BY JIM KNIPPENBERG
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Well dang, here's something you don't see every day: A Reds fan tramping around the stadium in a lime green Reds hat.
Well, OK, it's not happening a lot. But it could. This story starts last fall when Major League Baseball licensed New Era Cap Co. to manufacture official team hats in an assortment of colors -- lime green, baby blue, electric orange, several shades of red and more. So now you see one team's fans in caps with team logos but in colors belonging to rival teams.
Like Cleveland Indian fans running around with Chief Wahoo on Baltimore Oriole orange.
"I even saw an ad for Yankee hats for every holiday," says Reds spokesman Charles Henderson. "There was red and green for Christmas, Halloween orange and black. It's really big in some cities."
Here? "Not yet," he says, "and I can't speak for the future."
Maybe Reds marketing consultant Cal Levy, can: "You got me. That's up to the concessionaires. Sportservice handles that for us. "I know they're huge in other cities, and there are some in stores here, but I can't say what Sportservice is going to do."
How about it, Sportservice? Wellsir, turns out there are a few in the Reds' Store -- Kelly green, denim, green and black check -- in the Westin, but, according to one staffer, they aren't selling like the traditional stuff. Maybe later.
Yeah, maybe. We've never been big on new and different here.
JUST IN TIME: Whoa, talk about your sense of timing, what with Whitewater, Zippergate, Hillarygate, Lewinskygate, Billygate, Jockeyshortgate and goodness only knows Whatelsegate going on. Perfect for Gail Collins, who is not involved in scandal but who does have a bookful of plenty ripe gossip at the ready.
She's a New York Times staffer and former Cincinnatian -- a 1963 Seton grad whose parents, Roy and Rita Gleason, still live here. her new book is Scorpion Tongues (Morrow, $25).
Some kind of fun, that. Seems she spent several years sniffing out tasty dirt -- some true, some not -- about everyone from George Washington to Bill Clinton to Hollywood royalty.
Thanks to her, we now know about the rumor that Warren Harding did the mattress mambo in a White House closet; and the rumor that Woodrow Wilson murdered wife No. 1, Grover Cleveland was a notorious ladies man and James Buchanan was, well, in the closet because one didn't come out back in the 1850s.
Collins is in town signing the book 7 p.m. today at Joseph-Beth. And maybe whispering some gossip if you ask nicely.
BUZZ AROUND TOWN: Keeping eyes and ears open, Psst! has heard . . .
That John Tesh is coming to town, but you're not invited. Well, maybe you will be.
Turns out WRRM-FM and WVAE-FM are doing parties April 24 with Tesh as the centerpiece.
WRRM deejays won't begin talking about it until Monday, but what they're doing is similar to the Barry Manilow deal they did last year, says WRRM's Brinke Guthrie: Fly the star in, have him go live on the air, then do lunch with the star and listeners who win some kind of call-in.
The WVAE deal, says Gelene Morales at the station, is a listener appreciation party at the Museum Center. That guest list is mostly clients (as in people who buy air time) but there will be some tickets given away on the air.
See, you might be invited.
Psst! appears Sunday, Tuesday and Thursday. Have an item to report? Call Jim Knippenberg at 768-8513; fax: 768-8330.
KNIPPENBERG ARCHIVE