Gimme five

Today's Two Cents is brought to you by the number five. Today, during this fifth month of 2009, we celebrate the No. 5 because it's the number of the newest Tampa Bay Bucs player -- first-round draft pick Josh Freeman. In college at Kansas State, Freeman wore No. 1, but with the Bucs, he has chosen No. 5. So today we look at our favorite No. 5s -- from the sports world and beyond.

Joe DiMaggio
Sports' most famous No. 5, which no Yankee has worn since 1952 -- the year the team retired DiMaggio's number.

Symphony No. 5 (Beethoven)
For those with a bit of class and intelligence, this, of course, is one of the most famous pieces of music in history. For the rest of you, it's kind of like the Stairway to Heaven of classical music.

Donovan McNabb
Josh Freeman won't be the only quarterback to wear No. 5. The Eagles' McNabb does, too. Now all Freeman needs is a Chunky Soup commercial.

The Jackson Five
Pre-crazy Michael Jackson and his brothers Tito, Jermaine, Marlon and the other one made up the best "Five'' music group ever, with all due respect to the Dave Clark Five, Ben Folds Five, Five for Fighting and Maroon 5.

Niklas Lidstrom
The Islanders' Denis Potvin wore No. 5, but Lidstrom will go down as the greatest No. 5 in NHL history.

Five Easy Pieces
Enjoy Jack Nicholson in this 1970 film and have a sandwich, say a chicken salad sandwich on wheat toast, no mayonnaise, no butter, no lettuce … and hold the chicken.

Paul Hornung
The football great wore No. 5 at Notre Dame when he won the Heisman Trophy in 1956 and also with the Packers from 1957 to 1966 during his Hall of Fame NFL career.

Five Alive
The most underrated of the breakfast drinks. It has orange, lemon, grapefruit, tangerine and lime. And it's oh-so-economical in the frozen concentrated can.

Five
The name of a 1951 science-fiction film about a group of survivors from an atomic bomb that wiped out the rest of the human race. It didn't star anybody you know, and it was written and directed by Arch Oboler, who was more famous for bringing gruesome horror and science fiction to radio. Some credit Five, however, with being the first film to deal with a post-apocalyptic world.

Kevin Garnett
KG wore No. 21 with the Timberwolves, but he couldn't wear it with the Celtics because it was retired for Bill Sharman. So, Garnett wears No. 5, the same number Bill Walton wore in his latter years with the Celtics.

Albert Pujols
The Cardinals slugger wears No. 5, making him arguably the best athlete at the moment wearing that number.

Interstate 5
This is a great vacation: Rent a car in Washington state and drive south on I-5 for 1,381 miles until you get to Mexico. By the time you're done, you've passed either through or near Seattle, Tacoma, Portland, Sacramento, San Francisco, Oakland, Los Angeles and San Diego.

Johnny Bench
Perhaps the greatest catcher in the history of baseball wore No. 5 for Cincinnati’s Big Red Machine in the 1970s.

Chanel No. 5
The first fragrance from Coco Chanel, which raises the question: Why is it called Chanel No. 5 instead of Chanel No. 1? Whatever. This perfume -- or parfum, as they say in France -- has been on sale continuously since 1921.

Five hole
The best term in hockey, it means the opening between a goalie's legs. Even most hockey fans can't name exactly where one, two, three and four are, but everyone knows the five hole. By the way, 5-foot-5 goalie Darren Pang had a six hole: above his head.

Hawaii Five-O
Go ahead and hum the theme as you remember Jack Lord as Steve McGarrett, James MacArthur as Danno and, of course, Kam Fong and Chin Ho (or was it the other way around?).

5
A buddy of Charlie Brown and Linus. Actually, his first name was 555 and his last name was 95472 (with the emphasis on 4), but everyone called him 5. His sisters were 3 and 4. He played on Charlie Brown's baseball team, wore the No. 5 and played, of course, third base.

No. 5, 1948
One of the famous paintings by abstract expressionist Jackson Pollock. I would describe the meaning behind the work, but Ie have no idea what was going through that dude's head. To us, it looks like brown leaves covered with mustard, but I'm guessing there was probably a little more to it than that.

Brooks Robinson
The Orioles' vacuum cleaner at third base and the star of the 1970 World Series had his No. 5 retired by Baltimore in 1977.

The Fifth Dimension
The time: late 1960s and early 1970s
The members: Billy Davis Jr., Florence LaRue, Marilyn McCoo, Lamonte McLemore and Ron Townson
The songs: Up, Up and Away, Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In, Wedding Bell Blues, (Last Night) I Didn't Get to Sleep at All
The feeling: magically dreamy!

Take Five
The masterpiece of the Dave Brubeck Quartet and, perhaps, the coolest pieces of jazz ever. Want to hear something even more cool? The song's composer, Brubeck saxophonist Paul Desmond, left upon his death in 1977 all royalties of the song to the American Red Cross. It works out to about $100,000 a year. Told you it was cool.

George Brett
The Royals' Hall of Fame third baseman wore No. 5, and you can't think of Brett without thinking of the so-funny-milk-comes-out-your-nose moment when he charged the field in the Pine Tar Game. Eventually, a Yankees appeal was overturned, and Brett’s winning homer counted. The final score: Well, the Yankees finished with four. And the Royals? Five.

The high five
When did this replace the good old-fashioned handshake? On a sports field: cool. In the stands of a sports arena: acceptable. Everywhere else except a bar: un-cool. In a bar: totally lame.

With the third pick in the 2010 NFL draft, the Tampa Bay Bucs select ...

Sports Illustrated's Andrew Perloff admits it's only a semi-serious look, but he wrote a fun mock draft for the 2010 NFL draft. So not only was he guessing what players might be taken, he also was predicting how teams would finish next season so he could put together a draft order.

The Bucs ended up with the, ugh, third pick, meaning they would go something like 2-14 in 2009 . (Actually, Perloff might be on to something there.) With the third pick, the Bucs would then take Oklahoma defensive tackle Gerald McCoy. Other notable picks: Florida QB Tim Tebow going 13th to Washington and USF defensive end George Selvie going 26th to Arizona. And one last thing: Perloff has the Chargers picking last, meaning San Diego might finally win its first Super Bowl.

Lightning's most gruesome injuries

Kicked in the face with an ice skate. Just think about that for a second. Kicked. In the face. By an ice skate.  That was what happened to Lightning star Marty St. Louis on Saturday in Ottawa. Reaching for a loose puck on a faceoff, St. Louis was accidently kicked by official Derek Amell. Incredibly, St. Louis needed only eight stitches to close a gash on his forehead and is expected to be back in the lineup Thursday night. St. Louis' injury is hardly the only freakish and gruesome injury the Lightning has suffered over the years. Here are a few that come to mind. It's no wonder the team is owned by a guy who makes those Saw movies.

Marty St. Louis
Saturday wasn't the first time St. Louis suffered a crazy injury. In November 2005 during a lazy Sunday morning practice, St. Louis was standing in front of the net on what seemed to be harmless power-play drill. Seconds later, St. Louis was grabbing his hand and spilling blood all over the ice. Looking to deflect the puck, St. Louis was hit on his left ring finger, which was fractured. Now for the part that makes you go, "Ewww!'' Doctors had to remove St. Louis' fingernail, stitch the nail bed and then reattach the nail.
But St. Louis is a hockey player. He was supposed to be out for a month. He missed two games and scored the only goal in his first game back -- a 1-0 victory against the Islanders.

Aaron Gavey
This has to be the most gruesome injury in Lightning history. Chasing a loose puck during a game at Buffalo in 1996, Gavey was accidently clipped in the face by the skate of teammate Michel Petit. The skate zigzagged across Gavey's face from his chin, across the corner of his lips, up his right cheek to just around his right eye. He was helped from the ice and immediately raced to Buffalo General Hospital. Recounting the incident years later, Gavey said he felt fine until he heard paramedics telling the ambulance driver to hit the siren because "this guy might not make it.''

Gavey had three hours of plastic surgery and needed 120 stitches to close the cut. He returned to the lineup only a couple of weeks later. In 2000, Gavey said it was likely he would require surgeries as he grew older because many of the nerves in his face were severed. The scar, as you can see, remained long after the injury.

Dan Boyle
Certainly, the most freakish injury the Lightning has ever suffered. After a game early last season, Boyle was sitting at his locker talking to a teammate when a skate literally dropped from the sky and slashed his forearm. What happened was the skate fell from the hook that holds a player's skate above his locker.

"A one-in-a-million shot,'' assistant equipment manager Rob Kennedy said at the time. "I've never seen anything like it.''

The damage was severe. The skate blade cut his wrist and severed two abductor tendons and an extensor tendon. Boyle ultimately missed 45 games.

Shawn Burr
Just before Christmas in 1997, Burr, one of the more charismatic and humorous players in club history, was slashed on the left hand by a Boston player with a familiar name in these parts -- Rob DiMaio, who had two stints with Tampa Bay. At the time, Burr said, "I pulled my hand out of my glove and almost puked. It was the grossest thing that I have ever seen.''
What Burr saw was blood, lots of it. What he didn't see was the tip of his middle finger, which had been severed. The tip of Burr’s finger was re-attatched, but it didn't take. It eventually turned black and these days, Burr's left middle finger stops just above the top knuckle.

Craig MacDonald
It's amazing how hockey players' instincts are, which is why they are almost never hit by a puck though it often travels at more than 100 mph. But sometimes something freaky happens, like in a game last season. Toronto's Hal Gill partly fanned on a slap shot from the point. The puck acted like a slow curveball and ended up striking a surprised MacDonald right in the chops. MacDonald suffered nine fractured teeth and needed three root canals and approximately 50 stitches inside his mouth.

Jassen Cullimore
In a 2003 playoff series against the Capitals, Cullimore was getting a puck behind this net. That was when he was checked legally, but hard, by Washington's Dainius Zubrus. Cullimore lost his balance and slammed face-first into the boards. Not the glass part, but the hard board itself. If that wasn't bad enough, Cullimore appeared to hit a part of the boards where one section meets another. That little crack did the damage. Cullimore needed 70 stitches to close the nasty cut on his lip and chin.

Basil McRae
The funny thing about hockey fights is it's rare that anyone gets hurt. That is unless something freaky happens. During the Lightning's inaugural season, Tampa Bay tough guy Basil McRae squared off against Stu "The Grim Reaper'' Grimson. As the two grappled at center ice in old Chicago Stadium, tugging on each other's jerseys, McRae’s left skate caught a rut in the ice. The lower part of his leg went one way and the upper part went the other.

"I put all my weight on it,'' McRae said in 1992, "and I heard it snap.'' So did Grimson, who immediately let McRae go and skated away. Result: a spiral break of the left tibia. The injury could've been much worse, but McRae already had an 18-inch steel rod in the leg from a previous injury. Lucky for him, huh?

Reid Simpson
This was a case when someone actually did get hurt in a hockey fight. Hurt bad. Enforcer Reid Simpson only played 26 games for the Lightning back in the 1999-2000 season, but that was enough for 106 penalty minutes and an injury he will never forget. Simpson was fighting the Islanders' Eric Cairns when Cairns caught Simpson with a clean punch to the chin. The punch was so hard that it completely split open Simpson's chin bone. After, Simpson could actually put his fingers in his mouth and push down on his bottom teeth like it was a see-saw with each side of his now two chins moving up and down. Two months later, Simpson still hadn't played when he said his jaw felt fine but, "I don't know if it would feel fine if I got punched.''

Darryl Sydor
In a January 2006 game, the defenseman was standing in front of his net. Then he felt like he had been shot. He never saw a slap shot that was deflected until it was too late. The puck ripped into his upper lip, causing a gash that left his upper lip flapping just below the left side of his nose. He laid on the ice, woozy from the hit when he started to taste blood. "I didn't realize I was cut until I got to the (bench),'' Sydor said at the time.

The cut required 70 stitches to his lip, gum and cheek. Even days after the injury, it appeared as if he had a golf ball jammed under his upper lip. Oh yeah, he didn’t miss a game.

Jacques Demers
Hey, gotta throw a coach in here. Demers was injured in his very first practice as Lightning coach in 1997. Everything was going well until he slipped on the ice and fell hard on his knee. Next thing you know, he needed fluid drained and spent several days coaching practices from the bench. Only with the Lightning, kids, only with the Lightning.

Gone fishin'

So, let's see. In the past 12 months, I predicted the Bucs would go 5-10-1 in 2007. I put my foot in my mouth again about two months ago when I said I would trade Jason Bartlett and Matt Garza back to Minnesota for Delmon Young. And I riled up half of New England and ALL of Red Sox Nation by listing 10 reasons to hate the Red Sox. (I'm still getting nasty e-mails over that one.) What does this all mean? I need a vacation! Give me a couple of weeks and I'll be back with more stupid predictions and maybe 10 reasons to hate the Yankees or something. I'll return here Aug. 18. In the meantime, I'll be seeing if it's possible to snooze in a hammock while eating a cheeseburger at the same time. See ya soon.

Bad sports guarantees

Please tell me that new Lightning co-owner Len Barrie did not guarantee the Bolts would win the Southeast Division.

"I'll predict right now, Tampa Bay will win the division,'' he said.

Oh, no. He did. For every Joe Namath and Muhammad Ali, there have been dozens of guys like Jon Kitna and Patrick Ewing. Let's hope that come next April we’re not adding Barrie's name to this list of hollow guarantees.

Jon Kitna
The quarterback predicted the Lions, just 3-13 in 2006, would win 10 games -- actually, "more than 10 games'' — in 2007. Oh, the Lions came up just short. And by "just short,'' we mean "7-9.''

Matt Hasselbeck
After winning the overtime coin toss in a 2004 playoff game at Green Bay, the Seahawks QB said, "We want the ball, and we're going to score.'' He threw a pass that resulted in a touchdown, all right. Problem was, it was a pass intercepted by Green Bay's Al Harris.

Patrick Ewing
The Knicks' big man guaranteed a victory in Game 6 over the Pacers in the 2000 Eastern Conference playoffs. The prediction might have come true if Ewing hadn't turned into a bricklayer. He was 4-for-13 from the field, 2-for-8 from the line and missed his final six shots as the Pacers won 93-80.

Joe Glenn
You've probably never heard of him, but this is the ultimate guarantee gone south. This Wyoming football coach guaranteed his boys would beat Utah in 2007. His lads not only lost. They lost 50-0. (Side note: Utah coach Kyle Whittingham gets the Big Jerk Award for using an onside kick while up 40-0 in the third quarter, which led to Glenn giving Utah the one-finger salute.)

Roy Williams
Boy, the Lions have big mouths, don't they? The wide receiver guaranteed Detroit would knock off the Bears in the second game of the 2006 season. Final score: Bears 34, Lions 7. After the game, Williams told reporters, "You can all run with this: We will win the (next) game.'' Uh, they lost that one, too. And the next game. And the game after that, too.

Chad Johnson
Despite his team being 0-7 in 2002, Bengals chatty wideout Chad Johnson said, "Next week, I assure you a win. I guarantee you we will win.'' Yes, it’s true that the Bengals did win, and win handily:
38-3. But the victory came against the expansion Texans. After the victory, the Bengals went on a six-game losing streak and finished 2-14.

Don Waddell
Midway through the 2005-06 season. Here's the quote from the Atlanta Thrashers general manager: "We'll be in the playoffs. If you want to write: 'Guarantee,' I have no problem with that.'' Apparently his team had a "problem'' with that because when the season ended, the Thrashers were not in the playoffs.

Anthony Smith
Some people get caught up in the moment and say something dumb. The Steelers defensive back, however, lost all intelligence. He guaranteed a victory over the undefeated Patriots last season. Smith was part of a secondary burned for 399 yards and four TDs by QB Tom Brady and the Pats routed the Steelers 34-13.

Sportin' mullets -- the best of sports mullets

The mullet is back. Well, actually, that's not entirely true. The man who helped make the mullet famous is back. Barry Melrose, proud wearer of the mullet (which did to hairdos what the Pinto did for cars), is back behind an NHL bench as the newly named coach of the Lightning. But in case you hadn't noticed, the mullet is gone. At least from Melrose's head. Here's hoping he brings it back, for old time's sake. To get him in the mood, here's a trip down memory lane with some memorable sports mullets.

Andre Agassi
The tennis great tried to make up for the hair he was losing on top by going long in the back. (As if we weren't going to notice.) This wasn't his worst idea of the late 1980s and early 1990s. Uh, that would be dating Barbra Streisand. That's pretty much the ace of bad ideas. But the mullet was a close second.

Wayne Gretzky
The Great One set about a billion official NHL records and one unofficial NHL record: worst use of hair. This was the worst thing to come out of Canada since Paul Anka wrote (You're) Having My Baby. Notice how Janet Jones didn't marry him until he chopped off the raccoon tail.

Randy Johnson
The Big Unit has become the Michael Bolton of baseball. He has the worst mullet going and he refuses to give it up even though the darn thing went out of style about six seconds after Billy Ray Cyrus' Achy Breaky Heart hit the airwaves. Cyrus is a first-ballot Hall of Famer when it comes to mullets, the Babe Ruth if you will. And even he was smart enough to give it up.

Jaromir Jagr
The hockey star sported the "colek''’ or "deka.'' Those supposedly are the Czech words for the mullet haircut. We can only guess that he kept the style so long because he never learned the English phrase, "Yes, please, can I have a haircut that doesn't make me look like a total doofus?''

Barry Melrose
Of course, we have to remind Barry what he looked like in our attempt to sway him once again to the dark side. And were not trying to suck up to the new coach, but he was one of the few guys who actually got away with it, especially when he loaded it up with the Castrol 30W or whatever that was he put in his hair.

See a special slide show of memorable mullets.

Go Jonny Go

If Rays outfielder Jonny Gomes ran as fast to first base as he does to brawls, the guy would have more infield hits that Ichiro. Ever notice how fast Gomes arrives whenever punches are being thrown? And it doesn't matter where on the field -- pitcher's mound, second base, wherever. He wasn't even in the lineup last night and he almost got to the mound before Coco Crisp did.

Some day a team is going to trade for Gomes and the other GM is going to say, "We hated to give up our top pitching prospect, but we needed a guy with a little right-handed pop and someone who can apply the figure-four leg-lock in a fight. Now we think we have the missing piece to put us over the top.''

Sasha Vujacic is a heartbreaker

With the seconds ticking away and the Lakers about to wrap up the Western Conference final over the Spurs with a five-point victory Thursday night, Los Angeles' Sasha Vujacic was supposed to do what anyone with class does. He was supposed to dribble out the clock. Instead, he decided to take a meaningless three-point shot at the buzzer.

And he nailed it!

Even the TV guys commented that it was kind of bush-league. Well, it was more than that. Just ask all the gamblers out there who had the Spurs-PLUS SEVEN-AND-A-HALF. Yep, do the math. Instead of winning by five, the Lakers won by eight. Today, you have to think that Sasha has become the most hated player in the NBA in some circles. Then again, Sasha might now be the most popular player in the league in other circles -- those that had the Lakers-minus seven-and-a-half.

No octopus for you!

First, the Soup Nazi and now the Octopus Nazi.

You know how the demented good people of Detroit like to throw an octopus on the ice during Red Wings playoff games? Well, Pittsburgh is doing its best to make sure it doesn't happen in the Steel City. Check out this story.

Meantime, Penguins fans should start their own tradition of throwing smelly stuff on the ice. How about a catfish out of the Monongahela River? Or how about a few rusted Iron City Beer cans? Or, here's an idea: maybe Pittsburgh fans should do the right thing and not throw anything on the ice. Hate to break it to you, Detroit, but the whole octopus thing? That was soooo 1998.

Here's a way to end the Madden jinx

You've all surely heard of the curse that strikes whichever player graces the cover of EA Sports Madden football video games. Anytime a player appears on the cover, he ends up breaking a leg or busting an ankle and, generally, having the worst season of his life. Players such as Michael Vick, Ray Lewis, Randall Cunningham and Shaun Alexander have all fallen victim to the dreaded curse.

Well, guess who will be the cover of "Madden NFL 09?'' Retired QB Brett Favre. Assuming Favre stays retired -- and I'm not totally sold on that just yet -- the jinx ends now.

Then again, I'm now on a daily quest to "Google News'' the words "Favre'' and "golf cart'' and "mishap.''