No hits but a run to urinal

It's not a statistic recorded by Elias Sports Bureau, so there's no telling if the no-hitter tossed by Jered Weaver of the Los Angeles Angels was the first of its kind.

Weaver made the unusual move of taking a bathroom break before the ninth inning Wednesday, when the mostly hapless Angels beat the hapless Minnesota Twins, 9-0.

With a no-hitter on the line, the book of baseball etiquette says a pitcher should stick to routine and sit quietly in the dugout. Weaver's teammates didn't say a word, but his bladder was talking to him.

He needed relief, but not from a call to the bullpen.

"I had to pee so bad, it was unbelievable," Weaver said in a postgame interview on MLB Network. "I had to throw the superstition out the window and just go let it go."

Weaver struck out nine, walked one and made one sprint to the urinal - not that the latter stat will show up in the box score.

The pitching effort by Weaver stands as one of the few highlights in the Angels' season, which is swirling around the toilet bowl.

■ NATURAL BORN THRILLER - In less than a week, 19-year-old Bryce Harper captured the imagination of the national media with his inspired play for the Washington Nationals.

Harper, from Las Vegas High School and the College of Southern Nevada, hit four doubles in his first five major league games, all but guaranteeing the No. 1 draft pick from 2010 is not returning to Triple-A Syracuse anytime soon.

In a USA Today story headlined, "Is Harper a big leaguer for life? Probably," Paul White detailed the teen phenom's feats and wrote:

"Harper already has proven he's one of those players you can't take your eyes off. The outfielder rapidly is becoming a highlight reel of his own because anything's likely to happen. And enough of it is good that chances are quickly declining that he'll be heading back to the minor leagues."

Comparisons have been drawn between Harper and former New York Yankees great Mickey Mantle. White went a different route, writing, "This is Bo Jackson stuff, except Harper probably is a better player."

Bo knows big-time success in two sports. Harper runs the bases with unbridled aggressiveness, but don't look for him to line up at running back for the Redskins.

■ GETTING THEIR PHIL? - A guy can meditate in the Montana wilderness for only so long before getting the itch to return to the big city. The New York Knicks want Phil Jackson to be their next coach, and expect Jackson to be interested.

Jackson, who retired from the Los Angeles Lakers last year, turns 67 in September. He won 11 titles as a coach and two as a Knicks player. The Knicks would present his biggest challenge, because he would not be coaching Michael Jordan or Kobe Bryant.

"Jackson isn't enthralled with the Knicks' roster, a source who talks to him said, but that doesn't mean he'd completely rule out the job. New York matters to him, and, so does money," wrote Yahoo! Sports columnist Adrian Wojnarowski.

The price tag to sign Jackson could be around $12 million per year. And if the owner has a daughter as hot as Jeanie Buss, that might help.

COMPILED BY MATT YOUMANS
LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL