Glanville’s Ideas Not Music To Every Ear

Jerry Glanville is an acquired taste, sort of “NASCAR meets the NFL.”

Coach-turned-analyst Glanville knows the game. Sunday, the Glan-man provided the color for the Bears-New England Patriots game and sidekick Kevin Harlan provided the humility.

Harlan noted that Patriots placekicker Adam Vinatieri was daredevil Evel Knievel’s cousin, and Glanville said he used to kick for the World Football League’s Amsterdam Admirals. “I can’t even spell that,” Glanville said. “Among other things,” Harlan added.

New Lou

CBS analyst and ex-Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz doesn’t need to go for the jugular in criticizing his old team - studio co-analyst Craig James will do it for him.

But Holtz’s iffy, incorrect pick of Tennessee to beat Florida (his “ifs” were pretty much the keys to any underdog team beating any favored team) was soft. Holtz did offer a good line in the face of Michigan State’s domination of the Irish. Throwing up his hands, he said, “Hey, I’m no longer the coach of Notre Dame.”

Bears redux

If there’s one thing Fox Sports analysts and ex-NFL stars Terry Bradshaw, Howie Long and Ronnie Lott agree on, it’s that Dave Wannstedt is a good and inspiring coach. They expressed that repeatedly in a visit here Friday en route to Green Bay.

So what’s wrong with the Bears? Long blames poor drafts and free-agent signings, mistakes attributable to an “antiquated” scouting system and too much responsibility for Wannstedt. By comparison, he said here and reiterated on Sunday’s pregame show from Green Bay, the Super Bowl champion Packers’ scouting department outnumbers the Bears’ three to one.

Speaking of picks

HBO’s “Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel” (8:30 p.m. Tuesday) sheds some light on a practice you might have suspected was a scam: Sports-gambling services by touts who promise to give bettors the winning edge and don’t.

Among findings in HBO’s five-month investigation was collusion among some 1,500 touts, ranging from two dozen supposedly different “sports advisers” operating out of the same office to a supposedly objective investigative “betting guide” actually being published by one of the handicappers.

To illustrate how spurious the touts’ claims of success are, HBO pitted a 2-year-old girl named Rachel and a cocker spaniel named Casey (picking by eating from dishes with team names on them) against high-profile sports-betting “adviser” Stu Feiner.

Their record in picking winners of 50 baseball games? Feiner was 25-25. Casey was 26-24. Rachel was 28-22.