Scorecard

Tully tried for 18'8�" twice more, missing narrowly on each occasion. "The emotion was gone," he says. "And they had so many poles and tapes and cherry-picking ladders around the bar it looked like they were getting ready for a hanging.

"Then somebody came out of the stands with an International Amateur Athletic Federation rule book. He told me the rules only required measurement before a record attempt." So the vault seemed to qualify as a world record. "I quit," said Tully, who had a third jump coming to him.

The next day, watching the decathlon pole vaulters struggle to clear 12 feet, Tully learned that his informant had evidently misread the rule concerning remeasurements and that they were in fact required. "If only they'd marked the bar," moaned Tully. "Look at them. Today they're measuring perfectly."

TAKE A GANDER
You may remember the new duck decoy (SCORECARD, March 20) that has feet, the better to fool the real thing flying overhead. Now here is the goose kite, which hunters in blinds can send aloft while marking time. The kite, which comes in both Canada and snow goose models, is shaped and painted like a goose, and the theory is it can be spotted at a greater distance than can more conventional decoys. All you need is $25.95, a good wind and a dumb goose.

REPLAY PAY

The NFL is worried about the guy on an oil rig at sea, and others like him. How can they survive on Sunday afternoons in the fall without pro football to watch? The NFL has the solution.

It seems a Dallas Cowboy fan living in Houston complained to Dallas General Manager Tex Schramm that he frequently misses Cowboy telecasts because the Oilers black out Cowboy games when Houston plays at home. He wondered if it would be possible to buy tapes of Dallas games and watch them in his living room.

That started the football rolling. "Because of the growth of home videotape devices," says Schramm, "we—meaning the NFL—are looking into the potential marketing and sale of tapes, either of complete games or highlights. This could be an exciting new dimension for so many Cowboy fans who are scattered all over the world. Several large business firms have already contacted us for permission to tape our games so they can be sent to their employees in foreign countries, and even on oil rigs at sea. We will keep you posted on developments."

That was the sound of a cash register you just heard.

DELAWARE WATERGATE