If you detest outlandish athletic hot-dogging as much as I, you’re probably super-jubilant over how the Kansas City Chiefs lucked out against the Cleveland Browns in last Sunday’s incredible football battle.

Two bits of egotistical stupidity, then victory for Kansas City in a game the Browns had won, twice, but threw away. Hot dog!

The place-kicking duo, booter and holder, taunted the Chiefs after their collaboration produced a two-point lead with almost no time left. The 15-yard penalty made the Brownies kick off deeper than normal and gave KC an advantage. But even that wasn’t really enough, because Cleveland held on. Until Â

Dwayne Rudd thought he’d incapacitated KC’s Trent Green, but Green kept the ball alive by lateraling to massive tackle John Tait. Clock dead, but the game was still in progress. Granted, Tait should have been called for delay of game with his thundering canter, yet he was able to get to the Brownie 25.

In the interim, Hog Dog Rudd not only had ripped off his helmet on the field  a direct rules violation  but also threw the hat and then began stomping along beating his chest to show off to the Dog Pounders. Games can’t end on a defensive penalty, which cost Rudd and his team dearly.

KC was given half the distance to the goal line, setting up a chip shot for field goaler Morten Anderson. The guys with the frankfurter tendencies couldn’t find enough mustard to cover their gaffes.

Rudd, by the way, has a history of gloating and taunting. He did it with the Minnesota Vikings and all his previous victims also must be chortling with glee.

I always pull for the Chiefs, but this one was especially delicious. People have talked and written and bleated and bloated about the disgusting trend toward hot-dogging in sports. That was about as effective as trying to stop fading Liza Minnelli from slurping into that death-rattle vibratto of hers.

But along comes evidence that hot-dogging can be very costly; maybe somebody will listen. Hope there are a lot more costly penalties to cancel some of the antics of overbearing thespians.

Another pro rule I love is the one that prevents a defender from blindsiding and crucifying a would-be receiver when he has no chance to catch the ball. If there’s a contest for the porkhide, fair game. When it’s overthrown, no cheap shots. Could save a life or two.

Back to hot-dogging, I hope the Kansas University Jayhawks don’t get delusions of grandeur and engage in any embarrassing showboating, even if they finally beat a couple opponents, anybody, guys. OK, so you tackle someone for a two-yard loss, maybe even sack a quarterback. Wait until this team is doing a little better before acting as if you’d just discovered Osama bin Laden’s cave and snapped his spine.

There’s still a lot to be said about being guided by that marvelous old credo: Act like you’ve been there. Trouble is, KU hasn’t been anywhere yet, so it has a lot of squares to fill before it can entertain any notions of chest-beating, finger-pointing and helmet-throwing.

l Want a little nostalgia involving a basketball icon? Check the Journal-World online (http://www.kusports.com/basketball/history/phog_allen/letters/) for some letters written by the fabled Phog Allen.

Thanks to ex-Jayhawk and Olympian Bill Hougland, we have an 11-page letter Phog wrote to his squad in August of 1950, prior to the 1950-51 season. He touches on a vast range of subjects, including the atrocities in the Korean War, and gives the Jayhawks all kinds of advice. Phog not only was a great speaker but a fine writer.

Then there are some letters the Watkins Museum’s Steve Jansen found, including one to famed Emporia editor William Allen White, about the value of athletics. Phog takes W.A.W. to task for not understanding what sports can do for young people and it’s a gem.

OK, now comes the pitch for help, please, somebody! During World War II, Phog regularly sent newsletters to his players, talking about the campus, cheering them up, praising them for there armed service activity. Somebody must have saved one or two of those and would be willing to share.

If you have one of Allen’s wartime missives and will let us put them on the net, please let me know. I wouldn’t want anyone to read some of the sappy letters I sent home in 1943-44-45, but many would sure relish Phog’s Phantasies.

l If the blacks own basketball, as many claim, and white guys can’t jump, how come there was such an overwhelming predominance of Caucasian and Hispanic faces on the courts where the United States got its tail beat in the recent World Championships in Indianapolis?

America didn’t have its marquee pros, but it had a wealth of talent that might have prevailed if the Yanks had had one guy  Jason Kidd or Mike Bibby  to quarterback. Baron Davis just didn’t have it. And who says George Karl is a good enough coach to get a real team effort in only about two weeks?

Sure, the Europeans and Latinos have been working together a lot longer. But NBA guys like Vlade Divac hadn’t been with those teams much since they were getting rich in America.

Contrary to what Satchel Paige advised, we better look back because the world is gaining on us in basketball. More guys need to think about having USA on their jerseys at crunch time rather than ME, and playing one-on-one sandlot ball. Also, these foreigners can shoot the ball, something that often gets left in the dust in our dedication to the slam dunk and tomahawk dip.

They still call it basketball. That means you ought to be able to hit from farther than two feet if you want to beat a really good opponent.