THE WRITING ON (AND OFF) THE WALL GUIDANCE ALWAYS SUGGESTED.

Byline: TOM HOFFARTH

Forget about the inherent dangers these days of taking the family to a game at Dodger Stadium. Steve Garvey has enough trouble trying to sift out which movies are safe enough for his kids to see, especially with the erratic ratings system.

``As parents, we really do have to see the movies before we let our kids see them, because even a PG-13 gets too edgy sometimes,'' the Dodgers' always-image-conscious former All-Star was saying the other day from his home in Park City, Utah.

``Nowadays, kids have access to so much stuff, you can't control everything they see. So the challenge we have as parents is to get our kids to see good, quality, family fun.''

Which is why he thought it would be fairly safe to take a cameo role as a Little League coach in the just-released, straight-to-DVD ``Sandlot 2.''

Although this one carries a PG label (``some material may not be suitable for children ... language, rude humor and brief violence''), writer/director David Mickey Evans has cut it from the same ``Wonder Years''-kind of cloth as the original ``Sandlot'' released eight years ago, just moving the time frame to 1972, when girls finally were getting the same opportunities as boys.

Curses, you say to anyone trying to spin off the original masterpiece. But the message isn't lost a generation later.

``Different kids, same fun, same dog, same James Earl Jones character,'' said Garvey, who, in addition to having four daughters in their 20s, has Little Leaguer Ryan (12), Olivia (11) and T-ball player Shawn (6) in the house to look out for.

``With the way youth sports are these days - everything organized from practices to games to tournaments - kids don't get a chances to just go out and play,'' Garvey said. ``Maybe they'll see a movie like this, a throwback to when kids did more of these kind of things, and it'll stimulate them to do something more simple.'' ...

--And don't even get us started on the subject of high school athletes using steroids, although George Lopez isn't shying away from it.

On Tuesday's episode of ``The George Lopez Show'' (Ch. 7, 8:30 p.m.), he tries to use his humor to defuse the otherwise serious subject with a storyline he and executive producer Bruce Helford came up with.

It's centered on a high school football and baseball player named Jason McNamara (played by Bryan Fisher), the boyfriend of Lopez's daughter, who has come to live with their family.

Lopez discovers Jason's father (played by Stacy Keach) condones the kid's steroid use to get an edge on a college scholarship. Lopez's advice to Jason: ``Man, do it old school - lift weights. You might have to work twice as hard, but that way you can walk around the gym with your head held high and your huevos down low.'' ...

--On Wednesday's episode of ``CSI: NY'' (Ch. 2, 10 p.m.) entitled ``The Closer,'' the crack detective team of Mac Taylor (Gary Sinse) and Stella Bonasera (Melina Kanakaredes) tries to figure out why a Boston Red Sox fan is found dead in the Yankee Stadium parking lot.

Not that we're giving away any secrets, but maybe the killer was provoked by rabid New York sports talk radio host Rico Savalas - hauntingly played by the bombastic Petros Papadakis, the KMPC-AM (1540) talk-show host. ...

--What are the morning odds of George Steinbrenner ever having Giacomo Sumner's dad, Sting, do the national anthem at a Yankees game? ...

--According to the voters picking the NBA's Most Valuable Player, P.J. Brown (who averaged 10.8 points, 9.0 rebounds and 2.2 assists a game for the 18-64 Hornets this season) is worth more than Kobe Bryant (27.6, 5.9 and 6.0 for the 34-48 Lakers). ...

--One entrepreneur is peddling bright orange shirts that say ``Thank you, Kobe. ... Love, Miami'' for $16 (plus $6 shipping) in men's and women's sizes at a Web site named (what else?) www.thankyoukobe.com. ...