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Friday MLB— Athletics at White Sox, 5 p.m., CSNC MLB— Reds at Giants, 7 p.m., CSNB Stanley Cup — Game 5, Bruins at Canucks, 5 p.m., NBC PGA — St. Jude Classic, Noon, TGC NCAABaseball — Arizona St. at Texas, 4 p.m., ESPN Truck Series —WinStar World Casino 400k, 6 p.m., SPEED Turning the page The school year’s over. Time to turn the page. Well, maybe more accu- rately as far I’m concerned, it’s time to rip out the page. Hundreds of notebooks spilling out of my drawers. Reporters have a habit of not letting go of these. Nagging thoughts linger — is there some phone num- ber or name I’ll need later? We’d rather waste an hour in the future rifling through every page to find it then take the minute it would to re- acquire the information. So they stay. Piling up. Rich Greene Week after week, month after month. Alas, it’s time to let go, clean the slate for next school year. The easiest thing to do would be to take these things straight to the dumpster and try not to get a hernia when tipping the drawer over. But I can’t do that. Despite my last name, I’m no greenie, but I have read The Lorax, so maybe it’s best to save what I can from these notebooks. Rip out of the used pages and be left with enough thin little note pads to get me through phone messages to next year’s apocalypse. Commence tearing... And that’s when I was transported. Funny how just a few little words here and there can open a brain’s flood gates. The memories of the past nine months flashed in my head as each rip told a fragmented story. My eyes glancing down at the paper to pick up just enough words to relive some past experience. Chronologically it began with optimistic new coaches and closed with seasons ending in playoff disappointment as seniors choked back their tears. But this was a story told in no specific order or time frame, just random glimpses of yet another marvelous year working the sports desk. From a freshman belting a walkoff home run to a back-to-back championship celebration in Chico. There were plenty of good times. From blowout losses to losing a three-peat championship in Chico. There were plenty of low times. Yeah, it was all here. Coaches calls, parents e-mail addresses, batting averages and quotes. All in my unique brand of chicken-scratch. A page of mathematical calculations. Is it a possibility Red Bluff could actually make the playoffs? Another page filled with exclamation points. Can you believe they’re going to win this game? Each notebook was a handful of game stories decoded in numbers and bursts of phrases. One notebook even told the story by its physi- cal nature. Warped beyond rectangular shape, the pages fanned out, thickened from the absorption of too much moisture. Even the ink was smeared. Instantly I remembered being utterly cold and wet as I watched the Lady Cardinals win their first playoff soccer game. Memories fired through my... oh what’s the name for the part of brain that stores things. I can’t remember that, but I can remember peeking into the Red Bluff field house after a bas- ketball game to find Ian Hill and Carlos Tapia con- tinuing to practice their jump shots. I can remember the disappointed look on Cameron Nye’s face when he told me he would miss both the Tehama County Shootout and Shas- ta games. I can picture how packed the Los Molinos gym was for the Lady Bulldogs playoff showdown. The smiles as the girls celebrated each point. Tyler McIntyre splashing into the end zone. Colin Dahlberg soaring through the air. Hayley Harris diving for a ball in the dirt. They were all here in these notebooks. The tearing slowed... Should I really be throwing these out? Maybe there is a number I'll need. I mean even with phone books and the Internet sometimes you can’t... No it’s fine. The athletes this school year left me with some- thing better than notebooks. All those memories are there — not locked up, but stored for future use. Those memories will be triggered again and again for the rest of my life. Just like they will for the players and coaches involved and the friends and family who watched alongside me. It’s amazing how much the brain can store. It might take something such as stumbling across an old notebook or photo. Sometimes it’ll just be the way the rain pours down or squeezing through a crowd to find a seat in the bleachers, but those memories will be sparked time and time again. Decades later when these current Spartans and Warriors are watching their own Cardinals and Bulldogs I bet the memories will come back again. Thanks to nine months of filling up notebooks. Nine months of filling my hippocampus. That’s the word! Daily News Sports Editor Rich Greene has a slightly used notebook ready to jot down your phone message.You can leave him one by calling 527-2151 ext. 109 or the more digitally inclined folks can e-mail at sports@redbluffdailynews.com. MCT file photo The Oakland Athletics fired manager Bob Geren,Thursday. See GEREN, page 2B Mavericks take series lead DALLAS (AP) — Dirk Nowitzki and the Dallas Mavericks finally have the lead in these ultra-close NBA finals, and now it really is ‘‘now or never’’ for LeBron James and the Miami Heat. Nowitzki scored 29 points, dri- ving for the go-ahead dunk with 2:45 remaining, and the Mavericks beat the Heat 112-103 on Thursday night to take a 3-2 lead in the NBA finals. Five years after going up 2-0 on the Heat, the Mavs finally got that elusive third victory, and can wrap up their first championship in Game 6 at Miami on Sunday night. James, who called this game ‘‘now or never,’’ responded from his worst playoff performance with 17 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists, and Dwyane Wade battled through a sore left hip after a first-quarter colli- sion to finish with 23 points. They get the final two games at home, but history is against them as they try to win a title in their first sea- son together: In the 26 previous times finals that were tied 2-2, the Game 5 winner won 19 of them. The Mavs shot 60 percent through three quarters, briefly gave up the lead in the fourth, then controlled the final few minutes, just as they had in thrilling comebacks in Games 2 and 4. This time, they got to play from ahead thanks to some sizzling shoot- ing: 56.5 percent from the field, including 13 of 19 (68 percent) from 3-point range. Jason Terry scored 21 points and J.J. Barea had 17 for the Mavs, with Nowitzki briefly throwing both arms in the air as he walked off the court surrounded by a sea of blue fans who hope he’ll bring home a champi- onship trophy if they can pull out another victory in Miami. James scored eight points, going just 3 of 11 in Game 4, the first time in 90 postseason games he didn’t hit double figures. It’s been a rough first finals in Miami for James, who has been accused of everything from ‘‘shrinking’’ to ‘‘checking out’’ in the Sports 1B Athletics fire Geren Friday June 10, 2011 OAKLAND (AP) — With his banged-up team mired in a nine-game losing streak and rampant speculation about the tenuous status of manager Bob Geren, general manager Billy Beane felt he had no other choice than to make a change at skipper. The A’s fired a manager during the season for the first time in a quarter century on Thursday, letting Geren go after four-plus seasons and bringing in former Arizona and Seattle skipper Bob Melvin for the rest of the season. ‘‘It felt like at this point a change was necessary,’’ Beane said. ‘‘It got to the point where the emphasis was on the status of the manager on a daily basis and no longer on the field. When that starts to happen, you need to shift the focus to what’s really important, which is performance. That’s how we MCT photo Tyson Chandler dunks in front of LeBron James,Thursday. fourth quarters, when he had just nine points through the first four games. Trying to pump himself up, James wrote ‘‘Now or Never!!’’ on his Twitter page early Thursday morn- ing, later calling this the biggest game of his career. But they feel the same urgency in Dallas, where the slogan ‘‘The Time is Now’’ is printed on those blue T- shirts that surround the court, and where the Mavs are loaded with 30- somethings — late 30s, in Jason Kidd’s case — who could be on their last shot at an NBA title. Smith ’absolutely’ expects to be starting QB SAN JOSE (AP) — Count Alex Smith among those who find it awkward that a free agent quarterback is organizing the San Fran- cisco 49ers workouts during the NFL lockout. Just don’t count him among those who think he will never be a successful 49ers quarterback. Smith said Thursday he ‘‘absolutely’’ expects to be San Francisco’s starter next season, even though he’s not signed on the roster and sec- ond-round pick Colin Kaepernick is working to take his place. The 2005 No. 1 overall pick said he made the decision to return to the 49ers after speaking with new coach Jim Harbaugh and, in part, because he wants to prove he wasn’t a Bay Area bust. ‘‘That’s why I’m doing this. I don’t put in all this time, I don’t sacrifice all this stuff to not be (the starter). It’s the drive in me that I have and will continue to have. I love football. I want to play this game and I’ve got more to prove than ever, to be honest with you.’’ — quarterback Alex Smith ‘‘That’s just not who I am either to try to take the easy decision,’’ Smith said. ‘‘I was just trying to make the right decision.’’ No free agent can sign with a team until the lockout is lifted. In the meantime, Smith has made every effort to lead the only NFL team he has ever known. He spoke for the first time after a four-day informal minicamp at San Jose State that some 49ers dubbed ‘‘Camp Alex,’’ and his stamp was everywhere on campus. More than two dozen players, mostly on the offen- sive side, participated in workouts that included weight lifting, film study and on-field practices. The goal was to ease the transi- tion during what was already going to be a diffi- cult offseason with a new coaching staff and work to become the star quarterback so many once projected. ‘‘That’s why I’m doing this. I don’t put in all this time, I don’t sacrifice all this stuff to not be (the starter),’’ Smith said. ‘‘It’s the drive in me that I have and will con- tinue to have. I love football. I want to play this game and I’ve got more to prove than ever, to be honest with you.’’ Not everybody has been willing to accept Smith’s leadership immediately. Michael Crabtree openly challenged Smith’s status as the starter earlier in the week and downplayed the quarter- back’s efforts to organize workouts. His comments came after Smith questioned why Crabtree wasn’t at See SMITH, page 2B Oakland Athletics DAL Miami 103 Dallas 112 3-2 San Francisco 49ers