Why is this man smiling?

• Author: Kaelble, Steve
• Position: Hoosier Lottery hires Martin Mull to host series of new commercials

Hoosier Lottery hires comedian Martin Mull who once said he likes baseball because "I'll never have to go to Indianapolis."

Hoosiers usually have pretty good memories, especially when it comes to holding grudges, but they apparently are fond enough of comedian Martin Mull to forgive his transgressions and forget them completely.

Mull is the host of a series of new commercials for the Hoosier Lottery. He interviews real-life players of the lottery's instant games, finding out about their superstitions and secrets. According to Indianapolis-based Montgomery, Zukerman, Davis Inc., the lottery's ad agency, the TV and radio spots are going over well.

This guy, however, who is speaking for our lottery is the same guy who bad-mouthed the capital city in a national magazine a few years back. He was asked why he likes baseball more than football, and he replied with his top reason: "I'll never have to go to Indianapolis."

That remark, needless to say, didn't sit well with local civic leaders and the folks at Claypool Court, the downtown Indianapolis retail center that had hired Mull to appear in its commercials. It also probably didn't go over well at Bush Stadium, the historic diamond where the Indianapolis Indians play minor-league ball every summer. After being subjected to some well-publicized outrage, Mull tried to extract his foot from his mouth by saying that the place he really meant was Maryland's capital, Annapolis. A clever try, but most of the offended didn't buy it at the time.

What people in the maligned Circle City bought this year was a couple of days of Mull's time. There's still no major-league baseball, but roughly $45,000 lured the comedian back to Indiana for a weekend commercial shoot at two Indianapolis shopping malls (that actually was a bargain, compared with the quarter-million-dollar rate floated by Bob Saget, star of "Full...