Forget Beckham; who’s going to be the Colts’ third-string long snapper?

Vend it with Beckham?

While "Rants & Raves" has nothing against soccer, if those few but passionate futbol-loving Americans who think the arrival of one-time English superstar David Beckham -- hey, the dude's a soccer senior at 32 -- is going to turn football-loving folks into Major League Soccer fans, they're forgetting one undeniable truth: NFL training camps open next week.

• Being married to Posh Spice of Spice Girls music fame -- or is that infamy? -- and projecting a mega-photogenic presence, Beckham will get the word "soccer" splashed across every magazine cover and TV celebrity news show for the next month.

But once the novelty of playing for the Los Angeles Galaxy wears off, will Beckham be anything more than "Heck, him?" to most Americans, and soccer again be relegated to its second-class, kids-in-the-park-on-Saturday-morning citizenship in the colonies? ...

• Admittedly, Beckham's eye-popping wife, Victoria, the mother to the couple's three children, gives new meaning to the term "soccer mom." ...

• NFL training camps opening AND major league baseball's second-half pennant chase under way -- does life get any better than this?

Well, there is that overlap of the NFL regular season, college football's regular season and the major league baseball playoffs.

And Final Four weekend and Opening Day of baseball season.

Admit it: If you love sports, there aren't many bad days. ...

• Whether or not you agree that he should be the new home run king, Barry Bonds limping to surpass Hank Aaron on the all-time list has become as humourous as it is tedious.

At the rate he's going -- not homering since July 3 and grinding his gears at No. 751 -- Bonds might need a walker and an oxygen tank to get around the bases when he gets to No. 756. ...

• Brilliantly bombastic or brutally boorish, say this about former NBA star and current TV studio analyst Charles Barkley: The guy's heart is as big as his ol' "melon-head."

OK, that's not the nicest way to put it, especially when you consider that Sir Charles treated 100 Lake Tahoe-area firefighters like kings Saturday by taking them out to dinner after touring the devastation of the wildfire that destroyed 254 homes in the area last month.

Playing this past weekend in the American Century Celebrity Golf Championship at Stateline -- where he finished last -- the 11-time All-Star was quoted as saying, "This is unbelievable," while touring the damage.

In addition to treating the firefighters to dinner at Cabo Wabo, the restaurant owned by aging rocker Sammy Hagar inside Harvey's hotel-casino, Barkley pledged $25,000 to the area's relief fund.

Forget finishing last in golf. That's finishing first as a human being. ...

• Speaking of the annual celebrity golf tournament, Emmy Award-winning comedic actor Ray Romano hit a young fan Saturday when his ball skipped off the cart path on the Edgewood Tahoe course's 16th hole.

Hmmm. Not everybody loves Raymond?

"Are you all right?" Romano asked the victim, according to The Associated Press. "I'm unemployed now, so there's no money."

But, hey, we bet Romano could get the guy Brad Garrett's autograph. ...

• While spreading praise, how 'bout them 51s?

The alien-themed Triple-A team played in a different solar system in its first home series following the All-Star break. The 51s swept then-Pacific Northern Division-leading Salt Lake in four games at Cashman Field to drop the Bees into second place behind the Colorado Springs Sky Sox.

While it hasn't been the best of seasons for the old seam-heads, who stand last in the four-team Pacific South, the sweep was the franchise's first of a first-place team since May 23-26, 2005, when the team took four from the Round Rock Express of the American South. ...

• Reader Norm Nusbaum writes in with a little knife-twisting on one of our hapless, perhaps hopeless, local sports franchises:

"I find it interesting that the Review-Journal's coverage of the World Series of Poker has been appearing in the Business section. While I don't think it belongs there, this offers me hope that, in the future, Arena Football League coverage will appear on the comics page."

We believe "N-squared" is referencing our hometown Gladiators, who finished 2-12 this past season, including -- gaaaaag! -- 0-7 at home.

Joe Hawk's "Rants & Raves" is published Tuesday. He can be reached at 387-2912 or jhawk@reviewjournal.com.