Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 26, 1995 TAG: 9504260108
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: JACK BOGACZYK
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Baseball's Opening Day ... on April 25 ... at night ... in Miami ... at a stadium named for an NFL legend ... with substitute umpires ... to start a 144-game season ... which leads to wild-card playoffs ... and maybe even a World Series ... at which there likely won't be a commissioner.
Tradition. That's part of baseball's charm, right?
Who says a salary cap doesn't work? NFL free-agent signings since Feb.15 are closing in on 150. The average per-year value on contracts is up about 99 percent, from $520,730 to more than $1.03 million, and there are more than 50 new millionaires, after the salary cap rose from $34.06 million to $37.1 million for 1995.
Virginia will have a first-round pick in the NBA draft in June ... but it won't be Cory Alexander. Junior Burrough's tournament play, not to mention last week's NBA camp in Phoenix, has his stock and millions rising at power forward.
``I loved Junior in the [NCAA] tournament,'' one NBA general manager said. ``He played like that in the ACC tournament, too. He's much better than most people think he is.''
You won't have any problem finding ticket-order forms for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. There are 36.5 million of them, and they'll be available at Coke displays in stores starting next week. Ordering will be what's tough on a 48-page form.
Prices range from $6 to $600. The average seat is just under $40. Yes, Atlanta Olympic organizers say there are about 11 million tickets available for the next Summer Games. However, about 4 million of those already are reserved for various sponsors, and about 40 percent of the 11 million are in field hockey, soccer and baseball.
You can make it easy on yourself by simply ordering the Patron package. That's 64 prime seats at more than 32 big Olympic sessions. It's only $50,000. Or, you can rent a luxury box at some events. Those range between $10,500 and $1.3 million.
Atlanta's Lenny Wilkens deserved the Olympic men's basketball head coaching job. He wasn't picked just to save on travel expenses.
Who says the shortest track in Winston Cup racing doesn't offer enough pop? At Martinsville Speedway on Sunday, Ted Musgrave's Ford bumps Ricky Rudd's Ford in the rain-abbreviated Hanes 500. The race ends, and Rudd's crew chief, Bill Ingle, gives Musgrave a piece of his fist. Is this why ESPN has Dr. Jerry Punch working the pits?
Now that it appears Jim Druckenmiller has won the 1995 quarterback job on a veteran team at Virginia Tech, the Hokies should consider how formidable his September will be. Tech begins with three Lane Stadium games, but two of those are against Boston College and Miami, the two clubs who will be picked to finish ahead of the Hokies in the Big East football race. Then, Tech plays only two of its last eight games at home.
The selections of Mike Frederick and Tyrone Davis in Rounds 3 and 4 of the NFL draft give Virginia's program 10 players selected in the top four rounds over the past five years. In the last 14 years before coach George Welsh's move from Navy to UVa in 1982, the Cavaliers had only three players go in the first four rounds.
If Terry Holland isn't the front-runner for the athletic director's job at Virginia, as one recent report said he wasn't, then why isn't he?
Idaho athletic director Pete Liske, one of the reported finalists for the UVa job, was Penn State's starting quarterback in 1962 and '63. The last of those seasons was the first for George Welsh as a Nittany Lions assistant coach. Liske still stands seventh on the Lions' career list for touchdown passes.
In the crystal baseball, the divisional choices are the Braves, Reds and Padres in the National League and Yankees, Indians and Mariners (unless Randy Johnson is dealt away) in the American League, with Houston and Baltimore as wild-card teams.
The pick here for the NBA Finals has San Antonio against Chicago, as long as Dennis Rodman doesn't leave for a hair dye or Michael Jordan doesn't leave for baseball.
by CNB