Miami Dolphins wide receiver Brian Hartline

The phone would ring in the middle of the night,'' Greene said. ``And you knew it was either Mr. Steinbrenner or an illness in the family. After a while, you started to root for an illness in the family.''

Here's the story that led to that quote:

During his first spring training working for Steinbrenner in 1987, Greene returned to his hotel room after a dinner with longtime Sports Illustrated writer Ed Swift. He saw the red light blinking on his phone. It was a message from Steinbrenner.

``So I called him back,'' Greene said. ``He railed on me for not being available, and he told me I needed to be in my room by 9 p.m. every day moving forward.''

The next day was Greene's 33rd birthday, and some of the writers wanted to take him out to dinner. Greene declined, telling them that Steinbrenner had imposed a curfew on him and that ``I was able to stay out later for my bar mitzvah 20 years ago.''

Well, after another day passed, a writer published the bar mitzvah comment, causing an irate Steinbrenner to call Greene and fire him. It would be the first of many times, but the only firing that truly scared him.

``I made plans the next day to make a 10 a.m. flight back to New York,'' Greene said. ``I'm in my hotel at 8:30 a.m. I was packed and ready, and I get a call from George's assistant. She says, `George is furious that you're not at the office yet!'

``I said, `He fired me!' She told me to just get to work as fast as possible.''

So Greene hustled over to the office. When he arrived at 9 a.m., Steinbrenner again railed into him.

``You know we start at 8:30!'' Steinbrenner said. ``If you're late again, you're fired!''

Greene, having learned his first big lesson with Steinbrenner, responded with a simple, two-word answer: ``Yes, sir.''

To this day, Greene carries a laminated Trivial Pursuit card in his back pocket. Under the sports category, the question on the card reads, ``What baseball owner imposed a 9 p.m. curfew on public relations director Harvey Greene during 1986 spring training?''

 They don't know if there were any injuries, although a man identifying Chad Pennington himself as Hartline's attorney told FHP by phone that Hartline was uninjured.

 

What they do know, according to the accident report, is that the Ford is registered to Hartline; nobody reported the accident; nobody was present when troopers arrived; and Hartline still hasn't made contact with FHP to talk about the accident.

 

When an FHP trooper called Hartline's home, the report said, a guest told them Davone Bess Hartline wasn't home and she didn't know when he would be back. The guest gave the number of Hartline's wife, Lindsay, who was in California. Troopers called and left a message on her cellphone. The person claiming to be Hartline's attorney called in response to that message.

 

Whoever was driving the car could be cited for failure to report an accident and Miami Dolphins jerseys leaving the scene of an accident involving property damage. On the crash report, the estimated damages were $10,000 to Hartline's vehicle and $22,000 to the Escalade.

 

An entry on Hartline's Twitter account said Monday night that the Ohio native is back in his home state. Another entry said he was in California's Napa Valley on June 29. There's no direct reference to him returning to South Florida from California.

 

But Hartline wrote July 5 on Twitter that he was ``waiting for my dude to get into town'' Jake Long then on July 6 that he and a friend were ``starting our 1,400-mile trip to Ohio.'' Hartline's hometown of Canton is 1,177 miles from his Fort Lauderdale home. Northern California is 2,500 miles from Canton.