2054: A SPORTS ODYSSEY
Johnny Orbit here, and we've got open lines on SportsRap. What do you want to talk about? Getting on to the end of the year. Maybe we could talk about the greatest moment of 2054.
Here's tonight's trivia question, in case you didn't hear it earlier. Winner gets a wrist satellite dish. "What sport did the late Golf Hall of Famer Michael Jordan originally play?" Just pick up that visionphone and voice STAR-555-RAP.
Anybody out there? Let's get some dialogue here! What are you, men or mutants?
O.K., Sea of Tranquillity, go ahead. You're on the air with Johnny Orbit....
Transcaller?...Transcaller, turn down your visionphone...the red knob on the right. Good.
Hello, I'm a first-time transcaller.
Noooooo.
I have a question for you. You know Philayorkia's Megabyte McClendon?
Sure.
Well, he played 12 years in the NBA back in two thousand aught six, sort of died, had himself frozen, then came back this year when they discovered a cure, right?
Right.
Well, my question is, do the points that he scored before he died count in his career totals or does he have to start over?
They count. Continuation rule, (click) Mars. Go ahead.
Hey, what's transmutin', Johnny?
Oh, same ol' gamma-gamma.
I think the best moment of 2054 was the uphill skiing championships. The parachutes they're using today are really glorch.
Yeah, but how 'bout the seventh game of the Airball Cup? Kirk Cathode limping up to the ol' zanometer with his jet-pack on "empty." And the NBA's Eight Foot and Under League had its best season since they lowered the basket to 14 feet. Now if we can just get baseball to let designated fielders hit once in a while.... (click) Beijing, hello.
Can you please give me the entire college football schedule for this year?
Sure. Rice plays Brown the first week. Then Brown plays Rice the second week.
Thank you.
(click) Limestone Layer, you're on the air.
Hey, Johnny, how about Detrago's chances to make the Super Bowl this year? Pretty good, don't you think?
Simulated or actual?
Actual.
Well, not as good as simulated. Lately, I've been flipping off the actual and going simulated so I can call my own plays. A buddy of mine has got a simulator too, and I played him the other night—he had Barcelona—and we pulverized the electrodes out of 'em. Detrago's got talent coming out of its protein holes! (click) Tibet. Talk to me.
Yes, lama plumber here and I'm positive I was someone named Shirley MacLaine in my past life. And before that....
(click) Right. And I was President Cosby. We'll break for sports headlines and be right back.
Announcer: Now it's time for SportsPlanet Tonight.... Well, Jackie Griffith Kersee Joyner has been moved from next month's Drug-Free Olympics into the Enhanced Olympics after traces of steroids were found in her fingernails. That leaves only three athletes in the Drug-Free Games.
In Miampa, six men who rented 12 sport-robots to help them get up a game of softball are being charged with robocide. The men said the uncontrollable robots insisted on taking their turns at bat and refused to stop throwing fastballs in excess of 300 miles per hour. The humans eventually destroyed the robots' brain chips by reading them passages from the Jackie Collins novel Hollywood Husbands.
That's the sports. Downtown temperature is 610°. Under the Ozone Dome, as always, it's 72°. Back to you, Johnny.
O.K., back to the visionphones. Los Diego, you're on the air with Johnny Orbit.
Johnny, I just want to say I think you're full of photonic debris when it comes to Hagler-Leonard XIV. You keep calling Leonard the champion, when you know Hagler won that fight.
Look, anybody with half a bionic circuit sewn in his brain knows that Hagler's sensors showed he'd been hit something like 215 times to Leonard's 150. I mean, Hagler's brain waves had been altered 28 percent! That's when the computer stopped it, and let me tell you, diode breath, Hagler should be glad it did.
Ahhhh, that computer was fixed. Why do the computers have to get into it, anyway? Why can't they just let 'em fight, like in the old days?
And I suppose you'd like to see fighters dying like in the old days, too? (click) Geesch! Space Station 416.
Hey, Johnny, I guess that the guy would like to replace the electroscan umps in baseball with humans, too, right?
Yeah, or maybe he'd like to do away with self-umpiring tennis balls. Or bring back cameraless football helmets. I mean, if he wants to go all the way back, why doesn't he start fighting wars with people again?
Hey, speaking of that, who do you see winning the big U.S.S.R.-Iran series coming up?
What is it? Airball, best of 11?
Best of 11, winner gets the Caspian Sea.
I gotta go with Iran in eight. They got Tony Khomeini in goal, they'll be tough, (click) Back after this.
Bob: Zorts! Another missed three-foot putt! I hate those things!
Jim: Bob, can I give you a little advice?
Bob: Please.
Jim: You need Neuro-Numb.
Bob: Neuro-Numb?
Jim: Sure, Neuro-Numb is the guaranteed nerve-relaxer, with no measurable drop-off in motor skills. Neuro-Numb blocks your nerve endings, keeping you from getting uptight in tense situations. I use it.
Bob: Heeeeeey, come to think of it, Jim, you didn't miss a single big putt on the Big Screen today.
Jim: Right, Neuro-Numb is choke-proof. Great for job interviews and that big wedding day, too. It's from the makers of Busy-Brain, the motor-neuron stimulant that's helped thousands get smarter just long enough for that big exam or deadline.
Bob: Hmmmmm. Neuro-Numb. I think I'll try it.
Announcer: Neuro-Numb, the Official Nerve Relaxer of the PGA Tour.
O.K., Pacific Ocean, you're on with Johnny Orbit.
Hi, Johnny, comin' at you from the ocean floor, sub-3,000 feet. We're really into the Scubaball Leagues down here. Can you tell me something about this Three-Lung Jackson, the new wing-forward for Indian Ocean?
Yeah, hold on, let me find the book.... Yeah, seven-six, 340, 23 years old, born in Lake Superior...DNA baby...41 percent human, 59 percent cyborg, including his spear arm and fins.... Favorite meal is a big, thick grouper smothered in Rust-Oleum, (click) Take one more call. Antarctica, you're on.
Johnny, just want you to know it's a beautiful 108° here and still no dome.
Yeah, may your gluteal plate deoxify.
Listen, did you get this week's SPORTS ILLUSTRATED laser disk yet?
Not yet.
Well, I guess they're celebrating their 100th anniversary and they had some stuff from old issues in there you wouldn't believe.
I'll bite. Like what?
Like did you know that at one time, racehorses were ridden by little men instead of robots? And they said that ice gretzky used to be known as hockey. Oh, and get this, the World Series didn't even include Japan.
Ohhh, riiiight. Next thing you'll tell me is that the girls in the swimsuit issue actually used to wear swimsuits.
Swear to Orbitron.
Pal, you've been playing too much human pinball. (click) And that's it. We're out of time. This is Johnny Orbit, saying please don't zmunk and fly. Goodnight, everybody!
ILLUSTRATION
Call-in sports shows will be far out when orbital transmutin' begins.
ILLUSTRATION
ARNOLD ROTH
Hey, diode breath, who do you like for Hagler-Leonard XIV?