I’ll highlight a "Slap" who has done some wrong in the sports world.

The first DOBservations Slap of the Week winner is Boston Herald writer John Tomase. He’s the guy who "broke" the story that the New England Patriots filmed the St. Louis Rams’ walkthrough prior to Super Bowl XXXVI (or 36 for the non-Romans). As the world found out earlier this week, the Patriots never taped the Rams walkthrough and the story was 100 percent fiction.

How Tomase still has a job at the Herald after this is surprising. The paper ran a front-page apology on its front-page, which rarely happens. Tomase tried to explain how he screwed up.

One of the first things I learned in journalism school at Eastern Illinois University is that you NEVER go with anonymous sources for a story. The next story I write with an anonymous source will be my first.

Tomase did that and got burned. His credibility is shot. As a journalist, all we have is our credibility to lean on. You lose the public’s trust, and you’re toast.

Work may have kept me in the office today (figure that one out), but I’ve still got my midweek grades. Again, these can be heard at 7:15 a.m. Wednesday mornings on WGEM SportsCenter presented by Hardees on ESPN 1440.

A — The Tampa Bay Rays. They could very well come into Busch Stadium this weekend as the first-place team in the American League’s East Division. Yes, better than the Yanks and Sox. The Rays, who are no longer Devils, have a ton of young talent and made some shrewd off-season deals. The deal sending Delmon Young to Minnesota for Jason Bartlett and Matt Garza could be pretty lopsided by the time everything is said and done.

B — Annika Sorenstam gets the nod. Not only did she win last weekend, but she announced on Tuesday she’s going to retire from golf at age 37. She’s won 10 majors and 72 LPGA titles. She wants to pursue a family. Good for her. She’s made a comfortable living for herself and deserves to enjoy it. Still, I wouldn’t be surprised to see her make a comeback sometime down the road. She’s the best golfer of her generation and maybe the best ever.

C — To the NFL for how it handled the whole SpyGate thing. Commissioner Roger Goodell did the right thing by hammering the Patriots and coach Bill Belichick last fall for video taping other team’s signals. It’s too bad the league destroyed all the tapes and then did the circus earlier this week with a former Pats employee who had nothing more than some film of the San Diego cheerleaders. Hopefully, we don’t have to hear about this ever again.

D — To NBC or whoever told NBC to try to paint the picture of The Players Championship last weekend as if it were the Masters. Jimmy Roberts had a piece about the closing holes at TPC Sawgrass saying the debate has raged what to call the final three closing holes at Sawgrass. Just because Augusta National has “Amen Corner” it doesn’t mean Sawgrass needs something similar. The announcers also talked about the great tradition of the defending champion giving the trophy to the new champ when Phil Mickelson, the defending Players champ, finished his round. Sounds very Augusta-like with the whole green jacket ceremony. Give it up, please.

F — To the NAIA Region V Tournament committee. If you didn’t hear what happened to former Culver-Stockton College coach Doug Bletcher, check out my Wednesday column. You’ll know why the NAIA gets flunked.

I — Ron Villone’s jersey collection. The 38-year-old reliever has made St. Louis the 12th stop in his major-league career. If he continues to throw the way he has lately — when he’s looked like a modern-day Lance Painter — Villone will be left to look for team No. 13.

In my Sunday GamePlan column I wrote about the "Wow" moments in sports. They don’t come around very often, but when they do it makes you remember why you love sports so much.

I thought Tuesday’s play by Rick Ankiel on Colorado’s Omar Quintanilla was one of those "Wow" moments. Ankiel’s throw from the warning track to cut down Quintanilla at third base was one of the best I’ve ever seen. He might not give Cardinals fans the highlight-reel catches Jim Edmonds used to make, but watching Ankiel cut down runners is something special.

When you have to phone a friend to talk about the play, which I did on this one, you know it’s top-notch.

So, what are your "Wow" moments?

You can list ones you saw in person, which are really special, or ones you’ve seen while watching TV that will always stick with you.

Here’s the latest installment of midweek grades, which can be heard every Wednesday at 7:15 a.m. during the WGEM SportsCenter Presented by Hardee’s program on ESPN 1440.

A – As in Ankiel. I’m basing this only on what Rick Ankiel did Tuesday night, but what a night it was. Not only did he hit a bomb in the Cardinals’ 6-5 victory, but he threw two guys out at third base from center field, including an absolute seed from at least 225 feet away when Rockies infielder Omar Quintanilla tried to stretch a hit into a triple. It was a rare "Wow" moment in baseball. Cardinals third baseman Troy Glaus even gave Ankiel the ball. How can he struggled to throw strikes from 60 feet, 6 inches, yet throw absolute BBs from more than 200 feet away?

B – As in Bryant. Kobe Bean Bryant was the right choice for NBA MVP. Yes, Chris Paul is dynamite and LeBron is the king, but Bryant took a mediocre Lakers team and made them the best in the competitive Western Conference. He refused to let the team falter after the improving Andrew Bynum went down.

C- As in the Celtics. They survived their first-round series with Atlanta and barely slipped past Cleveland on Tuesday. You don’t get bonus points for blowouts in the playoffs, but they would be nice. The Celtics, who didn’t win a game in Atlanta during the opening round, will need to win on the road sometime if they’re to win the franchise’s first title since 1986.

D- As in Don’t count on Mark Mulder. Face it, he isn’t coming back to the Cardinals’ rotation any time soon. Roughed up for seven runs in his last rehab start, Mulder’s going to see the doctor. That’s never a good sign. Fortunately, the Cardinals are surviving without him, but how long can that last.

F – As in freaking get over it Dale Jr. fans. Schuckman’s boy, Dale Jr., was as close as driving from the Hardee’s at 30th and Broadway to the one on South 12th Street away from getting his first win in 71 races on Saturday night. Then he and Kyle Busch get to banging and Little E went flying into the wall. The Dale Jr. fans at Richmond sprayed the track with beer cans after the race. They were just racing, and accidents happen. Busch was less liable than when Dale Sr. used to do back in his hey day.

I – Youth traveling teams. The only reason for the incomplete here is who knows how far the lunacy will go. In the past week or so, we’ve had results for an under 9 traveling baseball team and two under 7 traveling soccer teams. Asked a soccer dad I know why his kid wasn’t on the U7 team. He said they weren’t asked to be on the developmental team. What is this, Manchester United? If the parents tucked away the 200 to 300 bucks it cost to travel to these tourneys and put it in a college fund, they may be thankful down the road. My kid’s ready for the U4 traveling tee ball team.

In case you missed it in the print edition on Sunday, the rosters for this year’s McDonald’s/Herald-Whig Classic were released.

It should be another set of good games, which will be played on June 14 at Quincy University’s Pepsi Arena. As is the case going into every Classic, the big question reamains: Can the Missouri boys end the streak? It’s been 19 years since the Show-Me Stars have beaten their Land of Lincoln counterparts.

I wouldn’t count out this year’s Missouri team, which has some scorers. Jesse Crawford is having a season to remember over in Knox County. If he can bring some of that magic with him to Pepsi Arena, who knows what could happen. We could even be talking about a Missouri winning streak at this time next year considering how strong the junior class is in Missouri this year — Palmyra’s Jonathon Nutt, South Shelby’s Matt Patterson and Knox County’s Dennis Dent among those who will be seniors in 2009.

The Missouri girls will have to contend with a pair of Division I players on the Illinois side — Charleston Southern-bound Ali Schwagmeyer of Central and Bradley recruit Leah Kassing of Brown County. Missouri will counter with a trio of South Shelby players who will know exactly what Missouri coach Milly Rash wants them to do.

To get you in the mood for the Classic, we’ll be running feature stories on Classic participants the next four Sundays. We’ll also have a player feature every day during the week leading up to the game. You’ll also notice player profiles appearing every day from now until game day in our "Top of the First" section on the sports cover.

Tickets will go on sale May 12 at the Herald-Whig and both Quincy McDonald’s locations. They’re $5 each with kids 5 and under getting in for free.

Here’s a look at the rosters, in case you missed them:

Illinois Girls
Coach: Ken Schuster, West Hancock
Renita Bunte, QND
Alyssa Duffy, Unity
Randi Gronewold, Illini West
Leah Kassing, Brown County
Emily Mast, W. Hancock
Maggie Reuschel, C-SE
Ali Schwagmeyer, C-SE
Megan Sorrill, Liberty
Cassie Weigand, West Hancock
Devin Wombles, Pleasant Hill

Missouri Girls
Coach: Milly Rash, S. Shelby
Danielle Caldwell, Canton
Miranda Chapin, S. Shelby
Abby Gaus, Highland
Shawna Kriegshauser, Highland
Whitney Kroeger, Palmrya
Erin Mayes, S. Shelby
Alex Milner, S. Shelby
Sam O’Brien, Palmrya
Kassidy Shuman, Clark Co.
Amanda Winters, Clark Co.

Illinois Boys
Coach: Bruce Bonness, Southeastern
Tim Bearden, QND
Shawn Blakeman, QHS
Perry Bonds, Griggsville-Perry
Jordan Cook, Payson Seymour
Garrett Janssen, Southeastern
Tim Jefferson, Southeastern
Ben Kearse, Warsaw-Nauvoo
Jake McNulty, Pittsfield
Mitch Rein, QHS
Matt Welding, QND

Missouri Boys
Coach: Jesse Crawford, Knox Co.
Drew Ayers, Canton
Tad Luebbehusen, Highland
Daniel McMahon, Knox Co.
Nathan Meyers, Marion Co.
John Mims, Highland
Randall Mosley, Hannibal
Cody Musgrove, Scotland Co.
Austin O’Bryan, Monroe City
Cory Schultz, Knox Co.
Colt Sommers, Clark Co.