The real reason to get into sports radio - procuring potential Playboy Playmates.

• Joe Buck bellows that he’s now bored with baseball. Boo-freaking-hoo.

• We cringe in sympathy for Diamondbacks catcher Chris Snyder, who’s been placed on the DL with a fractured left testicle.

• A sprinter runs for 30 seconds then rests for 30 seconds - but is it art?

• Tonight’s the last chance to stuff all those MLB All-Star ballot boxes! A-Rod & Jeter thank you.

• Who wears short shorts? The U.S. Olympic men’s volleyball team certainly doesn’t want to find out.

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We all know how hot and sexy sports radio guys can be, so it should come as no surprise that MIKE RESPONTS is reporting Vegas sports radio host Paul Howard used to date upcoming Playboy Playmate Monica Chairez:

Howard dated Monica Chairez when she was an up and coming Las Vegas model. Now Chairez is scheduled to be a centerfold in an upcoming issue of Playboy

“Up and coming Las Vegas model” = Permanent keycard holder to Champagne Room at the O.G..

You’ll be shocked to know that Chairez has since discarded Howard, well before she got her big *break* as a nudie model. We also can’t confirm the veracity of the claim, as Howard’s credit card receipts and ATM withdrawls during the time of the alleged relationship have not yet been made available to the public.

That unlikely couple reminds of the long-forgotten Rory Markas-Lauren Sanchez (above) coupling here in Los Angeles. … anyone?

And while there are high-fives due all around for Howard, by the looks of Chairez’s test shots, you no longer have to wonder how far Playboy has fallen.

The DALLAS MORNING NEWS reports today that, “Jessica Simpson and Tony Romo were spotted having dinner with his folks at an Olive Garden in Janesville, Wis.” PEOPLE magazine reports than when the reservation was phoned in, the staff thought it was “a big joke.”

Hey! Leave Jessica’s dad Joe out of this!

Baseball Hall of Fame President Jeff Idelson on the Dan Patrick Radio Show today on if the Barry Bonds #756 baseball will be displayed with the asterisk showing: “We feel it would be disengenious to accept the baseball and display it without the asterisk so that’s what we’ll do.” (audio)

Who do you think will be more irrelevant in five years, Bonds or Marc Ecko?

Not mentioned in our post yesterday about the USA TODAY piece on Mark McGwire: “If McGwire makes the Hall, the Cardinals will unveil the bronze statue of him that is sitting in a downtown St. Louis warehouse.”

Think that statue was commissioned before McGwire refused to “talk about the past” before Congress? (hello world’s largest doorstop!)

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Sports talk radio is the place where announcers and analysts take off the masks and tell us how they really feel about the sports they cover and the people playing them — because they really don’t think anyone is listening. Last month, Justin Gimelstob used a D.C. radio show to spew against Anna Kournikova. Now, we get Fox’s lead baseball and football announcer, Joe Buck, admitting to ESPN’s Colin Cowherd that he just doesn’t enjoy baseball as much as he used to.

AWFUL ANNOUNCING has the recorded audio, and is appropriately flabbergasted at the whole mess — because he’s right: this is why fans hate so much of the sports media right now.

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• THE 700 LEVEL has the video of that awesome Pat Burrell walkoff homer from last night.

• DEADSPIN covers the “official” Julio Franco retirement announcement, which was originally in Spanish.

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Orange Julius Jones Soda - make it so, Seattle soft drink distributors!

• Arizona State is bedeviled by some snapshots of their cheerleaders showing off in their skivvies.

(Photo back by popular demand)

• Apparently, Marvin Harrison is not the calm, cool customer we thought he was.

• Jim Rice boils at Torii Hunter’s claims that Red Sox fans are racist.

• Kentucky basketball coach Billy Gillispie likes ‘em young.

• Joe Buck & Tim McCarver are taken for a ride by the Feds. Unfortunately, they brought McCarver back.

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The Justice Department has been checking into reports that US marshals got into Fenway Park during the World Series last October using their badges, hung with Joe Buck and Tim McCarver in the booth, and then escorted them back to their hotel in their government cars, possibly with lights flashing.

(Give it up, boys; it’s time to start driving!)

While it may seem odd that this topic comes up six months after the World Series ended, please understand that anyone seeing US marshals next to Buck and McCarver may have simply assumed that the two Fox broadcasters were finally being arrested for their crimes against baseball-loving humanity.

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• DEADSPIN is all abuzz about Joe Buck hosting a “celebrity” spelling bee.

• FAN IQ’s 100% INJURY RATE races over video of A.J. Pierzynski taking on a Sun-Times columnist in a