NCAA adopts standards limiting aluminum bats
INDIANAPOLIS -- The speed of a baseball hit with a metal bat would not be greater than one hit with wood under new standards adopted Tuesday by the NCAA.
The association's executive committee affirmed a recommendation made last month by a research panel to limit the exit speed of metal bats to 97 mph in games involving NCAA schools for at least three years, starting in January.
Hoping to make metal bats perform more like wood, the panel recommended a batted-ball exit speed be adopted for non-wood bats equivalent to the highest average speed using major league-quality 34-inch solid wood bats, which is less than 97 mph. The executive committee received the report in August but delayed implementing the panel's recommendations pending further tests.
Many college teams last season went to smaller aluminum bats, one of the recommendations by the panel, to increase safety and to reverse a trend of higher scoring than with wood bats, which broke easily.
Sosa's wife hospitalized, released
CHICAGO -- The wife of Chicago Cubs slugger Sammy Sosa was hospitalized for more than 12 hours Tuesday with an illness linked to her prescription drugs.
Sonia Sosa, 25, went home shortly before 6 p.m. EDT, according to Northwestern Memorial Hospital spokeswoman Ellen Petasnick. She had been admitted to the hospital shortly after she arrived at 5 a.m. in an ambulance from the couple's downtown apartment on Lake Michigan.
"I received a call about 5 o'clock in the morning, and I was scared, because that's my wife," Sosa said in Philadelphia, where the Cubs played the Phillies.
He wasn't specific about what happened but said his wife had been taking prescription medication for her menstrual cycle.
WSU, FOX Sports extend broadcast deal
PULLMAN -- Washington State and FOX Sports Northwest have agreed to a five-year extension of their broadcast agreement in football, basketball and other sports, the television network announced Tuesday.
The agreement runs through 2004.
Umps call for meeting in Chicago Monday
NEW YORK -- In a move that may reveal its remaining strength, the Major League Umpires Association called for its members to gather in Chicago on Monday, the day after the regular season.
National League umpire Jerry Crawford, the union's president, gave no indication of the meeting's agenda, saying in a Sept. 22 memo that "the purpose of the meeting is to discuss union business."
The union's strategy of mass resignations backfired in July and cost one-third its members their jobs.
A dissident group led by American League umpires Joe Brinkman, John Hirschbeck and Dave Phillips is circulating cards to petition the National Labor Relations Board for a secret-ballot election to decertify the current union and form a new one.
Tar Heel assistant Ford busted for DUI
DURHAM, N.C. -- North Carolina basketball assistant Phil Ford was arrested Monday night and charged with drunken driving, Durham police said.
Police provided few details of the arrest, other than saying it happened about 9:30 p.m. EDT.
North Carolina athletic department officials said Ford, an assistant at North Carolina for 11 years, would take a medical leave of absence and receive an evaluation. It was unclear how long his leave will last or if his evaluation would be part of a substance abuse program.
LeFlore arrested after stadium ceremonies
DETROIT -- Former Detroit Tigers outfielder Ron LeFlore on Tuesday avoided 45 days in jail on charges he failed to make child support payments.
LeFlore was arrested Monday after Tiger Stadium's closing ceremonies on charges he failed to pay more than $50,000 in back child support to DeBorah Lewis of Detroit. He was ordered to pay $3,000 or go to jail.
The 51-year-old LeFlore has been living in St. Petersburg, Fla. He returned to Michigan to take part in the events surrounding the last game at Tiger Stadium.
His adopted son and nephew, Gerald LeFlore, said his father has paid $300 a month in Florida for at least a year. Ron LeFlore also made lump sum payments after various court orders, but Judge Mary Beth Kelly ruled that LeFlore still owed Lewis about $52,000 to $56,000 for their daughter, LaRonda LeFlore, now 23.
Tarkenton fined for accounting fraud
WASHINGTON -- Hall of Fame quarterback Fran Tarkenton was among those cited Tuesday when the SEC announced enforcement actions against 68 people and companies for alleged accounting fraud, including creating phony invoices and inflating earnings.
Tarkenton, the former head of a computer software company, agreed to settle by paying a $100,000 fine without admitting or denying wrongdoing, the Securities and Exchange Commission said.
In Tarkenton's case, he and 10 other former executives of his computer software and consulting firm, KnowledgeWare Inc., were accused by the SEC of fraudulently inflating by millions of dollars the company's earnings in reports for its fiscal year ended June 30, 1994.
CBA team may Stampede out of Nampa
NAMPA -- The chief executive officer and general manager of the Idaho Stampede is warning that lagging ticket sales in Canyon County could have consequences on where the third-year Continental Basketball Association team plays its games.
"Basically, what the community at large is telling us is it has a little apathy on whether we stay or whether we go," Clay Moser said Monday. "At the moment, there have been little to no results out of our efforts in Canyon County to try and instill in them the urgency of the matter."
Boise's Bank of America Centre has approached the Stampede to discuss the possibility of hosting the team's home games, and Moser said that location has advantages.
The Stampede, along with Nampa Mayor Maxine Horn and the Nampa Chamber of Commerce, pushed during the summer to recruit new season ticket holders in Canyon County, but the effort was not successful, Moser said.
