CURSES! THEY SWEAR BY THESE WORDS.

Byline: KEVIN MODESTI

A film all about what its Web site calls ``the infamous F-word'' hit a few local theaters last week. I haven't seen this documentary, but I've read the reviews and the list of famous participants. For my money, the most shocking thing about it is the apparent absence of sports people.

Drew Carey, Janeane Garofalo and Bill Maher (from the comedy world) are interviewed. Pat Boone, Ice-T, Alanis Morrisette (from the music world). Sam Donaldson, Michael Medved, Dennis Prager (from the political world). And Tera Patrick (never heard of her).

What, no Pete Carroll? No Tommy Lasorda?

The film's title is -- depending on where you read it -- ``F--k,'' or ``F---,'' or ``****.'' Which happens to be the word Carroll kept shouting at the officials during the replay controversy in the USC-Oregon game last Saturday (``Bleep you! Bleep you! Bleep you!''), and the root of the word Carroll used to persuade the ref to wind the timer at the end of the USC-Washington game last month (``Run the bleeping clock!'').

These incidents left lip readers in TV land either scandalized or amused. The latest prompted the Trojans coach to apologize once to the Pac- 10 director of officials and twice publicly to anybody offended by his loss of composure.

As for the question of how many viewers actually were offended: Trojans athletics spokesman Tim Tessalone said Wednesday the school received only a handful of complaining e-mails on the subject from fans, probably fewer than it gets about this play call or that lineup change.

Of course, maybe the sort of people who would care about a football coach swearing would do so by U.S. Mail. The letters haven't arrived yet.

What does it mean? Not the word, but the use of it in public by a respected representative of an institution of higher education.

We should take this obscene outburst by as polite a man as Pete Carroll, and the embarrassment evident from his apologies, as a reminder of the impossible pressure coaches and managers are under to win, win, win, while sticking to the highest standards of decorum. Every now and then the emotional lid blows off, as it must for George Patton in battle or Dick Cheney mid-campaign.

Normally, you can't even get the gee-whiz Carroll to call the BCS the BSC. But when a game is on the line, it's to hell with Miss Manners.

There's something hilarious about a head coach or a baseball manager -- a control freak who's supposed to act the adult in a locker room of big children -- losing control. If you don't think so, listen to the tapes of Lasorda (13 F-words in the rant on Dave Kingman's performance) or Lee Elia (35 in the old Cubs manager's ``bleep those bleepin' fans'' explosion) and tell me you didn't laugh.

It's funnier when you realize that sometimes these guys are putting on a look-how-mad-I-am act, pushing our buttons. Or aiming to fire up a drowsy team.

Bobby Knight's chin-tap on a Texas Tech player was news because it was Knight, because it's right in character. Carroll's F-bombs are interesting because it's Carroll, because it's out of character.

In our endless pursuit of what makes Carroll tick, we've finally found an area where he can't hang with the big boys. Come back when you've rattled off a phrase like ``I'm bleepin' bleeped off to lose a bleepin' game'' (Lasorda, Kingman Address, May 14, 1978).

A sportswriter colleague tells me he was put off by Carroll's language, the writer having changed his attitude and cleaned up his own mouth since becoming a father recently. His wife never swears, and quit after a few minutes when she tried to watch ``The Sopranos,'' creeped out when ritual murder is accompanied by something less than the Queen's English.

Inevitably, you talk about cursing and you trip over hypocrisy, the realization you care but you don't care. How is it that I think there's nothing wrong with Pete Carroll or Tom Lasorda going HBO on us, yet I giggle at the tapes as if they've been caught doing something naughty?

The Associated Press review of ``F---'' has a footnote stating the film is ``not rated but contains language, sexuality and nudity.'' No, uh, kidding, Sherlock.

From here, the last word on the worst word in sports is that as long as you can put it in perspective for your kids, there's nothing wrong with getting a yuk out of the coach showing he's human. It's a four-letter expression of fire, of swagger, of audacity.

Karl Dorrell ought to try it.

heymodesti(AT_SIGN)aol.com

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Photo:

(color) Pete Carroll -- using language not fit for print -- argues with referees about a replay Saturday.

Hans Gutknecht/Staff Photographer