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Denver Nuggets Star Player Investigated For Internet Sex Crimes

Denver Nuggets reserve center Chris "Birdman" Andersen has been excused indefinitely from all team-related activities after Douglas County sheriff's deputies searched his home Thursday as part of an investigation by the department's Internet Crimes Against Children unit.

So, Andersen won't be on the bench when the Nuggets face the Los Angeles Lakers in Game 6 of their playoff series Thursday night.

The team issued a statement saying Andersen has been "excused from all team-related activities indefinitely as he deals with the reported investigation" and declined further comment.

The 10th-year pro hasn't played in the postseason after averaging 5.3 points and 4.6 rebounds during the regular season.

Sheriff's spokesman Ron Hanavan confirmed that the search took place Thursday. Andersen has not been arrested and Hanavan said no arrest warrant has been issued.

The department began investigating Andersen in February after receiving information from a law enforcement agency in California. Hanavan declined to release details, including the nature of any pending charges, citing an ongoing investigation. He said they're asking that the case be sealed.

Andersen answered the door at his Larkspur, Colo., home, about 40 miles south of Denver, and let deputies in, said Deborah Sherman, another sheriff's spokesperson.

"He did cooperate. He spoke with deputies," Sherman said.

The unit investigating Andersen investigates child porn, Internet luring, child predators and child pornography.

The sheriff's office said it recovered property from Andersen's home that investigators believe is connected with the case. Sherman said items typically seized by the unit include computers, hard drives, and thumb drives, though she said she could not provide details on what items were seized from Andersen's home, citing the ongoing investigation.

An arrest is not imminent, Sherman said, saying that it typically takes several weeks to a month for investigators to collect evidence from the seized items.

Deputies requested that the search warrant application filed in court be sealed because of the ongoing investigation.

Mark Bryant, who serves as Andersen's agent and attorney, said: "At this time, I respect the process and I have no further comment to protect the integrity of everyone involved. We'll proceed from there."

A message left at Andersen's home wasn't immediately returned Thursday to The Associated Press.

"For me right now, I think I'm at a stage where I don't know enough information," Nuggets coach George Karl said before Thursday night's game. "I think we all were advised probably not to talk about it until we know the information. The only thing I will say is I trust Chris. In my years with him, he's been fantastic. I think he's really grown as a person. We're going to support him and stand by him."

Andersen is in his seventh season in Denver, although his playing time dropped dramatically this season as young players gobbled up more minutes.

"He's been dealt a bad hand by me," Karl said. "For a guy that's played great basketball for me and the Nuggets over the years, (he's) kind of been phased out because of the youth movement, and in the middle of the season is not always fair. I personally think Bird is a very good basketball player, can play for many NBA teams. He could play for us someday, if the situation would open itself up again."

Karl said he had a chance to speak with Andersen after the morning practice.

"He was emotional. I was in a state where I didn't think, I didn't want to spend a lot of time on that," Karl said.

As for how the news might affect his team on the court, Karl wasn't quite sure.

"I think enough guys individually have been told what's going on. I don't think we have the full information, the full story to analyze or scrutinize," Karl said. "Like I said before, I trust Bird. I think Bird will figure this out."

Andersen has a history of helping out charities during his time in Denver and New Orleans, where he played from 2004-08. According to the Nuggets' media guide, Andersen raised money for Mount Saint Vincent, a home for troubled and abused children, and was honored at the home's 2009 Silver Bell Ball. He's also involved with Alliance for Choice in Education, which provides scholarships for low-income families to use in private schools.

His middle name is Claus, and he dressed up as Santa to raise money for ACE in 2009, according to his media guide bio. He also helped with hunger initiatives while with the Hornets.

With his colorful tattoos and high-flying, shot-blocking act, Andersen has long been a favorite with the fans in the Mile High City.

(by Associated Press)

Mystery Surrounds Death of Junior Seau

Junior Seau, a homegrown superstar who was the fist-pumping, emotional leader of the San Diego Chargers for 13 years, was found shot to death at his home Wednesday morning in what police said appeared to be a suicide. He was 43.

Police Chief Frank McCoy said Seau's girlfriend reported finding him unconscious with a gunshot wound to the chest and lifesaving efforts were unsuccessful. A gun was found near him, McCoy said. Police said no suicide note was found and they didn't immediately know who the gun was registered to.

Seau's death in Oceanside, in northern San Diego County, stunned the region he represented with almost reckless abandon. The same intensity that got the star linebacker ejected for fighting in his first exhibition game helped carry the Chargers to their only Super Bowl, following the 1994 season. A ferocious tackler, he'd leap up, pump a fist and kick out a leg after dropping a ball carrier or quarterback.

"It's a sad thing. It's hard to understand," said Bobby Beathard, who as Chargers general manager took Seau out of Southern California with the fifth pick overall in the 1990 draft. "He was really just a great guy. If you drew up a player you'd love to have the opportunity to draft and have on the team and as a teammate, Junior and Rodney (Harrison), they'd be the kind of guys you'd like to have."

Quarterback Stan Humphries recalled that Seau did everything at the same speed, whether it was practicing, lifting weights or harassing John Elway.

(by Associated Press)

Magic Johnson Completes Historic Purchase of Los Angeles Dodgers

Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt has announced an agreement Monday night to sell the bankrupt team for $2 billion to a group that includes former Lakers star Magic Johnson and former Atlanta Braves and Washington Nationals President Stan Kasten.

The agreement, revealed about five hours after Major League Baseball owners approved three finalists for the auction, is to lead to a transfer of the team by the end of April. It is subject to approval in federal bankruptcy court.

Magic Johnson will leave the operation of the Dodgers to Stan Kasten, a longtime MLB executive.

Mark Walter, chief executive officer of the financial services firm Guggenheim Partners would become the controlling owner. The price would be easily a record for a North American sports franchise.

As part of the agreement, the Dodgers said McCourt and "certain affiliates of the purchasers" would acquire the land surrounding Dodger Stadium for $150 million.

The acquiring group, called Guggenheim Baseball Management, includes Mandalay Entertainment chief executive Peter Guber.

"This agreement with Guggenheim reflects both the strength and future potential of the Los Angeles Dodgers, and assures that the Dodgers will have new ownership with deep local roots, which bodes well for the Dodgers, its fans and the Los Angeles community," McCourt said.

McCourt paid $430 million in 2004 to buy the team, Dodger Stadium and 250 acres of land that include the parking lots, from the Fox division of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., a sale that left the team with about $50 million in cash at the time. The team's debt stood at $579 million as of January, according to a court filing, so even after the divorce payment, taxes and legal and banking fees, he stands to make several hundred million dollars.

Kasten is expected to wind up as the team's top day-to-day executive.

The other two finalists were:

— Stan Kroenke, whose family properties own the NFL's St. Louis Rams, the NBA's Denver Nuggets, the NHL's Colorado Avalanche and Major League Soccer's Colorado Rapids, and who is majority shareholder of Arsenal in the English Premier League.

— Steven Cohen, founder of the hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors and a new limited partner of the New York Mets; biotechnology entrepreneur Patrick Soon-Shiong; and agent Arn Tellem of Wasserman Media Group.

"I am thrilled to be part of the historic Dodger franchise and intend to build on the fantastic foundation laid by Frank McCourt as we drive the Dodgers back to the front page of the sports section in our wonderful community of Los Angeles," Johnson said in a statement.

(by Sporting News Staff

College Elects To Ban U.S. National Anthem at Sporting Events

Goshen College will no longer play The Star-Spangled Banner at sporting events, school leaders announced, reversing last year's decision to allow the use of the national anthem for the first time in the Mennonite college's history.

Some Mennonites had criticized the anthem's lyrics as glorifying war and offensive to the school's pacifist traditions. Goshen's Board of Directors said many felt the school's "allegiance should be to Christ rather than to country."

"As a result of a thoughtful, thorough, prayerful period of listening, learning and discerning," the board said in a June 6 statement, "it is the board's judgment that continuing to play the national anthem compromises our ability to advance the vision (of Goshen College) together."

The switch by the Indiana college, which is affiliated with the Mennonite Church USA, upends a February 2010 decision to permit an instrumental version of the song at athletic gatherings after decades of shunning the patriotic anthem.

Supporters of the anthem, who were mostly non-Mennonites, argued that it "honors our country and improves community relations by welcoming and respecting the views of non-Mennonite students."

The board is now seeking an "alternative" to the national anthem "that fits with sports tradition, that honors country, that resonates with our core values and that respects the views of diverse constituencies."

(by Jack Jenkins)

At Nike, The Bottomline is All That Counts

A few years ago, Kobe Bryant was in big trouble. A woman accused him of rape, a felony sexual assault charge was filed but dropped before the trial and Bryant later settled a civil lawsuit with the woman. Sponsors such as McDonald's understandably bailed on Bryant. But one sponsor did not. Nike stayed put.

Five months ago, Tiger Woods found himself in the midst of the mother of all self-induced, personal scandals. Sponsors such as AT&T and Accenture left him, and who could blame them?

But Nike? Are you kidding? "When his career is over, you'll look back on these indiscretions as a minor blip," company chairman Phil Knight said, swooshing in to wrap Tiger in a big corporate bear hug, all the while keeping an eye on which way the decimal point was moving on that half-billion-dollar golf industry he has constructed on Tiger's broad shoulders.

Not long after Tiger came Big Ben. While no charges were filed, the NFL suspended Ben Roethlisberger for six games and he apologized for his behavior, without saying exactly what it was he had done for which he was so sorry. Almost everyone expressed his or her disappointment in Roethlisberger.

Everyone, that is, except for Nike, which jauntily said he continued to be part of its "roster."

Tammy Wynette, move over. No one stands by its men, particularly its bad, misbehaving men, as Nike does.

"This is business as usual for Nike," Donna Lopiano, president of Sports Management Resources and the former CEO of the Women's Sports Foundation, said on the phone Wednesday. "You think back quite a few years to Charles Barkley saying 'I am not a role model.' Nike just continues to stand there with its brand as this macho, edgy company, no matter what breaks out around them."

That certain edginess has always been the Nike way, going back to the days when Oregon track coach Bill Bowerman, who shook hands with Knight in 1964 to create the company that would become Nike, ruined his wife's waffle iron by pouring rubber into it to create a new sole for their running shoes.

Not long afterward, Steve Prefontaine, the legendary runner from Oregon, became the first athlete to sign with Nike. It was a perfect fit: the dashing, anti-establishment athlete and the daring new company. "Pre," as he was known, was killed at 24 in a car accident in 1975; a statue of him graces the Nike campus, and his name adorns one of its many buildings.

The Nike that Prefontaine helped launch would be unrecognizable to him now, a corporate giant that has become exactly the kind of company he railed against: predictable, bloated, untouchable.

Witness the decision to stick with Woods. It's branded as the typical Nike thing to do, as well as the supportive thing — Nike being there for Tiger when so few else are.

But is it Tiger the man Nike is standing by, or Tiger the cash cow? Nike has built that half-billion-dollar golf business around Woods, so how brash is it really to stick with him when so much money is on the line? Since when did a rebel make a decision after speaking to his accountant?

"Nike, perhaps better than just about any other company, understands what motivates its customers to buy — or even what may prevent them from buying," David Carter, executive director of the University of Southern California Sports Business Institute, said in an e-mail.

"The outrage is not only relative, but consistently wanes over time. Where were all the protesters that were anticipated upon Michael Vick's return? How quickly did Kobe Bryant rehabilitate his reputation after some championships and an 81-point game?

"The behavior of the athletes Nike has under contract has far less impact on their sales because they are an endemic brand, and fans separate performance-related attributes from the police blotter."

If it's all about the money, Nike wins. Carter is right; even if people say they'll never buy another Nike product due to the misbehavior of Woods or Roethlisberger, Knight is still laughing all the way to the bank.

But what if it's not all about the money? What if the character of a company actually matters, perhaps not so much now, but sometime in the future? What if history judges Nike by more than the decisions it made to save its bottom line? What then?

"There's no question that the right thing for a company to do is to drop athletes who treat other people so badly," Lopiano said. "What does it say when a company doesn't do that? It says that they like the reputation of being sexist because it fits in their edgy, macho, not-so-nice-male brand. Companies that care about these ethical issues do pull back.

"It says something about the company, and ultimately it says something about the leadership of the company, when they don't."

(by Christine Brennan)

Disturbing Prognosis For Progress in Sports Performances

It merited only a few paragraphs inside newspaper sports sections. Crystal Cox, a member of the gold-medal-winning U.S. women's 1,600-meter relay team in the 2004 Athens Olympics, had admitted to using a performance-enhancing drug. Cox would lose her medal and be banned from competition for four years.

On the surface, the announcement last month seemed just another episode of sports doping and its sad consequences. But to many sports scientists, the news was evidence of a broader trend. They believe that human athletic performance has peaked, and only cheating or technological advances will result in a rash of new world records.

A French researcher who analyzed a century's worth of world records concluded in a recent paper that the peak of athletic achievement was reached in 1988. Eleven world records were broken that year in track and field. Seven of them still stand.

That paper and others published in the last two years suggest that the Olympic motto -- Citius, Altius, Fortius (Faster, Higher, Stronger) -- is becoming an anachronism.

"We saw a strong evolution of performance during the past century," says study author Geoffroy Berthelot, a researcher at INSEP, an internationally respected school and research institute for athletes in Paris. "Then in the 1990s we started to see a decrease in performance. Now, there are a lot of events that don't show any progression at all."

In track and field, Berthelot found, peak times have not improved in 64% of events since 1993. In swimming, performances stagnated in 47% of events after 1990, rising again around 2000 when new high-tech swimsuits proven to improve performance were introduced.

Achievement appears to have plateaued throughout the sports world. Records in winter sports -- which are, in general, younger than many summer sports -- are still on the rise, but in ever-smaller increments, says Carl Foster, director of the human performance laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, and past president of the American College of Sports Medicine.

"World records are indeed flattening," he says. "The likelihood that a world record occurs is becoming less and less."

The prospect that humans have given all they've got is generating some discomfort among elite athletes, trainers, researchers and sports federation officials, as evidenced by the furious interest in training methods and nutritional enhancements that may squeeze an extra hundredth of a second off a performance.

Some sports scientists predict a greater reliance on equipment or waning public interest in individual events. Others worry about heightened pressure to cheat.

"What happens when world records cease to be achieved on a regular basis?" says Conrad Earnest, director of exercise biology at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center in Baton Rouge, La., a leading science research organization. "I think the public thinks that athletes will get better and better. That's why they tune in to watch. I don't know if people realize that athletes can't keep improving at the rates that they have been."

Using history as his guide, Berthelot doesn't expect a banner Winter Olympics. His study, published in January in the journal PLoS One, is an exhaustive analysis of track and field and swimming world records over the last 109 years. It reported that athletic prowess peaked in 1943 and again in 1958, 1968 and 1988, correlating with periods of international conflict or economic wealth that stirred competitive juices.

Italian researcher Giuseppe Lippi has also concluded that human athleticism has reached its apogee. An associate professor in morphological-biomedical sciences at the University of Verona, Lippi analyzed world records ratified by the International Assn. of Athletics Federations from 1900 to 2007 in nine sports disciplines. He found that "improvement has essentially stopped or reached a plateau in several specialties."

Mark Denny, a marine sciences and biomechanics professor at Stanford, says athletic achievement is constrained by basic biomechanics. According to his statistical models, the maximum attainable speed for male sprinters is only a few percentage points greater than what has already been observed. Women have already reached their top speed, by his calculations.

Further, the global portrait of athletics is changing.

In the last century, Foster says, participants from many parts of the world have begun to compete. That makes it easier to find what researchers call "extreme outliers," people blessed with the right genetics and right circumstances to excel.

And elite athletes have squeezed every ounce of advantage from their training regimens. Most devote themselves to a single sport and utilize a team of trainers and coaches in pursuit of a competitive edge.

"Everyone in Vancouver is pretty much a full-time athlete," Foster said. "Once you become a full-time athlete, the body only does so much."

Technology has become so important in athletic competitions that the winner of an event may be the person with the latest gear.

Apprehension that technology may overtake sports was reflected in the decision last year by the International Swimming Federation to ban the kind of high-performance swimsuits that Michael Phelps used while winning eight gold medals in 2008.

According to Berthelot's paper, in the 2008 Beijing Games, the swimsuit was the determining factor in 21 of 22 world records.

The swimming federation "made a decision to go away from world records," Foster said. "You can make an argument that there may never be a world record in swimming again. We may have broken them all."

In today's sports, the wild card is science, says Lippi.

"Future limits to athletic performance will be determined less and less by the innate physiology of the athlete, and more and more by scientific and technological advances and by the still-evolving judgment on where to draw the line between what is 'natural' and what is artificially enhanced," he wrote in his paper, published in 2008 in the British Medical Bulletin.

Some observers fear an era of rampant doping as athletes seek an edge.

Peter Weyand, an associate professor of applied physiology and biomechanics at Southern Methodist University, used a series of biomechanics experiments on runners to show that humans could theoretically top the world-record speed of 28 mph, set by Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt in 2008, ultimately reaching speeds of 35 or 40 miles per hour.

The prediction, outlined in a paper Weyand published last month in the Journal of Applied Physiology, is based on the idea that humans could run faster if they were able to apply much greater force to the ground.

The speed at which muscle fibers contract limits how quickly a runner's limbs can apply force to a running surface. The key to improved speed, Weyand says, is to identify ways to allow muscle fibers to generate force more rapidly, such as through drugs, nutrients or gene transfer.

Use of gene therapies in sports is, so far, theoretical. But researchers believe it won't be long before athletes use substances or therapies designed to enhance their DNA.

Researchers at the Salk Institute in San Diego have shown that an experimental drug can reprogram how muscles respond to exercise. Mice given the drug could run farther than with exercise training alone. In an editorial in this month's issue of the journal Science, a leading genetic researcher warned that some gene therapies may be used by athletes before they've been tested in humans.

But performance based on science, not natural ability, may have less public appeal. And athletes who never improve may no longer hold our interest.

"Today we really focus on who is the best: Who are the summiters. Who can jump or run the highest," Berthelot notes. "Maybe we need to focus more on the competition; focus more on the winner of the race, not the fastest guy on earth."

Perhaps such a focus would have prevented Cox from using anabolic steroids in her relay race in Athens and having to hand over her gold medal six years later.

Even if athletes don't get any better, says Foster, they're still pretty darn good. Just watch the replays of Bolt or tune in to speed skater Shani Davis' races.

"These people are just different to begin with, and they have devoted unbelievable time to their sport," he says. "Sometimes you look at them and say, 'This is as good as it can be done. This is as good as the human species can get.' "

(by Shari Roan)

The World Champion Lakers Take White House by Storm

The Lakers became the first NBA champions to meet with President Barack Obama on Monday, when they visited the White House in the middle of their eight-game road trip out East.

Obama knows his hoops, and being from Chicago, was excited to meet Phil Jackson, who (as he reminded during his speech) won six of his 10 championships while coaching the Bulls. Obama also got in a dig at Magic Johnson, who just so happened to be a member of the Lakers team that Michael Jordan's Bulls defeated to earn MJ his first NBA title back in 1991.

An avid basketball fan, Obama says no team exemplified excellence on the court more than the Lakers did last year in winning their 15th league championship.

Obama said Monday he was especially excited to meet Lakers coach Phil Jackson, who has won 10 championships, though he didn't hesitate to remind the team that six of those victories were with Obama's hometown Chicago Bulls.

Obama commended the players not only for their athletic achievements, but also their work off the court. The players held a fitness clinic for Washington-area school children Monday, and several players are donating money to relief efforts in Haiti.

(by AP)

Ode To Elin: An Apology Tiger Might Make

Sometimes we wish for 'The Better',
When we have it good as it gets.

Sometimes the grass isn't greener,
Soon as we find out, we forget.

Sometimes a fool doesn't know he's a fool...
Sometimes a 'Dog', he don't know he's a dog,

Sometimes I do stupid things to you,
When I really didn't mean it at all.

And sometimes a Man is gonna be a Man...
It's not an excuse...it's just how it is.

Sometimes the wrong don't know that they're wrong,
Sometimes the strong aint always so strong!

Sometimes a girl is gonna be a girl...
She don't want to deal with all the drama in your world!

Lord knows I don't mean to bring it to you,
So, girl I'm sorry for the stupid things I wish I didn't do...but I do.

(by Kenneth "Babyface" Edmonds, from the song 'Sorry For The Stupid Things')

Performance-Enhancers Have a History in All of Sport

In 15 big-league seasons in the late 1800s, pitcher James "Pud" Galvin won an astounding 364 games and completed an even more astonishing 646.

He was considered so effective that he was said to reduce opposing batters to "pudding" (hence his nickname).

The secret of Galvin's success? It may have been something called the Brown-Sequard elixir, an injectable concoction consisting of glycerin
and . . . ground-up animal testicles.

Galvin, in other words, may have been baseball's first known "juicer."

Decades before anyone had heard of anabolic steroids, Barry Bonds or Alex Rodriguez, Galvin was enhancing his performance -- or trying to --
through something other than raw skill and training, in this case by shooting up testosterone derived from guinea pigs and dogs.

As wacky as Galvin's method may have been, his story fits a larger historical pattern. With baseball's long summer stretch approaching,
and steroid scandals unabated, it pays to remember that the sport's search for chemically induced glory isn't particularly new.

Indeed, as long as there have been athletes, there have been athletes who've sought to drink, eat, smoke, inject, snort or otherwise ingest potions they believed would make them run faster, hit farther or jump higher.

In perhaps the earliest instance of a performance-enhancing substance, ancient Olympians sought a testosterone kick (much like Galvin) by consuming sheep testicles.

A physician of the era, Galen, advised Olympians to consume "the rear hooves of an Abyssinian ass, ground up, boiled in oil, and flavored with rose hips and rose petals."

European cyclists of the late 1800s drank alcohol mixed with caffeine and strychnine, a poison thought to be a stimulant at low doses.

The winner of the 1904 Olympic marathon, an American named Thomas Hicks, was revived near the finish by drinking a combination of brandy, egg whites and strychnine.

Early baseball players, who didn't get paid
unless they played, medicated their aches with the most widely available balm of the day, alcohol.

In fact, baseball cheats of an earlier age weren't secretive about their performance-enhancing habits, and weren't even considered cheats.

Galvin was lauded for his drug of choice; The Washington Post wrote after one game in 1889: "If there still be doubting Thomases who
concede no virtue of the elixir, they are respectfully referred to Galvin's record in yesterday's Boston-Pittsburgh game. It is the best proof yet furnished of the value of the discovery."

"They would try anything," says Roger I. Abrams, a law professor and baseball fan who unearthed Galvin's regimen in his recent book, "The
Dark Side of the Diamond: Gambling, Violence, Drugs and Alcoholism in the National Pastime." "You certainly can never say this is a purely modern phenomenon because it's gone on as long as there were sports. . . . There's something innate about our desire to improve our
performance by whatever means are available."

In his 1992 book "Mortal Engines: The Science of Performance and the Dehumanization of Sport," John Hoberman lays out a startling list of
substances that athletes in the 1920s and '30s thought to be beneficial: glucose, vitamin B1, calcium, phosphates, ultraviolet light, kola nuts, Benzedrine, nitroglycerin, ammonium chloride, cocaine, digitalis and animal gland extracts, among others.

"It was junk," says Hoberman, a professor at the University of Texas.

"It was not effective. But the fact that people wanted to believe it worked is the same as today. It's not as if the mind-set of elite
athletes has undergone a sea change in the past 100 years. It's just that effective drugs weren't available" back then.

For at least a couple of generations, the modern athletic toolkit included amphetamines (for their stimulative effects), steroids (for
muscle-building and faster rehabilitation from injury), diuretics (for masking steroid use) and human blood ("blood doping" can aid cardiovascular performance). To these have more recently been added beta-blockers (which slow the heart rate and thus are useful for such
athletes as archers and shooters) and synthesized human growth hormone (for building strength).

If anything, the modern steroid-addled baseball players are late to the performance-enhancing party. Synthetic steroids were first developed by European scientists in the 1930s; the first reported use of them by athletes was in the 1950s, when weightlifters and wrestlers discovered their muscle-building benefits, according to Olympic historian Bill Mallon.

Soon, track athletes from the West (particularly sprinters and throwers) began using them as pressure to keep up with the Soviet and East German athletes increased, leading to the first Olympic drug tests in 1968.

There are few documented (or even alleged) cases of steroid use by baseball players before the late 1980s. The lack of interest may have been a result of some hoary baseball wisdom: Too many muscles could hurt, rather than help, your game. "We were told, 'Don't bulk up. It will bind you up and slow you down,' " says Jim Bouton, who pitched for the New York Yankees in the 1960s before writing his groundbreaking tell-all book, "Ball Four." "Heck, we were always taught not to lift weights."

Instead, as Bouton details in his book, the players' drugs of choice in his day were alcohol and "greenies," amphetamines that Bouton describes being handed out like M&Ms in major league clubhouses. At the urging of his teammate Whitey Ford, Bouton says he also used DMSO, a chemical solvent used in embalming and as a veterinary anti-inflammatory agent, to soothe his pitching arm and shoulder. He also received shots of cortisone, a steroidal hormone that was unknown to Pud Galvin.

But Bouton draws a distinction between the performance-enhancing substances of his playing days and the steroids of today. "Pep pills" -- as amphetamines were benignly called -- "weren't performance enhancers. I consider them performance enablers," he says. "It's an important distinction. You never played better than your natural ability because of them. If you were out the night before, and you were hung over, you could take a greenie and play up to your ability, or close to it. It never made you bigger or stronger, the way steroids do."

Adds Bouton: "There was no sense at the time that taking [amphetamines] was wrong. There was a sense that it was illegal. But it terms of the ethics of the game, it was not considered unfair."

That kind of ethical hairsplitting is lost on Will Carroll, a senior writer at Baseball Prospectus and the author of "The Juice: The Real Story of Baseball's Drug Problem." Carroll says players in both generations benefited from a little chemical assistance. He reframes the issue this way: Would players of Bouton's era have played as well, or at all, if they couldn't fall back on a pill or a shot?

This suggests that the current outcry about performance-enhancing substances is really only a matter of degree, and that such arguments can land on a slippery slope. Sports fans react instinctively to reports of players who use "drugs" to gain an advantage, but a drug is often just a processed and purified version of something that occurs naturally, points out Mallon, a former pro golfer who is now an orthopedic surgeon.

No one would object if an athlete picked the leaves off a foxglove and chewed them, he says, but they might object when an athlete takes digitalis, a weight-loss drug made from foxglove leaves.

Similarly, Dara Torres, the ageless Olympic swimmer, freely acknowledges that she maintains a regimen of amino acids and dietary supplements, even though such supplements are unregulated by the Food and Drug Administration and their health effects aren't well understood. "I think the line is hard to draw in these cases," Mallon says. "It's a far more complex issue than what has been written in the press, and the way Congress has come down on it."

Mallon isn't defending the use, or certainly the abuse, of steroids, whose long-term health consequences are becoming clearer every year. East Germany's state-sponsored experiments in athletic engineering three decades ago, for example, are playing out tragically, with as many as 20 percent of the athletes from that era having been diagnosed with liver, testicular and breast cancer, heart disease, infertility, depression and eating disorders. Miscarriages and birth defects in babies born to former East German female athletes have also been reported.

Despite the success (and later ignominy) of some steroid users, Mallon says science hasn't really established whether steroids actually make better baseball players. Yes, the empirical evidence is undeniable -- steroids make you bigger and stronger, as one glance at a pre- and post-'roid Barry Bonds would show -- but how it affects hitting, pitching and throwing hasn't been subject to rigorous evidentiary tests, he says.

Baseball, unlike weightlifting, for example, requires dexterity and hand-eye coordination, neither of which are improved by muscle-building bulk. It's possible, he says, that merely believing they work might be enough. "The placebo effect is incredibly strong," Mallon says.

Or not. In either case, Bouton has no doubts that the incentives for even the slightest competitive advantage in professional sports are so overwhelming that scientific evidence is beside the point. "I've said it before and I'll say it again: If someone told us that there was a pill that would help you win 20 games but would take five years off our lives, we'd all be taking it. Competitive athletes will do anything to win. They need to be protected from their own instincts or guys will kill themselves."

(by Paul Karhi)

Time For Agents To Undergo Scrutiny

First it was Barry Bonds. Then it was Eric Gagne and Kevin Brown and Ivan Rodriguez and Rick Ankiel. After them it was Alex Rodriguez. And now Manny Ramirez.

They all have one thing in common in addition to being linked either by tests, the Mitchell Report or Jose Canseco to performance-enhancing
drugs — agent Scott Boras.

There are several other among Boras’ 65 clients who have been connected to PEDs, but those are the biggest ones. It’s enough to make you wonder
if there comes a time when baseball general managers and owners simply stop dealing with him.

You know they’d like to. Boras is the undisputed holder of the title “Most Reviled Agent in Sports.” He’s famous for his ability to extract
money from owners and his willingness to do anything to promote his clients.

He’s the guy who broke into the Red Sox’s march to the 2007 World Series title with the leaked story about A-Rod declaring free agency. He engineered Manny’s acrimonious exit from Boston and the trade to the Dodgers.

A lot of people thought the Dodgers were making a mistake by re-signing Manny. Boras assured them they were not. He was wrong.

Everyone’s known for a long time that Boras isn’t pleasant to deal with. But this isn’t about being held up for money. This is about
cheating, and he’s the guy who represents some of the biggest cheats and alleged cheats in the game.

Boras obviously isn’t the only agent whose clients have been caught up in baseball’s drug scandal. Both Andy Pettitte and Roger Clemens are clients of Randy Hendricks. Troy Glaus, another big name in the Mitchell Report, along with three other players connected to drugs, are
represented by Michael Nicotera.

Glaus and one of the other players, Todd Greene, told investigators Nicotera sent them to the doctor who obtained the drugs for them and other players.

This shouldn’t be surprising. Agents are paid a percentage of their clients’ contracts, so the more money the players get, the more the
agents make. So if one of their players resorts to something illegal to build better stats — and bigger contracts — agents are the last people
likely to complain.

But it always seems to come back to Boras. It’s not clear if he has the most steroid-tainted players among all agents because not all agents
reveal who their clients are. He just has many of the most famous ones.

It would be all but impossible to prove that Boras tells his clients to take drugs. No one’s ever even accused him of doing that. If he did and word got out — and word always gets out — he would be banned by baseball in a heartbeat. That doesn’t mean he can’t be an enabler.

Boras certainly wouldn’t object to whatever the players do on their own. He said as much in a recent interview in Playboy magazine. And
he’s never criticized any of his clients for doing ‘roids. The closest he’s come is draft treacley mea culpas for those who are caught.

“Look, the Hall of Fame is for players who distinguish themselves in their day,” the magazine quotes him as saying. “Each era has distinctive features — from equipment and rules to pharmacology, surgical advancements, labor agreements, federal and state laws — that impact performance. The game is always changing. The Hall's scroll of admission must be drafted with a fluid and broad pen.”

The other idea that Boras passes on is that the most important thing in the world is making as much money as possible.

The way you do that is by being the best player possible. If his clients took substances that made them even better, he wasn’t likely to object. If he has objected, he certainly hasn’t done so publicly — and for a guy who relishes the spotlight, it’s hard to believe he would do so in private.

Boras has more influence over his players than the normal agent. In addition to the standard agent services, Boras also runs a sports clinic at his California headquarters where his clients can train in the offseason with his own staff of trainers who claim to know more about getting peak performance out of the players than just about anyone.

He also limits his business as much as possible to the best players, who also happen to be the most competitive players. Some are so competitive they’ll do anything for an edge. And when those players get together on his campus, you can bet they trade training tips.

It’s wrong to say Boras encourages his players to use performance-enhancing drugs, even though some of the biggest names associated with them show up on his client list. But he hasn’t stood up against those substances, either.

My mother would have explained it by saying, “Birds of a feather flock together.” And the place a disturbingly large number go to roost is at Scott Boras’ place.

The Yankees were singed by A-Rod. The Giants made a lot of money by sponsoring Barry Bonds’ march to the juiced home-run record, but their reputation suffered. The Dodgers were burned by Manny.

The day may be coming when teams stop returning Boras’ calls. As the Dodgers discovered, it just isn’t worth it.

(by Mike Celizic)

Michael Phelps 'Sex-Capade' Latest Scandal For Olympian

DRUGS-shamed Olympic swimming star, Michael Phelps, plunged into bed with a pair of strippers - then bragged of getting out of his head on dope.

But,lapdancer Theresa White last night revealed how CRY BABY Phelps instantly changed his tune when the News of the World published shocking pictures of him puffing on a marijuana bong as he celebrated his record Beijing gold medal haul.


In an exclusive interview, Theresa told us: "I saw Michael after the photos were published in February and he got really upset. He turned to me and said, 'I can't believe that happened. I'm terrified my career will be over.' He was almost in tears."

After all the glory of scooping eight golds at the China games the drugs scandal earned American swim star Phelps a three-month ban, which ended this week.

He celebrated his return to sport on Tuesday and dived straight in. . . to bed with sexy Theresa, 25.

Stash

Afterwards she said: "I think the whole thing's made Michael paranoid. Since the story got out I've seen him tell friends that he'll throw their mobile camera phones in the river if he sees them using them around him.

"I guess he's scared someone else will snap a picture of him doing something he shouldn't."

And she confided that he has an Olympic-size stash of secrets he'd rather keep dark, like how he:

TRIED to buy more cannabis to keep HER happy.
INDULGES his fantasies with a string of beauties constantly on call for sex.
CHEWS tobacco and litters his home with foul makeshift spittoons.
LOVES to bet and yearns to be a professional poker hustler.
BLUBS at the drop of a hat and is a real mummy's boy.

Lapdancer Theresa White tells all about Michael Phelps' sex secret
Theresa, just five feet tall and dwarfed by 6ft 4ins Phelps, recalled how they first met at a strip club where she works in his home town of Baltimore, Maryland, on a drunken night out last November-the same month our famous bong pictures were taken.

Boozy Phelps invited the 34D Latina and several of her lapdancing pals back to his £1.1 million waterfront apartment. "Michael came in with a bunch of friends to celebrate," said Theresa.

"They were there a couple of hours and asked three of us back. Michael was a bad tipper but he was nice to me, although he was kind of mean and cocky to some of the girls.

"He said he liked short girls and I thought that was funny because he's so tall. At the his place we started playing drinking games. Two hours later I was pretty drunk and I went up to Michael and said, 'If you were to have a threesome tonight, who would you like it to be with?' He told me he'd never had one before but said it would be with me and then pointed at another girl.

"Everybody else stayed put while we went upstairs and jumped into bed.

Candy

"The sex lasted for about three hours. Michael should get another Olympic gold for marathon love-making!"

After that first night of passion 23-year-old Phelps often returned to Theresa's club. She said they met two or three times a week throughout November and December for sex and intimate chats.

And Phelps brazenly boasted to Theresa of his dope-smoking exploits. She said: "He told me he'd done marijuana since he got back from Beijing. And he tried to get some for me one night but couldn't find any."

Strangely, Phelps always refused to take Theresa out in public on a proper date-apart from one time he treated her to a "value deal" meal at Mexican fast food chain Taco Bell. "That was it," she said. "He just bought me some soft tacos. No romantic candlelit dinner. He HAD said he'd take me to The Capital Grille which is one of the city's swankiest restaurants, but it never happened. And he's supposed to be a millionaire!

"I never saw his medals either. He doesn't have a lot of stuff in his house. It's bare, there's no food. Just a pantry full of candy and a fridge full of beer."

Soon Theresa tired of Phelps' tight-fisted ways-and the fact he wouldn't publicly acknowledge her as his girlfriend. "He was trying to hide his relationship with me, probably because of my job," she said. "It didn't bother me at first but then it started to. He tried to tell me he really liked me but I knew he just wanted sex.

"Then he became hard to get hold of and wouldn't call back. When I ran into another girl called Jen at a party it turned out he was sleeping with BOTH of us. And I've heard that there are at least five or six girls he can call on any time to come over and be with him.

"Michael's not the all-American boy the public thinks he is. I never saw him smoke marijuana but he was into booze-and chewing tobacco. When he's been drinking that's usually when he starts crying. He cries a lot.

"And he chews tobacco like a sailor. It's disgusting. All over his house are plastic bottles that he spits it into."

Theresa said she has seen Phelps just a handful of times since Christmas. "During his suspension he wasn't really in the greatest shape," she told us.

"He was losing his muscles and got into online poker. He'd just pretty much play that all the time. He gambled a lot for money. One of his goals is to be a poker champ." On Tuesday the pair were reunited as Phelps celebrated the end of his suspension.

"We'd been texting each other sporadically," said Theresa. "And Michael said he was alone at a hotel while his house was getting fixed.

"He said, 'You can come over if you like.' Then he sent me about 15 messages in 10 minutes asking when I was arriving. He had three friends there, all playing poker online on their laptops.

"When I got to the suite I went to the bathroom and Michael followed me in even though his friends were sitting there just a few feet away.

"He started to kiss me and we had sex. He said he definitely wasn't doing weed now and hadn't even been drinking as he was getting back in shape."

Fun

Despite everything, Theresa is happy to be a sex buddy on call for the athlete, whose product endorsements alone are estimated to pull in more than £3 million a year.

"He's a person I can just hook up with and it doesn't bother me," she said. "But I don't see a future between us. His mother would never approve.

"What she thinks really matters to him. She's so strait-laced and they'd both be concerned that someone like me would hurt his career.

"Michael's definitely a Momma's boy. He talks about her a lot, and he calls her and texts her a lot. She's probably the most important person in his life. It's hard to compete.

"But Michael is a young guy who likes to have fun. He might not be doing marijuana any more but he sure likes to party. That'll never change."

(by Georgina Dickinson)

A Look at The Evolution of "The Post-Season" in American Sports

With the BCS going in front of Congress, this is a look to see how postseasons evolved in American sports in order to figure out college football's place in the pantheon.

The longest running postseason event in major American professional sports is baseball’s World Series. The first one was in 1903, when the National League and American League, then two completely separate entities, organized under the mantle of Major League Baseball.

Each league’s champion played a best-of-nine series to determine the overall champion. The necessity for this playoff came from the fact that AL and NL teams didn’t play each other during the regular season. After a dispute canceled the series in 1904, it returned in 1905 and would be played every year since except the strike-shortened 1994 season.

The next oldest professional postseason event is the NHL Playoffs, as the league has had some sort of playoff determining a champion every year since its inception in 1917. The lone except was in 1920, when the Ottawa Senators won both halves of the regular season and the league decided a playoff would be unnecessary. The league’s regular season system was strange up until that point; read the Wikipedia page linked to above for details.

After that, you have the NFL playoffs. The NFL was founded in 1920, but from its founding until 1932, no playoffs were held. From 1920 to 1923, the champion was selected by the owners voting at the annual owners meeting. From 1924 to 1932, the team with the highest winning percentage won the championship as the teams all played different numbers of games. In 1932, the Chicago Bears and Portsmouth Spartans tied for the lead in winning percentage, so a one game playoff was thrown together hastily to determine a champion.

Responding to fan interest in the game, the NFL split itself into two divisions (East and West) in 1933. From then on, playoff games were held if necessary as tiebreakers and then the east and west division winners played in a championship game.

A consistent tournament to determine who got to play in the NFL title game was not held until 1967 when the league expanded to 16 teams. The first Super Bowl was played in 1967 as a championship game between the NFL and AFL winners, and it became the NFL championship game after the AFL/NFL merger in 1970.

The NBA playoffs have occurred every year since the precursor BAA league was founded in 1947. The league had east and west divisions from the start, and at least the top three teams from each division have appeared in the playoffs every year. Perhaps the relatively late founding of the NBA allowed it to observe the popularity of other leagues' playoffs, causing it set up a tournament from the start.

The NCAA

The precursor to what we know as the NCAA was the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (IAAUS). It was founded by Teddy Roosevelt after his son broke his collarbone playing football at Harvard while running the offense known as the flying wedge. The idea was to have a governing body setting rules for collegiate sports to cut back on the injuries and yes, deaths, being experienced by college athletes. The organization took the name NCAA in 1910.

The NCAA was a a discussion group and rule-setting club until 1921, when the first NCAA championship was officially recognized: the National Collegiate Track and Field Championships won by Illinios. In the years since, it has come to sponsor 44 women’s, 41 men’s, and 3 coed championships.

The only sanctioned sport without a recognized champion is Division I-A football, a.k.a. the Football Bowl Subdivision. Only in the sport of football is a relevant distinction made between multiple parts of Division I.

Bowl Games

As we all know, I-A football uses a system of bowl games as its postseason fare. They were originally a method of attracting tourists for the areas in which they were played, and they were scheduled around the new year to give fans time to plan trips and travel to the site.

The first bowl game was the "Rose Bowl" of 1902. I put it in quotes because while it was put on by the Tournament of Roses, it was called the "Tournament East-West Football Game." It featured a dominant Michigan team versus a decent Stanford team, and it ended in the third quarter when Stanford quit while trailing 49-0.

The Tournament of Roses was so scarred by the blowout, it wouldn’t sponsor a football game again until 1916. The game wouldn’t take on the name "Rose Bowl" until 1923 when the stadium known as the Rose Bowl was completed and hosted the game. Fun fact: the structure wasn’t actually a bowl at the time, but a horseshoe stadium.

The Rose Bowl pitted a team from the Pacific Coast Conference (the predecessor to the Pac 10) and an eastern US team up until 1947. At that point, the champions of what are now the Pac 10 and Big Ten became the annual contestants. It was the only major bowl until 1930, and the oldest surviving bowl games besides the Rose are the Sugar, Orange, and Sun Bowls, all founded in 1935. Besides those, the Cotton (1937), Gator (1946), and Florida Citrus/Capital One (1947) are the only bowls that have been held consistently for more than 50 years. The first major bowl with a title sponsor was the (in)famous Poulan Weed-Eater Independence Bowl, operating under that name from 1990-1996.

Football Playoffs

Up until 1973, the NCAA had two divisions - the University Division, roughly football’s Division I, and the College Division, roughly football’s Divisions II and III. In 1973, the I-II-III system was set up, and Divisions II and III immediately began holding playoff tournaments for football. Division I did not set up a playoff tournament however thanks to the tradition of the bowls and polls.

In 1978, the NCAA partitioned Division I into three levels: I-A for the principal football schools, I-AA for the lesser football schools, and I-AAA for the Division I schools that did not play football. Division I-AA from its inception has had some sort of playoff tournament, probably because none of its participating schools would be bowl material.

This fact confirms that the real reason I-A has no playoffs is due to the bowls. Every other excuse given (demands on players, the sanctity of the regular season, etc.) is secondary to the bowl games. The NCAA must have realized in the late ’70s that teams with no hope of making a bowl were playing meaningless seasons, so a separate division with a playoff was created for them. No other reason for the existence of Division I subdivisions makes sense.

The Polls

The absence of an officially recognized champion of major college football naturally created a power vacuum of sorts that many organizations have been eager to fill in. The NCAA on its website keeps a record of every major poll service’s pick for national champion dating back to 1869. No polls existed at that time, but poll services such as Richard Billingsley, the National Championship Foundation, and Parke Davis have gone back and somehow come up with champions for all those years.

The two oldest surviving polls are the AP Poll and the Coaches’ Poll, the latter initially being published by UPI before being taken over by the USA Today in 1991. The AP Poll began in 1936, but it didn’t release a poll after bowl season until 1965, and it wouldn’t do so on a consistent basis until 1968. The Coaches’ Poll, for its part, began in 1950 and didn’t release polls after bowl season until 1974.

Over time, mathematicians began taking cracks at making polls since human-based opinion polls can be influenced by bias, ignorance, and misinformation. The BCS has used a variety of them over its decade of existence, but the ones used today are done by Jeff Sagarin (his ELO-CHESS specifically), Richard Billingsley, Anderson and Hester, Kenneth Massey, Peter Wolfe, and Wes Colley. These people were chosen because they all do not rely on margin of victory.

One final human poll has come to prominence: the Harris Poll. It was created by Harris Interactive, a market research firm that specializes in opinion polls, after the AP pulled out of the BCS formula in 2005. The Harris Poll is made up of former players, coaches, administrators, and current and former media members selected at random from a pool of candidates nominated by the I-A schools.

A National Title Game

For the most part, national champions for Division I/I-A football since 1950 are recognized to be the final #1 in the AP and Coaches’ Polls. That’s fine when they agree with each other, but what if they disagreed? You’d get two teams with equally legitimate claims at a title. How could one convince both to vote for the same champion? Why, by having a national title game, of course.

The first attempt at creating a national title game was the Bowl Coalition. It consisted of the SEC, Big 8, SWC, ACC, and Big East partnering with the Orange, Sugar, Fiesta, and Cotton Bowls. The idea was that the site of the national title game would rotate among the four bowls, and it’d take the #1 and #2-ranked teams from the AP and play them against each other. This setup might require the breaking of tie-ins of conference champions to their traditional bowls, but the Coalition agreement made that possible. It lasted from 1992-94.

You may notice the absence of the Pac 10, Big Ten, and Rose Bowl. They did not participate in the Coalition, and they kept their traditional arrangements with each other. This resulted in 1994 of #1 Nebraska playing #3 Miami in the "national title game" while #2 Penn State played in the Rose Bowl.

Following the formation of the Big 12, the Bowl Coalition was replaced by the Bowl Alliance. It consisted of the SEC, Big 12, ACC, and Big East along with the Orange, Sugar, and Fiesta Bowls. The purpose and goal was the same as the Coalition’s, but the absence of the Pac 10, Big Ten, and Rose Bowl created the same problem. Twice a #1 vs. #3 game was forced to occur in the so-called national title game. It lasted from 1995-97.

In 1998, the three stubborn laggards finally came aboard to form the Bowl Championship Series. The goal was the same - have #1 and #2 play each other - only this time it would use the AP poll, Coaches’ Poll, and an index of computer polls to determine #1 and #2. Initially, strength of schedule and losses were their own categories, and in 2002 a quality win category was included as well.

By 2002, the BCS purged all computer models that included margin of victory to discourage teams from running up the score. However, it’s impossible to keep the human element from considering it, and margin of victory definitely plays a part in the human-generated polls.

In 2004, it was streamlined to include just the human and computer polls with no other categories. In 2005, the Harris Poll replaced the AP poll. In 2006, the system was tweaked to deemphasize the computers, and the result was that the human polls control the BCS formula almost completely. Only a huge anomaly in the computer element could override a unanimous human selection. That situation creates a Catch-22, since such an anomaly would likely cause an outrage, probably leading to further de-emphasizing of the computers.

Also in 2006, a fifth bowl game was added to the BCS in order to expand the pool of participating teams to ten. This move was a direct response to legal pressure from the non-automatic qualifier conferences and Congress itself. What will happen to the BCS after this year's brush with Congress is anyone's guess.

A Brief Timeline of the Postseason in America

1902: The Tournament East-West Football Game

1903: The first World Series

1905: First annual World Series

1916: First annual Rose Bowl game

1917: NHL formed; first NHL playoffs

1921: First officially recognized NCAA championship

1932: First NFL Championship Game

1935: First annual Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Sun Bowl

1936: First AP Football Poll

1937: First annual Cotton Bowl

1939: First NCAA men’s basketball tournament, consisted of 8 teams

1946: First annual Gator Bowl

1947: First annual Florida Citrus Bowl

1947: Advent of NBA precursor; first annual pro basketball playoffs

1950: First college football Coaches’ Poll

1965: First post-bowl season AP Poll

1967: First Super Bowl

1968: First annual post-bowl season AP Poll

1971: First annual Fiesta Bowl

1973: NCAA creates Divisions I, II, III; first annual D-II and D-III football playoffs

1974: First annual post-bowl season Coaches’ Poll

1978: NCAA creates Div. I-AA; first annual I-AA football playoffs

1984: NBA playoffs expands to current 16-team format

1985: NCAA men’s basketball tournament expands to 64 teams

1990: NFL playoffs expands to current amount of 12 teams

1992: Bowl Coalition formed

1992: SEC expands to 12 teams, plays first ever football conference championship game

1993: NHL playoffs expand to current format

1994: MLB institutes the wild card; World Series canceled due to strike

1995: Bowl Alliance formed

1996: Big 12 formed; first Big 12 Championship Game

1998: BCS formed

2001: NCAA men’s basketball tournament adds 65th team, play-in game

2002: NFL reorganizes to 8 divisions, drops one wild card per conference to keep playoffs at 12

2003: Split national title between LSU and USC; BCS formula completely rewritten

2004: NASCAR implements its "Chase for the Cup" quasi-playoff system

2005: ACC expands to 12 teams; first ACC Championship Game

2005: AP Poll drops out of BCS formula, Harris Poll is formed to replace it

2006: BCS adds a fifth game

(by YEAR2)

Olympic Drug Woes Far From Over

Olympic 1,500m champion Rashid Ramzi’s exposure as a drugs cheat is desperate, if not entirely surprising news for the Olympic movement, confirming that it is still impossible to trust track-and-field results on the greatest stage.

Since Ben Johnson’s steroid-assisted 100m victory in 1988 we have become used to the sprint events becoming as much a test of chemistry as pure speed. Usain Bolt’s feats in Beijing may, fingers crossed, have restored some faith in the fast men, but Ramzi’s positive test for the blood-enhancer CERA confirms that cheats are trying harder than ever to fool the world.

If confirmed by analysis of his ‘B’ sample, the impact of Ramzi’s transgression should not be underestimated. The 1,500m is the blue riband event of the Olympic athletics program and a highlight of any Games, a compelling test of speed and endurance won by some of the great Olympians.

Ramzi’s success did not make a great impact here amid the British gold rush but that should not detract from the gravity of his exposure. Ramzi was born in Morocco but competed in Beijing for Bahrain, a flag of convenience now tarnished. He is also exposed as a hypocrite. When he dropped to his knees in prayer after crossing the line first we assumed he was offering thanks to God. Now it transpires his gratitude would have been better directed to the scientists who developed CERA.

Ramzi’s choice of drug says much about the tactics now being employed by cheats. CERA (Continuous Erythropoiesis Receptor Activator) is a sophisticated form of erythropoietin (EPO), a substance that stimulates the production of oxygen-rich red blood cells.

Developed to treat those suffering serious blood conditions and cancer it offers a distinct clinical advantage by allowing patients to be dosed just once a month, as opposed to several times a week.

CERA, as the name suggests, continually stimulates the receptors that produce red blood cells, meaning injections are required far less frequently. That’s great news for cancer patients and, as it turns out, too good an opportunity for drugs cheats to ignore. Fewer injections means less chance of foreign substances being revealed in drugs tests and more chance of beating the system.

The cynicism displayed by the exploitation of clinical advances such as CERA tells you everything you need to know about the approach of some athletes and those that train and advise them.

The one sliver of good news to emerge from the exposure of Ramzi and five others is that they got caught, suggesting new anti-doping procedures are working. Co-operation between CERA’s manufacturer and the World Anti-Doping Agency produced a reliable test, and almost 1,000 samples from Beijing were re-analysed after the Beijing Games.

That will be little consolation to those running track-and-field, a sport so battered by cheats that its image may be beyond repair.

Of course the test-tube battle now moves on to London, where a new independent National Anti-Doping Organisation with increased funding and co-operation from law enforcement agencies will try and expose drug users at the 2012 Games.

No doubt those running the new agency will work diligently to keep the cheats at bay, but as long as athletes like Ramzi are prepared to hold the public, their fellow-competitors and even their faith in contempt, they face an uphill battle.

(by Paul Kelso)

Terrorism Finds Its' Way Into The Sporting Landscape

The attack by gunmen on Sri Lanka's cricketers in Lahore, Pakistan, will have sent a shiver of apprehension throughout world sport, not only cricket, over the threat posed by terrorism.

The assault on the team’s bus, as it travelled from their hotel to the Gaddafi Stadium for the third day’s play in the Second Test, resulted in the deaths of five policemen on security duty, one driver and injuries to seven players and a coach.

But the wider effect of the outrage will be a heightened fear that terrorists – acting in support of any cause, whether nationalistic, territorial, cultural or religious – are now prepared to scrap the unwritten rule that players/athletes were comparatively untouchable.

A Pakistan security spokesman said: “For all the problems with security down the years it was always thought that terrorists would not attack the players for fear of the backlash against whatever their ideology or cause. Now no-one can be sure any more. Cricket, football, athletics, who knows?”

The most notorious sport-linked terrorist event in history was the Black September assault on Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich; 11 Israeli athletes were killed in a shootout at a nearby airport as the terrorists tried to make a negotiated getaway.

The contrast between the low-key, “friendly” policing of those Games up until then with the high-profile armed and uniformed security operation at football’s World Cup back in West Germany two years later in 1974 could hardly have been greater.

Security concerns

In recent years, despite the proliferation of terrorist attacks across the breadth of international society, concerns about security at major sports events has tended to focus on spectator behaviour.

This does not mean governments have not worked hard to protect events. Strict controls on even air space are activated for World Cups and Olympic Games. But the profile of anti-terror measures is likely to be racked up after the Sri Lanka cricket attack.

Pakistani officials said about 12 gunmen were involved and grenades and rocket launchers have been recovered. The incident has been compared with the terrorist attacks last November on Mumbai (Bombay) in India. Those were blamed on Pakistan-based Islamic militants.

Pakistani cricket was already suffering from security concerns. Sri Lanka’s cricketers had been invited to tour at short notice after India had pulled out of a scheduled tour on security grounds, following the Mumbai attacks.

David Morgan, president of the International Cricket Council, said: “It will be very difficult for international cricket to be hosted in Pakistan for quite some time to come".

The injured players were Thilan Samaraweera and Tharanga Paranavita who both needed hospital treatment as well as Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara, Ajantha Mendis, Suranga Lakmal and Chaminda Vaas plus assistant coach Paul Farbrace.

The attackers, who employed grenades and rocket launchers, are all believed to have escaped. Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse condemned the "cowardly terrorist attack" and sent an aircraft to fly the players back to Sri Lanka immediately.

Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari also strongly condemned the attack, and ordered an immediate investigation "so that the perpetrators are identified and their motives exposed."

The country's participation as a co-host, along with India and Sri Lanka, of the 2011 cricket World Cup is now in extreme jeopardy.

Other sports have also moved to strike Pakistan off their competitive calendar. The Professional Squash Association has cancelled its April tour event which had been scheduled for Islamabad.

At Last! A Positive Story Involving Science and Sports

Two of the Pittsburgh Steelers’ biggest stars, Hines Ward and Troy Polamalu, used their own blood in an innovative injury treatment before winning the Super Bowl. At least one major league pitcher, about 20 professional soccer players and perhaps hundreds of recreational athletes have also undergone the procedure, commonly called platelet-rich plasma therapy.

Experts in sports medicine say that if the technique’s early promise is fulfilled, it could eventually improve the treatment of stubborn injuries like tennis elbow and knee tendinitis for athletes of all types.

The method, which is strikingly straightforward and easy to perform, centers on injecting portions of a patient’s blood directly into the injured area, which catalyzes the body’s instincts to repair muscle, bone and other tissue. Most enticing, many doctors said, is that the technique appears to help regenerate ligament and tendon fibers, which could shorten rehabilitation time and possibly obviate surgery.

Research into the effects of platelet-rich plasma therapy has accelerated in recent months, with most doctors cautioning that more rigorous studies are necessary before the therapy can emerge as scientifically proven. But many researchers suspect that the procedure could become an increasingly attractive course of treatment for reasons medical and financial.

“It’s a better option for problems that don’t have a great solution — it’s nonsurgical and uses the body’s own cells to help it heal,” said Dr. Allan Mishra, an assistant professor of orthopedics at Stanford University Medical Center and one of the primary researchers in the field. “I think it’s fair to say that platelet-rich plasma has the potential to revolutionize not just sports medicine but all of orthopedics. It needs a lot more study, but we are obligated to pursue this.”

Dr. Neal ElAttrache, the Los Angeles Dodgers’ team physician, used platelet-rich plasma therapy in July on a partially torn ulnar collateral ligament in the throwing elbow of pitcher Takashi Saito. Surgery would have ended Mr. Saito’s season and shelved him for about 10 to 14 months; he instead returned to pitch in the September pennant race without pain.

Dr. ElAttrache said he could not be certain that the procedure caused the pitcher’s recovery — about 25 percent of such cases heal on their own, he said — but it was another encouraging sign for the nascent technique, which doctors in the field said could help not just injuries to professional athletes but the tendinitis and similar ailments found in the general population.

“For the last several decades, we’ve been working on the mechanical effects of healing — the strongest suture constructs, can we put strong anchors in?” Dr. ElAttrache said. “But we’ve never been able to modulate the biology of healing. This is addressing that issue. It deserves a lot more study before we can say that it works with proper definitiveness. The word I would use is promising.”

Platelet-rich plasma is derived by placing a small amount of the patient’s blood in a filtration system or centrifuge that rotates at high speed, separating red blood cells from the platelets that release proteins and other particles involved in the body’s self-healing process, doctors said. A teaspoon or two of the remaining substance is then injected into the damaged area. The high concentration of platelets — from 3 to 10 times that of normal blood — often catalyzes the growth of new soft-tissue or bone cells. Because the substance is injected where blood would rarely go otherwise, it can deliver the healing instincts of platelets without triggering the clotting response for which platelets are typically known.

“This could be a method to stimulate wound healing in areas that are not well-vascularized, like ligaments and tendons,” said Dr. Gerjo van Osch, a researcher in the department of orthopedics at Erasmus University Medical Center in the Netherlands. “I call it a growth-factor cocktail — that’s how I explain it.”

Dr. van Osch and several other experts said they had used the procedure as a first option before surgery for reasons beyond its early results. There is little chance for rejection or allergic reaction because the substance is autologous, meaning it comes from the patient’s own body; the injection carries far less chance for infection than an incision and leaves no scar, and it takes only about 20 minutes, with a considerably shorter recovery time than after surgery.

Because of those apparent benefits, the consensus among doctors is that the procedure is worth pursuing. However, several doctors emphasized that platelet-rich plasma therapy as it stands now appeared ineffective in about 20 to 40 percent of cases, depending on the injury. But they added that because the procedure costs about $2,000 — compared with $10,000 to $15,000 for surgery — they expected that with more refinement, insurance companies would eventually not only authorize the use of PRP therapy but even require it as a first course of treatment.

Dr. Mishra said that he was particularly encouraged by PRP therapy’s effectiveness on chronic elbow tendinitis, or tennis elbow. For a 2006 study published by The American Journal of Sports Medicine, he used the treatment on 15 of 20 patients who were considering surgery; the five others received only anesthetic. Two months later, the patients receiving PRP therapy noted a 60 percent improvement in pain measurements, compared with 16 percent for the control group.

Dr. van Osch is performing a double-blind, randomized study on 54 patients with Achilles’ tendon injuries, while doctors in the United States, India, Sweden and elsewhere are performing formal trials on PRP therapy’s performance with rotator-cuff shoulder strains, partial knee-ligament tears and bone fractures. Studies also are examining PRP therapy’s possible use in conjunction with surgery, which a group in Spain used on Achilles’ tendon ruptures and found recovery time reduced.

“The guy who plays softball on weekends, the woman who runs a 5k race every now and then, they suffer very common injuries,” said Samir Mehta, the chief of the orthopaedic trauma service at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania who has performed PRP therapy on nine patients. “It’s for those people that we hope that this therapy’s uses can be more apparent.”

The possibilities of platelet-rich plasma are certainly apparent to the Steelers. Mr. Polamalu, an All-Pro safety, had the procedure for a strained calf after a playoff game and, although the injury was not considered particularly serious, he returned healthy enough the next Sunday against the Baltimore Ravens to return an interception 40 yards for a touchdown.

The technique played its most glaring role with Mr. Ward, a receiver who left that Baltimore game in the first quarter with a sprain of the medial collateral ligament in his right knee. The next day, he was injected with a form of PRP therapy called autologous conditioned plasma, which features different proportions of platelets and other cells. Along with strenuous rehabilitation and hyperbaric oxygen therapy, Ward recovered enough to make two catches in the Super Bowl, in which the Steelers beat the Arizona Cardinals.

“I was next in line, the next guinea pig,” Mr. Ward said, referring to Mr. Polamalu’s experience with platelet-rich plasma. “I think it really helped me. The injury that I had was a severe injury, maybe a four- or six-week injury. In order for me to go out there and play in two weeks, I don’t think anyone with a grade-2 M.C.L. sprain gets back that fast.”

Professional sports teams have great financial incentive to pursue decreasing athletes’ rehabilitation even one week. Last year, Major League Baseball’s 30 teams had 519 players spend 28,602 days on the disabled list — representing $455 million in total salary sitting idle — according to data compiled by Baseball Prospectus.

“Let’s say a soccer player is out six weeks — if you can cut a week or two off, that equates to two, three, four games,” said Dr. Michael Gerhardt, the team physician for Major League Soccer’s Chivas USA and Los Angeles Galaxy clubs. He said that he had administered PRP therapy to about 20 players with medial collateral ligament injuries and had found an average decrease in recovery time of 25-30 percent.

But most doctors said that if platelet-rich plasma was scientifically proven to be safe and effective, its largest effects would be on the amateur, weekend-warrior athletes for whom sports was recreation and healthy lifestyle. Stanford’s Dr. Mishra said: “It’s not just the professional athlete who needs to get back to their game. Everyone wants to get back to what they do for play or for work.”

Sports May Be In The U.S. Economy's Crosshairs

After cars and banks and houses and retail centers, there may be another economic domino ready to thud to earth: sports.

Our pro sports commissioners probably won't be appearing anytime soon before Congress, hats in hand, begging for a bailout, but one thing is certain: The economic crisis seems as serious as the Pittsburgh Steelers' defense in exacting a pound of flesh - even in the world of sports, which was once thought to be recession-proof.

Today's Super Bowl will see the city of Tampa, Fla., taking in 20 percent less than projected. That's a $30 million loss, as companies have chosen to host far fewer parties during a week that's usually like Mardi Gras for multimillionaires.

But it's not just the Super Bowl. The National Football League's stepchild, the Arena Football League, has had to cancel its upcoming season. The Florida Marlins baseball team played a game in August with 500 people in attendance. The Ladies Professional Golf Association has canceled three tournaments and dropped millions in prize money. The NFL and the National Basketball Association had to lay off approximately 10 percent of their corporate workforces.

Baseball, the first sport to start its season in 2009, may suffer the most. "Historically, baseball has been recession resistant," Donald Fehr, executive director of the Major League Baseball Players Association, told the New York Times. But Fehr is looking at a historical model far different from the current economic sporting landscape. Gone are the days when fans continued to support baseball - or any of the major sports - during tough times as an entertaining and affordable escape for the family.

The sports business has become as inflated and volatile as the dot-coms, the housing market, and any industry that has focused on short-term gain over long-term health. Sports have spent the past 15 years becoming bloated with cash at the expense of fans themselves. The revenue streams became floods, but the industry now looks like it could dry up.

Just look at the three main revenue streams: public funds for stadium construction, corporate boxes and personal seat licenses, and television mega deals alongside 24-hour sports media. Except for television, these revenue sources are feeling about as relevant as your McCain for President bumper stickers.

The days of public subsidies are nearing an ignominious end. The reign of the mega domes is coming to a close. Sports have relied on public subsidies to a degree that would shame the automobile industry and those farmers paid not to grow corn.

During the past 10 years, more than $18 billion of the public's money has been spent for stadium construction and upkeep in cities across the United States. Two-thirds of baseball teams have gotten new stadiums - including the New York Yankees, whose $1.3 billion park opens this year.

But last month, when the Yankees demanded and received $370 million more in city bonds, New Yorkers raised hell. Seems the timing wasn't good, with schools and roads in disrepair and President Obama calling for everyone to sacrifice. Consider also the Bay Area, where new stadium projects are in a holding pattern.

In addition to publicly financed stadiums, sports made riches through spiked season ticket prices, luxury boxes and personal seat licenses, which "hold" season tickets in prime seats. The Dallas Cowboys want $100,000 for two of these licenses - for tickets that would normally be $129 a game. The Cowboys need the money to pay for their new $1 billion mega stadium. But corporations are balking. The Cincinnati Bengals, in economically masticated Ohio, have seen their seat licenses drop from $2,783 to $536.

As corporations head for the sidelines, commissioners are turning back to the people who once sustained the business of sports: the working- and middle-class fan. It's no exaggeration, and even almost a cliche, to point out that working-class people have been priced out of attending sporting events - it's no longer possible for kids to trade in some milk bottles for a ticket to the game.

Several teams have already tried to lower ticket prices to $10, with mixed results. The problem is that the relationship between sports franchises and "average" fans has been abusive for so long, it's a question about whether the fans will return to throw pennies in the jars of owners who have been reaching into taxpayers' pockets for the past two decades. The growth in popularity of everything from interactive video games to mixed martial arts shows that major sports leagues don't have a personal license of people's attention spans.

The flood of money that seems the safest right now is the television deals and the hype machine of 24-hour sports television. As long as there are games, there will be people with megawatt smiles and blinding white teeth telling us to watch. The question, though, is whether people, in searching for escape in tough times, will be hesitant to return to entertainment that for too long has taken them for granted.

Cater to the masses, not the elite to fill those stadium seats
The model of dependence on publicly funded stadiums and luxury boxes is over, and professional sports will need a radical economic reconstruction to survive the coming period, or risk losing a generation of fans to Guitar Hero, Facebook, and other pastimes that don't cost an arm and a leg. Some suggestions:

1. Lower ticket prices. Sports teams should have a recession special: a limited number of $10 tickets in all sections, not just the nosebleeds.

2. Promote a luxury-box lottery. Every game, six fans get to watch from an unused luxury box. Nothing is worse than being in a nosebleed seat and seeing boxes that have been left unbought or unattended.

3. Nationalize failing franchises. Hey, San Francisco's own House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has talked about nationalizing banks. Why not the A's or Raiders? If taxpayers are already putting money into stadiums, shouldn't they get a piece of the franchise? Imagine every time you see a Raiders hat or an A's jersey, you know the profit on the sale is going back into the public till instead of Al Davis' pocket. Now that's what I call "shared sacrifice."

- Dave Zirin

Click To Play Video of Tragedy in Beijing

Major League Baseball Has Its' Worse Scandal Since 1919 Blacksox

NEW YORK -- Roger Clemens, Miguel Tejada and Andy Pettitte were among 75 players named in the long-awaited Mitchell report on Thursday, an All-Star roster linked to steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs that put a question mark -- if not an asterisk -- next to some of baseball's biggest moments.

Barry Bonds, already under indictment on charges of lying to a federal grand jury about steroids, and Gary Sheffield also showed up in Major League Baseball's most infamous lineup since the Black Sox scandal.

The report by former Senator Majority Leader George Mitchell, who was hired by commissioner Bud Selig to examine the Steroids Era, blamed both players and management for the problem.

"Everyone involved in baseball over the past two decades -- commissioners, club officials, the players' association and players -- shares to some extent the responsibility for the steroids era," Mitchell said in summation of his 20-month investigation. "There was a collective failure to recognize the problem as it emerged and to deal with it early on."

Mitchell recommended that the drug-testing program be made independent, that a list of the substances players test positive for be listed periodically and that the timing of testing be more unpredictable.

Selig will hold his own news conference in New York and union officials will speak at a separate location.

Eric Gagne, Jason Giambi, Troy Glaus, Gary Matthews Jr., Jose Guillen, Brian Roberts, Paul Lo Duca and Rick Ankiel were among other current players named in the report -- in fact, there's an All-Star at every position. Some were linked to human growth hormone, others to steroids.

Mitchell and his investigative staff interviewed former New York Mets clubhouse attendant Kirk Radomski on four occasions. Radomski identified a number of former and current players he said he sold steroid and human growth hormone to. Checks and money orders, mailing receipts or shipments, and statements of other witnesses were used to back up Radomski's allegations. Much of this was found in Radomski's seized telephone records.

Brian McNamee, a former New York Yankees major league strength and conditioning coach who worked with teammates Clemens and Pettitte, was interviewed three times by Mitchell, with a personal lawyer and federal law enforcement officials in the room.

Clemens, whose Hall of Fame credentials include 350 victories, seven Cy Young Awards and the 1986 AL MVP award, was singled out in nearly nine pages, 82 references by name, with much of the information on him provided by McNamee.

Page 169 of the report reads, "According to McNamee, from the time that McNamee injected Clemens with Winstrol through the end of the 1998 season, Clemens' performance showed remarkable improvement. "During this period of improved performance, Clemens told McNamee that the steroids 'had a pretty good effect' on him.''

McNamee also told investigators that "during the middle of the 2000 season, Clemens made it clear that he was ready to use steroids again. During the latter part of the regular season, McNamee injected Clemens in the buttocks four to six times with testosterone from a bottle labeled either Sustanon 250 or Deca-Durabolin."

The report also says Pettitte, during his stay on the disabled list from April 21 to June 14, 2002 because of elbow tendonitis, "wanted to speed his recovery and help his team." The report says "McNamee traveled to Tampa at Pettitte's request and spent about 10 days assisting Pettitte with his rehabilitation. McNamee recalled that he injected Pettitte with human growth hormone that McNamee obtained from Radomski on two to four occasions. Pettitte paid McNamee for the trip and his expenses; there was no separate payment for the human growth hormone."

It continued: "According to McNamee, around the time in 2003 that the BALCO searches became public, Pettitte asked what he should say if a reporter asked Pettitte whether he ever used performance enhancing substances. McNamee told him he was free to say what he wanted, but that he should not go out of his way to bring it up. McNamee also asked Pettitte not to mention his name. McNamee never discussed these substances with Pettitte again.

"After the 2001 season, Pettitte, like Clemens, continued to use McNamee's services and to serve as a source of income after McNamee was dismissed by the Yankees. In a 2006 article, Pettitte 'acknowledged an ongoing relationship' with McNamee. Pettitte was quoted as having said that he still talked to McNamee about once a week. ' "

Clemens and Pettitte are from the Houston area and spent three seasons together with their hometown Astros. Tejada was traded to Houston from Baltimore on Wednesday.

"After we read the report, we will have something to say," said Randy Hendricks, the agent for Clemens and Pettitte.

When reached by ESPN.com, a high-ranked union official said, "Based on the press conference and not having read the report, the anti-climatic theory is stronger than it was three hours ago. [Mitchell] made a strong pitch for amnesty."

Jose Canseco, who created a firestorm with his 2005 book, which detailed his steroid use and accused several former teammates of using them, too, was denied entrance to Mitchell's news conference.

Several former MLB players and strength and conditioning coaches were also interviewed by Mitchell's team. Each player named was invited to meet with him if his name came up in his investigation. Mitchell said almost all current players refused to meet with him. Mitchell also said:

• Response to the problem from both baseball and its players was slow to develop and was initially ineffective.

• There is evidence the problem wasn't isolated to one club. Many players were involved. Each club has had at least one player involved.

• The investigation found that some players were given a heads-up to drug tests.

•In his report, Mitchell wrote he was against Selig disciplining players -- those named in the report or not -- for past violations of baseball's rules against using performance-enhancing substances "except in those cases where he determines that the conduct is so serious that discipline is necessary to maintain the integrity of the game. I make this recommendation fully aware that there are valid arguments both for and against it."

• Among Mitchell's conclusions:


There has been a great deal of speculation about this report. Much of it has focused on players' names, how many and which ones. After considering that issue very carefully I concluded that it is appropriate and necessary to include them in this report. Otherwise I would not have done what I was asked to do: to try to find out what happened and to report what I learned accurately, fairly, and thoroughly. While the interest in names is understandable, I hope the media and the public will keep that part of the report in context and will look beyond the individuals to the central conclusions and recommendations of this report. In closing, I want to emphasize them:

• 1. The use of steroids in Major League Baseball was widespread. The response by baseball was slow to develop and was initially ineffective. For many years, citing concerns for the privacy rights of the players, the Players Association opposed mandatory random drug testing of its members for steroids and other substances. But in 2002, the effort gained momentum after the clubs and the Players Association agreed to and adopted a mandatory random drug testing program. The current program has been effective in that detectable steroid use appears to have declined. However, that does not mean that players have stopped using performance enhancing substances. Many players have shifted to human growth hormone, which is not detectable in any currently available urine test.

• 2. The minority of players who used such substances were wrong. They violated federal law and baseball policy, and they distorted the fairness of competition by trying to gain an unfair advantage over the majority of players who followed the law and the rules. They  the players who follow the law and the rules -- are faced with the painful choice of either being placed at a competitive disadvantage or becoming illegal users themselves. No one should have to make that choice.


• 3. Obviously, the players who illegally used performance enhancing substances are responsible for their actions. But they did not act in a vacuum. Everyone involved in baseball over the past two decades -- Commissioners, club officials, the Players Association, and players  shares to some extent in the responsibility for the steroids era. There was a collective failure to recognize the problem as it emerged and to deal with it early on. As a result, an environment developed in which illegal use became widespread.


• 4. Knowledge and understanding of the past are essential if the problem is to be dealt with effectively in the future. But being chained to the past is not helpful. Baseball does not need and cannot afford to engage in a never-ending search for the name of every player who ever used performance enhancing substances. The Commissioner was right to ask for this investigation and report. It would have been impossible to get closure on this issue without it, or something like it.


• 5. But it is now time to look to the future, to get on with the important and difficult task that lies ahead. Everyone involved in Major League Baseball should join in a wellplanned, well-executed, and sustained effort to bring the era of steroids and human growth hormone to an end and to prevent its recurrence in some other form in the future. That is the only way this cloud will be removed from the game. The adoption of the recommendations set forth in this report will be a first step in that direction.


Also:

• On page 121 of the report, under a heading "players requested to be interviewed," Jason Giambi is the only player in the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative probe who participated in Mitchell's investigation. This portion of the report read:

"Concerning BALCO and Major League Baseball I requested interviews of all the major league players who had been publicly implicated in the BALCO case: Marvin Benard; Barry Bonds; Bobby Estalella; Jason Giambi; Jeremy Giambi; Armando Rios; Benito Santiago; Gary Sheffield; and Randy Velarde. Jason Giambi agreed to be interviewed, and Randy Velarde provided information through his attorney. All the other players implicated in the BALCO case refused my requests to be interviewed or did not respond to them. Gary Sheffield initially declined my request for an interview. Sheffield later said that he would agree to an interview, subject to the availability of his lawyer who was undergoing medical treatments."

Several stars named in the report could pay the price in Cooperstown, much the way Mark McGwire was kept out of the Hall of Fame this year merely because of steroids suspicion.

Rafael Palmeiro, who tested positive for steroids, was among the former players named. So were Kevin Brown, Benito Santiago, Lenny Dykstra, Chuck Knoblauch, David Justice, Mo Vaughn and Todd Hundley.

Mike Stanton, Scott Schoeneweis, Ron Villone and Jerry Hairston Jr. were among the other current players identified.

"We identify some of the players who were caught up in this drive to gain a competitive advantage," the report said. "Other investigations will no doubt turn up more names and fill in more details, but that is unlikely to significantly alter the description of baseball's 'steroids era' as set forth in this report."

"The illegal use in baseball of these substances also victimize the majority of players who don't use them. We heard from many former players who believe it was grossly unfair that the users were gaining an advantage," Mitchell said.

Mitchell is a director of the Boston Red Sox, and some questioned whether that created a conflict.

"Judge me by my work," Mitchell said. "You will not find any evidence of bias, special treatment, for the Red Sox or anyone else. That had no effect on this investigation or this report, none whatsoever."

Coalition Pushes For Legal Brothel To Cater To Olympic Visitors

VANCOUVER -- A group of Vancouver prostitutes wants to open a "co-op" brothel in time for the Winter Olympics, saying it would help sex-trade workers by providing a safer working environment when the world comes to visit in 2010.

Susan Davis, a working prostitute, said she envisions the creation of as many as five cooperative brothels if the B.C. Coalition of Experiential Communities -- which includes men, women and transgendered sex-trade workers -- convinces the federal government to permit the first brothel on an experimental basis.

The group has support from some politicians, including Vancouver East MP Libby Davies and Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan, who believe a brothel owned and run by sex-trade workers would help reduce violence against prostitutes.

Davis said the group is weeks away from incorporating a cooperative corporation and is looking for a possible location in the city's east-side Strathcona area. But she said the group won't open the facility, complete with "quickie rooms" equipped with sinks and a bench, unless it has support from the federal government.

"What we'd like to see is an exemption given to us along the lines of what was given for the Insite safe-injection site," Davis said.

She believes tens of thousands of men who come to Vancouver during the Games will be searching for sex. B.C.'s booming construction economy has already brought thousands of workers, and along with them, prostitutes, she said.

"Just like the workers are coming from all over the world to build the city, sex workers are coming with them," she said.

Sullivan, who said the city needs a new approach to dealing with the problems of prostitution, doesn't object to the idea of a co-op brothel.

But he said he's more focused on helping so-called "survival sex-trade" workers find cures to their addiction.

"I believe we need to keep an open mind," he said. "But I don't believe it would address the needs of the survival sex trade. I don't think a brothel of this kind would even allow women like that into it, because they come with lots of problems."

Opponents of the brothel say it would only perpetuate the idea that prostitution is acceptable, and not solve the abuse heaped on women in an industry most of them don't want to be in.

"It entrenches prostitution as legitimate, and therefore legitimatizes pimps and traffickers," said Daisy Kler, a social worker with Vancouver Rape Relief. "I do not believe the public would agree that this is a good idea, to have some disposable women available for the Olympics."

Last week, Calgary-based The Future Group released a report warning that Vancouver's Olympics will be a target of human traffickers wanting to exploit prostitution. The report, titled Faster, Higher, Stronger: Preventing Human Trafficking at the 2010 Olympics, said the federal and provincial governments need to deter traffickers from using the Games to profit from human misery.

Janine Benedet, an associate professor of law at the University of B.C., said the city already has hundreds of brothels. The only difference is that they operate illegally. Bringing in one for the Olympics, she said, is wrong.

"To the question, 'Is society ready for this?' my answer is, 'I hope not,'" said Benedet, who lectures on sexual violence. "The notion that this is somehow different or better than any of the other brothels out there is simply false."

Studies show more than 90 per cent of women in the sex trade are not there by choice, but rather because of trafficking, drug addiction and societal problems such as incest.

Benedet said the majority of Vancouver's prostitutes are native women, and many of them suffer from deep psychological trauma. Davis said a brothel run as a cooperative would not turn away prostitutes looking for a safe and clean place to do their business.

The trial of Robert Pickton, who is accused of the first-degree murder of 26 women, all of whom were either survival sex-trade workers or addicts, amplifies that point, she said.

"It would be better to be working inside in a bad place than it would be to be outside and getting killed," she said. "Our main focus is to help the adult prostitutes. We're focusing on the Downtown Eastside first because that's where so many of them are getting killed."

Davis said the co-op has the support of federal politicians, including Davies, Liberal MP Hedy Fry and Senator Larry Campbell, the former Vancouver mayor. Davies said she supports the coalition's idea of the co-op, and also wants to see prostitution decriminalized.

Society's prohibitionist stance against the sex trade hasn't solved the problem that men continue to seek out women for sex, she said. While she is opposed to child prostitution, she doesn't think adult prostitution should be illegal.

"Where there is sex between two consenting adults, even if there is money exchanged, I don't think the state should prohibit it," Davies said. "I think even the police would agree that the current situation is not tolerable, and that we need safer conditions for sex-trade workers."

But Vancouver police department spokesman Const. Tim Fanning said a brothel can't legitimize an industry that completely victimizes women.

"You can call it what you want, but prostitution is just a breath short of slavery," he said. "These women are not in it by choice. The police department would in no way support anything like a brothel."

Davis said better "exit" strategies are needed to help prostitutes who want to leave the industry. But she thinks prostitution as a whole should be accepted instead of stigmatized. She said as an example, she services many elderly men whose wives either won't have sex with them or who are widowers and don't want long-term relations.

But Kler saw Davis's proposal as a thinly disguised attempt to legalize an industry she sees as akin to slavery.

"Fundamentally, it's not the laws that kill, beat and rape women, it's men," she said. "The mantra in this city is that it's safer, it's safer, it's safer. We fundamentally see prostitution as a form of violence against women. If you are coming from a women's equality perspective, as we are, fighting for the equal status of women, we see that there is no benefit to women as a group to legalizing or decriminalizing prostitution."

The idea of brothels is not new to Vancouver. In 2005, then-councillor Tim Louis suggested the city should open one to support prostitutes as long as it didn't make money from it, prompting Sullivan, then a mayoral candidate, to say: "The goal should be to help these women get out of the survival sex trade, not keep them in it. I'm running to be mayor to help people, not to get into the business of being a pimp."

But the approach of the Winter Games has brought the issue to the fore again. The Olympics, like many major sporting events, traditionally generate a boost in prostitution.

Victor Malarek, author of the best-selling book The Natashas: Inside the New Global Sex Trade, said more than 40,000 women and girls were brought to Athens for the 2004 Summer Games.

For the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany, more than 20,000 women were imported. In both countries, prostitution is legal, but the vast majority of those brought in were foreigners from countries like Moldova, Romania and Ukraine.

While Canada's immigration laws and visa requirements will prevent many foreign prostitutes from being trafficked in Vancouver for the Games, Malarek says the reality is that the 2010 Winter Games will be no different than other Olympics.

"You're going to open up a Pandora's box if you allow even one legal brothel," he said.

Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day, the federal government's senior minister in B.C., and the Vancouver Organizing Committee declined to comment.

(by Jeff Lee, Vancouver Sun)

Olympian Weighs-in On Marion Jones Fiasco

This is actually the second time that I've written this column. The first draft was mostly about my disappointment and anger over Marion Jones' admission to using steroids and her pitiful apology, which I didn't buy, since the only difference between the moment she admitted to cheating and the moment she decided to cheat was that in between she got caught.

But you won't read that column because I erased it and decided to write about something that actually concerns me more than it angers me.

In 1988, Ben Johnson tested positive for steroids but had used them and tested negative many times before he was finally caught at the Olympic Games in Seoul that year.

Dwain Chambers and Kelli White had tested negative several times before they were caught. BALCO (the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative), was only discovered to have been producing 'the clear' (THG) when Trevor Graham sent a syringe containing the undetectable steroid to the US Anti-Doping Agency.

Justin Gatlin tested positive two years ago, but he had tested negative several times before as well. Tim Montgomery and Jones have both admitted to using steroids but neither has ever tested positive. So do the tests work?

It has only been by luck, the work of government agencies and the incredible stupidity of some athletes and coaches that these people have been brought to justice. That causes me great concern.

Has justice actually been served? Jones made millions while she cheated the sport, other athletes, sponsors and meeting organisers. Only because of her filing numerous lawsuits and defending herself against accusations we now know were true, is she broke.

But while there may be poetic justice in that, there is no justice for those sponsors and, in particular, those other athletes who lost prize money and sponsorship income because of Jones.

Gatlin lost sponsors but didn't have to pay back the money he made while cheating. Neither did White or Chambers.

All of these athletes probably have little of their money left, but that's due to their own stupidity or maybe even fate. But the fact is that the athletes who finished behind them will never experience the glory or recoup the financial benefit they deserved for their hard work.

The proudest moments of my life include the times I stood on the podium to receive my gold medals at Olympic Games and World Championships.

I don't know how bitter you would feel thinking you should have been there but were not because someone who finished ahead of you had cheated.

For the record, none of the people who finished behind me at any of those championships has to be bitter and wonder what it would have felt like – because I beat them fairly. But one of my biggest concerns is what people now think of me and those performances.

I know that a small group of people doubted I could do what I did without taking drugs and that's not because of any allegations or investigations, but because my performances were that good. I'm actually proud of that.

The fact that I was tested more than 100 times during my career and never tested positive should support the fact that I achieved my success clean. But I honestly don't know if I could blame someone at this point for questioning whether I, or any athlete who has accomplished greatness, was in fact clean.

I have never felt the need to defend myself in the past when our sport has come under attack and people have said that the majority of athletes are doping.

But it saddens and disappoints me greatly that I now have to feel defensive about my performances, even though no one has ever accused me.

In the past I have defended this sport vigorously and pointed out that track and field athletics, more than any other sport, has set the standard for all others regarding testing.

It punishes its athletes far more harshly than any other sport, and is held to a higher standard than any other sport because of its own zero-tolerance policy.

But I am running out of ammunition and feel I can no longer defend it against the argument that most of the athletes are doping.

That's not because I believe that to be the case. I actually still believe that most of the athletes are in fact clean. Also, it is not because the testing is that great, because it has proven not to be, but because I still believe that the majority of people in the world are good and do the right thing.

Sport is only a microcosm of society and while you have a small percentage of people in life who will take the short cut and cheat to get ahead, most people will work an honest job and play by the rules.

That is a fact that is proved every day in society.

(by Michael Johnson)

Professional Tennis Investigating Possible "Fixed" Matches

LONDON (AP) - Tennis officials are examining a document that lists professional matches considered to be suspicious, including some at Grand Slams, dating back to 2002.

"We were in receipt of the document yesterday, and it has been sent to the relevant authorities within tennis," ATP spokesman Kris Dent said Thursday.

The document was labeled "Suspect Tennis Matches," and it was unclear who compiled the list.

Match-fixing rumors have swirled around tennis after online betting site Betfair voided bets on a match in August because of irregular betting patterns. Fourth-ranked Nikolay Davydenko withdrew from that match in Poland against 87th-ranked Martin Vassallo Arguello in the third set because of a foot injury. The ATP is looking into it.

The listed matches were followed by a brief explanation as to why they were considered to be suspicious, with reasons ranging from illness to leaving town to prepare for another tournament.

"I saw this list earlier in this week after it was passed on to me," said Adrian Murdock, a spokesman for Betfair. "It's already gained quite a lot of notoriety within the industry. Quite what the long term effects of this will be I don't know - I don't think anybody is yet able to predict that."

ATP players and their entourages are not allowed to bet on any tennis match.

"We have not found evidence of corruption in the sport," Dent said. "But we recognize there is a threat to all sports posed by gambling."

The ATP is planning to meet with the International Tennis Federation and the WTA in London on Friday to discuss match-fixing. The meeting comes only three days after 18th-ranked Andy Murray became the latest player to speak out about corruption in the sport, saying "everyone knows it goes on."

"I'm not going to name names," Murray said Thursday from Moscow, where he was upset in the second round of the Kremlin Cup. "I've just spoken to quite a lot of the players about that and there's obviously something that needs to be addressed. I'm going to speak to the ATP in Madrid to discuss that."

Second-ranked Rafael Nadal doubted Murray's claims.

"I doubt he knows more than anyone else," Nadal said. "I see what goes on each week on the circuit just as he does, and I'm not more stupid than him as to not see what goes on."

Murray's previous comments also revived talks about a rule requiring players to tell the ATP within two days of any information they may have regarding match-fixing.

"Any information we receive regardless of source we examine and investigate," Dent said.

Since the Davydenko match, others have said they have been approached by outsiders trying to influence a match. Last month, Belgian player Gilles Elseneer said he was offered - and turned down - more than $100,000 to lose a first-round match against Potito Starace of Italy at Wimbledon in 2005.

On the women's tour, a match in September drew suspicion for unusual betting patterns.

An online betting site briefly delayed payment after 120th-ranked Mariya Koryttseva beat No. 96 Tatiana Poutchek in the quarterfinals of a tournament in India. Eventually, bets were paid out, and both the WTA and the betting site said they doubt there was any wrongdoing connected to the match.

(by Chris Lehourites,AP)

Media Rights Group Condemns China's Censorship Policies

Beijing - A media rights group on Wednesday condemned the 'unparalleled' level of censorship of the internet in China, urging the government to 'allow the Chinese to exercise their rights to freedom of press, expression and information' in the run-up to next year's Olympic Games in Beijing.

'This system of censorship is unparalleled anywhere in the world and is an insult to the spirit of online freedom,' Paris-based Reporters Without Borders said in a statement issued jointly with the Chinese Human Rights Defenders group.

'With less than a year to go before the Beijing Olympics, there is an urgent need for the government to stop blocking thousands of websites, censoring online news and imprisoning internet activists,' the statement said.

The two groups circulated a detailed report on how China controls internet content, which they said was produced in cooperation with a Chinese-based computer expert who worked on condition of anonymity.

The report shows the 'key mechanism of the Chinese official system of online censorship, surveillance and propaganda' for China's estimated 160 million internet users.

It details controls over websites and individuals by Beijing's government-run internet supervision bureau.

'Either on their own initiative or on orders from above, the bureau's members remind websites of the importance of political and social stability in China as soon as a story grabs the attention of the online media or public opinion,' the report said.

The bureau issues dozens of orders every week to Beijing-based websites to remove content or avoid a particular news story, it said.

'The Chinese authorities send orders of three kinds - bans issued before publication of a report, bans issued after publication of a report and propaganda instructions,' the report said.

It said commercial websites in Beijing received at least 74 banning orders and propaganda directives in May and June 2006 alone.

'To avoid fines, websites of any importance practice self-censorship by blocking key words,' it said.

London-based Amnesty International also urged China on Wednesday to allow 'full media freedom before and during the [2008] games, which should include unrestricted legitimate use of the internet.'

Amnesty said at least 50 internet users had been sentenced to prison in China after 'unfair trials, often on vaguely defined charges such as subversion or leaking state secrets.'

Thousands of technicians, censors, chatroom monitors and real police help to maintain control of the Internet in China.

The government tries to keep content on sensitive political and social issues broadly in line with the ruling Communist Party's ideology.

Tens of thousands of smaller internet cafes have been closed, with the government favouring large chains that can be relied upon to monitor and control online activity.

A Disgraced Marion Jones Gives Back Olympic Medals

Her reputation is gone and now so are Marion Jones' Olympic medals. Jones gave back the five medals she won at the Sydney Olympics on Monday and agreed to forfeit all other results dating back to Sept. 1, 2000, further punishment for her admission that she was a drug cheat.

The three gold medals and two bronzes were turned over to U.S. Olympic Committee and U.S. Anti-Doping Agency officials at her attorneys' office in Austin, Texas. They are en route to USOC headquarters in Colorado Springs, and the USOC will return them to the International Olympic Committee.

"We've done what we can," said Jim Scherr, the USOC's chief executive officer. "We caught the person who was not clean. We've got the medals in our possession, and we will return them to IOC."

Jones won golds in the 100 and 200 meters, as well as the 1,600 relay. She won bronzes in the 400 relay and the long jump. It will be up to the IOC to decide what to do with the medals and whether to vacate Jones' results from Sydney - which could cost her relay teammates medals, too.

Scherr and USOC chairman Peter Ueberroth both said they would support the IOC nullifying the relay results, and encouraged the other Americans to give back their medals.

Jearl Miles-Clark, Monique Hennagan, Tasha Colander-Richardson and Andrea Anderson all won golds as part of the 1,600-meter relay. Chryste Gaines, Torri Edwards, Nanceen Perry and Passion Richardson were on the 400-meter relay team.

Both Edwards and Gaines have served doping bans since the 2000 Olympics.

"It's our opinion when any sporting event is won unfairly, it's completely tarnished and should be returned. The relay events were won unfairly," Ueberroth said. "It's very unfortunate, but your result involved cheating, so the result is unfair to the other athletes of the world."

Jones pleaded guilty Friday to lying to federal investigators about using steroids, saying she'd taken designer steroid "the clear" from September 2000 to July 2001. "The clear" has been linked to BALCO, the lab at the center of the steroids scandal in professional sports.

After Friday's court hearing, Jones announced her retirement, but Monday, she accepted a two-year ban and agreed to forfeit any results dating back to Sept. 1, 2000.

Her 100-meter win and long jump bronze medal at the 1999 world championships will stand.

No one answered the door Monday at Jones' house in Austin, Texas.

If the IOC does vacate Jones' results, the standings likely will be readjusted, with the second-place finisher moving up to gold, third to silver and fourth to bronze.

Jamaica won silver in the 1,600 relay, and France was fourth in the 400. Pauline Davis-Thompson of the Bahamas was the silver medalist in the 200 meters, and Tatiana Kotova of Russia was fourth in the long jump.

The silver medalist in the 100 meters in Sydney was Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou - at the center of a major doping scandal at the Athens Olympics. She and fellow Greek runner Kostas Kenteris failed to show up for drug tests on the eve of the games, claimed they were injured in a motorcycle accident and eventually pulled out. Both later were suspended for two years.

"Obviously we're concerned about a level playing field all the time. But we have no jurisdiction or nothing to say about that," Ueberroth said. "We have a responsibility to compete fairly. That's our system, and that's the way we're going to live."

Ueberroth also said the USOC board had written letters of apology to 205 national Olympic committees, as well as to the people of Australia. As part of those apologies, Ueberroth said the USOC is pledging that it will bring a clean team to next summer's Beijing Olympics.

"There's never any absolute guarantees, but we're taking steps to see that will happen," Ueberroth said.

Jones stands to lose still more. The International Association of Athletics Federations can strip athletes of results and medals after notification of a doping violation.

IAAF rules also allow for athletes busted for doping to be asked to pay back prize money and appearance fees, and Scherr said the USOC plans to go after Jones for any prize money that it awarded her.

British sprinter Dwain Chambers, who admitted using the clear, had to pay back a reported $230,615 before he was allowed to return to competition after a two-year ban.

Jones would have earned millions in prizes, bonuses and fees from meets all over the world, including a share of the $1 million Golden League jackpot in 2001 and 2002.

Jones had been dogged by suspicions and doping allegations for years, angrily denying all of them. On Friday, though, she told a federal judge that then-coach Trevor Graham gave her a substance that he said was flaxseed oil but was actually "the clear."

"By November 2003, I realized he was giving me performance-enhancing drugs," Jones said Friday.

(AP Sports Writers, Nancy Armour, Stephen Wilson in London and Rachel Cohen in New York, and April Castro in Austin, Texas, contributed to this report.)

Another Nail In The Coffin...Marion Comes Clean

NEW YORK (Oct. 4) - Marion Jones admitted to doping before the 2000 Olympics in a recent letter to close family and friends, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

Jones, a triple gold medalist in Sydney, said she took "the clear" for two years, beginning in 1999, and that she got it from former coach Trevor Graham, the newspaper reported. Graham told her it was flaxseed oil.

"The clear" is a performance-enhancing drug linked to the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO), the lab at the center of a U.S. government doping investigation. Until now, Jones had steadfastly denied she ever took any kind of performance-enhancing drugs.

Jones also said she will plead guilty Friday in New York to two counts of lying to government agents about her doping and an unrelated financial matter, the Post reported.

"I want to apologize for all of this," the newspaper reported, quoting a person who received a copy of Jones' letter and read it to the paper. "I am sorry for disappointing you all in so many ways."

No one answered the door at Jones' home in Austin, Texas, Thursday evening.

The admission could cost Jones the five medals she won at the Sydney Olympics. Though she fell short of her goal of winning five gold medals, she came away with three and two bronzes and was one of the games' biggest stars.

But her career has been tarnished by doping allegations since then. Victor Conte, head of BALCO, repeatedly has accused Jones of doping.

Jones was one of several athletes to testify in 2003 before a grand jury in San Francisco that's investigating BALCO, and former boyfriend Tim Montgomery was given a two-year ban for doping in late 2005.

In December 2004, the International Olympic Committee opened an investigation into doping allegations against Jones.

Last year, a Jones urine sample tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug EPO. Jones immediately quit a European athletics tour and returned to the United States. Although she was cleared when a backup sample tested negative, she missed at least five major international meets, forfeiting an estimated $300,000 (212,630) in appearance and performance fees.

In her letter, Jones said she'd used performance-enhancing drugs until she stopped training with Graham at the end of 2002. She said she lied when government agents questioned her in 2003, panicking when they presented her with a sample of "the clear," which she recognized as the substance Graham had given her.

"Red flags should have been raised when he told me not to tell anyone," the Post reported, quoting the letter.

Graham was indicted in the BALCO case last November on three counts of lying to government agents. He has pleaded not guilty, and a trial is set for Nov. 26,

A woman who answered the phone at Graham's home in Raleigh, North Carolina, declined to identify herself, but said Graham was not home before refusing to answer any other questions. There was no answer at the door of Graham's north Raleigh home on Thursday.

Nike and Adidas Looking For More Than Medals in Beijing

The Beijing Olympics are less than a year away and one of the hottest races shaping up is not among the athletes, but the companies that outfit them.

China is one of the largest emerging markets and a top focus for shoemakers fighting for market share. And as the 2008 Beijing Olympics approach, the intensity is reaching a new high.

"The Beijing 2008 Games are set to be the greatest sporting event in modern Chinese history," said Paul Pi, head of marketing for Adidas in greater China.

Adidas is an official sponsor of the Olympics. In addition to paying a reported $80 million for the sponsorship position, the company has coordinated a marketing blitz that includes opening an average of two stores a day in the country.

The German company has declared the event will help put it in the No. 1 position in China by 2008, a coveted spot now held by shoe giant Nike.

Nike says China is poised to become its second-largest market in the world by 2009 after the U.S. The company has seen tremendous gains there; its first-quarter earnings reported in September show sales in China jumped 50 percent. And Nike executives say the company is widening its lead there.

"The Chinese marketplace is the most exciting marketplace in the world," said Nike Brand President Charlie Denson.

Nike declined to discuss its Olympics marketing plan but says the Olympics is less about advertising than about supporting the athlete.

The company is sponsoring 22 of the 28 competing Chinese federations. And it has one of China's hottest athletes, hurdler Liu Xiang, wearing the swoosh.

Both companies may hit $1 billion annually in sales in China by the Olympics, said Terry Rhoades, managing director of Zou Marketing, a sports consultant company in Shanghai.

In third is Chinese company Li Ning — a premium local brand but a fraction of the size of its international competitors. Analysts say Li Ning has a different strength, with its base in the smaller and less urban markets where brands like Adidas and Nike have not spread.

Record-Breaking Homerun Ball Headed For Cooperstown With A "Brand"

NEW YORK (AP) -The ball Barry Bonds hit for his record-breaking 756th home run will be branded with an asterisk and sent to the Baseball Hall of Fame, its owner said Wednesday.

Fashion designer Marc Ecko, who bought the ball in an online auction, set up a Web site for fans to vote on the ball's fate, and the decision to brand it won out over the other options, sending it to the museum unblemished or launching it into space.

"We're going to be working with the folks at the Hall of Fame," Ecko said on NBC's "Today" show.

Ecko, whom Bonds called "an idiot" last week, had the winning bid Sept. 15 in the online auction for the ball that Bonds hit Aug. 7 to break Hank Aaron's record of 755 home runs. The final selling price was $752,467, well above most predictions that assumed Bonds' status as a lightning rod for the steroids debate in baseball would depress the value.

The asterisk suggests that Bonds' record is tainted by alleged steroid use. The slugger has denied knowingly using performance-enhancing drugs. Fans brought signs with asterisks on them to ballparks as he neared Aaron's hallowed mark.

Hall of Fame president Dale Petroskey, also interviewed on the show, said accepting the ball did not mean the Hall endorses the viewpoint that Barry Bonds used drugs.

"We're happy to get it," he said. "We're a nonprofit history museum, so this ball wouldn't be coming to Cooperstown without Marc Ecko buying it from the fan who caught it."

The Giants announced Friday they will part with Bonds after this season, the seven-time NL MVP's 15th in San Francisco and 22nd in the majors.

Nationwide Steroid Seisure Disclosed

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Sept. 24) - Authorities arrested more than 120 people and uncovered dozens of steroid labs in an international investigation into the illicit trade of performance-enhancing drugs, federal officials announced Monday.

The Drug Enforcement Administration said the investigation, dubbed Operation Raw Deal, was assisted by governments of nine other countries, including China.

In the U.S., agents seized 56 labs that manufactured anabolic steroids and human growth hormone, the DEA said. Agents seized 11.4 million doses of drugs in all.

Among those charged, federal authorities say, are a Chinese manufacturer accused of smuggling human growth hormone into the country and four men who allegedly distributed drugs through a MySpace.com profile.

The seizures and arrests follow a growing number of scandals in the sports world over steroid abuse, but federal authorities in Rhode Island said no professional athletes were directly involved in the investigation.

DEA spokesman Michael Sanders said 143 federal search warrants were issued during the 18-month investigation, many of them since Thursday. The FBI, Internal Revenue Service, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Food and Drug Administration were also involved.

In Connecticut, four men were charged with purchasing raw steroid powder from China, manufacturing anabolic steroids in home laboratories and distributed them to customers through a MySpace.com profile and a Web site.

A Chinese corporation and its chief executive were indicted in Rhode Island on federal charges of smuggling illegal human growth hormone into the country in connection with the operation.

"China really stepped up to the plate to help us in this investigation," DEA spokesman Garrison Courtney said in Washington.

The federal grand jury in Rhode Island indicted Genescience Pharmaceutical Co. and its CEO, Lei Jin, last week on charges including money laundering and conspiracy to facilitate the sale of smuggled goods. Jin is accused of marketing the drugs, under the brand name Jinotropin, through e-mail and Web sites.

Jin, who authorities say has an address in Madison, Wis., is believed to be living in Shanghai and is not in custody.

The Rhode Island indictment also names three alleged Genescience Pharmaceutical distributors. A separate criminal complaint charges a Florida man with selling kits used to convert steroids from powder into injectable forms.

"Even though their storefront is the Internet, rather than the street corner, the people who engage in the smuggling and distribution of these substances are drug dealers, plain and simple, and we will treat them accordingly," U.S. Attorney Robert Clark Corrente said.

In all, investigators seized over 500 pounds of raw ingredients for steroid manufacture that originated in China.

Other countries participating in the investigation were Mexico, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Sweden and Thailand.

Police in Denmark raided 26 locations across the country. Germany's Federal Criminal office said its agents closed five illicit labs and confiscated tens of thousands of illicit tablets and capsules as part of searches carried out in five of the nation's 16 states.

Danish police were able to see the China link in the investigation through money transfers between a buyer and a Chinese seller, said Joergen Isalin of the Denmark National Police investigative center.

(by Eric Tucker, AP)

Texas Fan Nearly Castrated Over T-Shirt

OKLAHOMA CITY (Sept. 11) - To some Oklahoma football fans, there are things that just aren't done in the heart of Sooner Nation, and one of them is to walk into a bar wearing a Texas Longhorns T-shirt.

A man walked into Henry Hudson's Pub in Oklahoma City wearing a Texas Longhorns
T-shirt and left nearly castrated. "He could see both of his testicles hanging on the
outside of his body," said the Texas fan's attorney.

That's exactly what touched off a bloody skirmish that left a Texas-shirt-wearing fan nearly castrated and an Oklahoma fan facing aggravated assault charges that could put him in prison for up to five years.

The shocking case has set off a raging debate in this football-crazed region about the extreme passions behind a bitter rivalry. Some legal observers have even questioned whether this case could ever truly have an impartial jury.

"I've actually heard callers on talk radio say that this guy deserved what he got for wearing a Texas T-shirt into a bar in the middle of Sooner country," said Irven Box, an attorney in this city 20 miles from Oklahoma's campus in Norman.

According to police, 32-year-old Texas fan Brian Christopher Thomas walked into Henry Hudson's Pub on June 17 wearing a Longhorns T-shirt and quickly became the focus of football "trash talk" from another regular, 53-year-old Oklahoma fan Allen Michael Beckett.

Thomas told police that when he decided to leave and went to the bar to pay his tab, Beckett grabbed him in the crotch, pulled him to the ground and wouldn't let go, even as bar patrons tried to break it up. When the two men were separated, Thomas looked down and realized the extent of his injuries.

"He could see both of his testicles hanging on the outside of his body," said Thomas' attorney, Carl Hughes. "He was wearing a pair of white shorts, which made it that much worse."

It took more than 60 stitches to close the wound, and police interviewed Thomas at a nearby hospital emergency room.

Beckett's attorney, Billy Bock, concedes that his client commented about Thomas' shirt, but said it was just good-natured ribbing and that he apologized to Thomas when it appeared to upset the Texas fan. Later, Bock said Thomas approached his client at the bar and threatened him.

"My client is a little man, and this guy (Thomas) is 30 to 40 pounds bigger than him," Bock said. "He's bigger, stronger, younger and probably faster, and he aggressively leaned in and touched my client and threatened to beat him up. ... My guy was defending himself and just took control of the situation."

Thomas' attorney disputes Beckett's version.

"That's total malarkey," Hughes said. "My client never said a word to him. He got up to pay and when he paid and left a tip, the guy grabbed him."

Beckett, a 53-year-old church deacon, federal auditor and former Army combat veteran, has pleaded not guilty. His next court appearance comes Oct. 4, two days before the Sooners and Horns tangle in their annual football game at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.

Thomas, who once lived in Houston and became a Texas fan during the heyday of star running back Earl Campbell, is still recovering from his injuries but has returned to work as a meat cutter at a Sam's Club warehouse store.

Like Beckett and Thomas, many fans of the two college squads never attended either university, but have come to identify so closely with these teams that they attach banners to their cars, wear team colors on game day and even have programmed their car horns to play school fight songs.

Dallas police Sgt. Andy Harvey, a 12-year veteran of the force, said it's not uncommon for fights to break out between fans of the two schools.

"People are passionate about their teams and their universities, and that's a good thing," he said, "but when you mix a real passionate sports fan and then get a little alcohol in there, sometimes it's not a good mix."

On both Texas and Oklahoma fan Web sites, boosters trade familiar tales of having their car tires slashed or windshields smashed for sporting the opposing team's sticker in enemy territory.

Assistant District Attorney Scott Rowland said the rivalry will have no bearing on the way the case is prosecuted.

"It appears that it played a part in the fight," he said, "but that won't play any more of a role in our handling of the case than would a fight over a girl or a car or a song on the jukebox."

(by Sean Murphy,AP)

Beijing Officials Accused of Going Back on Pledge

WASHINGTON (AFP) - Chinese officials are flouting a pledge made to the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which helped to secure the 2008 games for Beijing, by harassing and abusing journalists, Human Rights Watch said Friday.

"The Chinese government's assurances of wider media freedoms during the Olympic Games were key to the International Olympic Committee's 2001 decision to allow Beijing to host the Games," the international rights watchdog said in a report.

Despite the unveiling last year of new freedoms for accredited foreign journalists, which were to run from the start of 2007 until October 2008, "journalists in China continue to face physical abuse and harassment from police and plainclothes thugs who appear to work at official behest," the report said.

"Violations of the letter and spirit of the temporary regulations raise troubling questions about the freedom of expression and the security of the thousands of journalists expected to come to Beijing to cover the 2008 Olympic Games," it said.

The report cites several incidents in the past month in which foreign media were denied access to dissidents or their families, barred from covering a public trial, or pressured to halt coverage of an event.

"But the piece of the puzzle we are more concerned about is that the relaxed rules don't apply to Chinese journalists or fixers and translators, and they remain as vulnerable as ever," Sophie Richardson, HRW's Asia Advocacy Director, told AFP.

Five Chinese journalists interviewing witnesses to a bridge collapse last month were beaten up by thugs and then arrested by the police, the report said.

The Chinese government has taken other, more subtle steps to muzzle domestic media -- unplugging Internet data centers which host thousands of servers and ordering search engines to remove some postings from websites, it said.

"Media freedom is one of the few issues on which the Chinese government made a fairly explicit commitment to the IOC in order to get the games," Richardson said.

"The fact that these temporary regulations, which were issued to fulfill an obligation to the IOC, are not being honored makes you wonder if issuing them in the first place wasn't a shallow gesture," she said.

"Presumably, the IOC will look to see that its standards are upheld. If they don't do something, then they will look weak," she said.

Richardson said she was both hopeful and pessimistic that China would ease restrictions on the media in the 11 months remaining before the Olympics open.

"I'm pessimistic in the sense that the impulse to control the press will not go away, especially because the entire world will be watching and the authorities will want to present a picture of a peaceful, prosperous, healthy China," she said.

"But I'm hopeful, too, because if the predicted numbers prove to be accurate, it will be hard to keep tabs on up to 25,000 journalists.

"Much will also depend on the extent to which the journalists take the regulations at face value and challenge people who flout them."

Runner Who Failed Gender Test Attempts Suicide

CHENNAI: Indian 800m runner Santhi Soundarajan, who failed a gender test and was stripped of a silver medal won at the Doha Asian Games, has attempted to commit suicide, officials said yesterday.

Twenty-six-year-old Santhi apparently took a veterinary drug and was brought to hospital on Wednesday.

“Her condition is stable. Doctors have said she is out of danger but will remain there for some time for observation,” Pudukottai district administrator S.J. Chiru said.

He said he did not know exactly what had driven the athlete to try to take her life amid reports of a family dispute over the 1.5mil rupees (US$33,500) she was awarded by the Tamil Nadu government.

The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) announced she failed a sex test and implied Santhi had deceived the sporting world by competing as a woman when she was a man, effectively ending her career. But Santhi insisted along with her parents and coaches she had done nothing wrong.

Gender testing is controversial and the International Olympic Committee stopped the practice in 1999, but the Olympic Council of Asia continue.

Normally, women have two X chromosomes (XX) and men have an X or Y chromosome (XY) in their cells. However, some people born with a Y chromosome develop all the physical characteristics of a woman except internal sex organs – androgen insensitivity syndrome or AIS.

The woman might be XY but still not a man because her body never responds to the testosterone she’s producing. – AFP

Atlanta Olympics Bombing Hero Turned Falsely-Accused, Dies

ATLANTA (Aug. 29) - Former security guard Richard Jewell, who was erroneously linked to the 1996 Olympic bombing, has died, a spokesman for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation said Wednesday.

From Hero to Suspect

A decade after the bombing at the Atlanta Summer Olympics, Richard Jewell said he believed some people still remembered him for being a suspect rather than for the two days in which he was praised as a hero for helping warn people away from the bomb.

Richard Jewell, 44, was found dead in his west Georgia home, GBI spokesman John Bankhead said.

He died at 9 a.m. Wednesday, said Meriwether County Coroner Johnny Worley. Worley said Jewell died of natural causes.

"There's no suspicion whatsoever of any type of foul play. He had been at home sick since the end of February with kidney problems," Worley said.

Bankhead said the GBI would do an autopsy Thursday.

Lin Wood, Jewell's longtime attorney, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that he was "devastated" by the news. He declined further comment, saying he was in New York trying to get back to Atlanta.

Jewell was initially hailed as a hero for spotting a suspicious backpack in a park and moving people out of harm's way just before a bomb exploded during a concert at the Atlanta Summer Olympics.

Then the media called him a suspect and he became a public spectacle.

The blast killed one and injured 111 others.

As recently as last year, Jewell was working as a sheriff's deputy in rural Meriwether County.

The frenzy that changed Jewell's life started three days after the bombing with an unattributed report in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that described him as "the focus" of the investigation.

Other media, to varying degrees, also linked Jewell to the investigation.

He was never arrested or charged, although he was questioned and was a subject of search warrants.

Eighty-eight days after the initial news report, then-U.S. Attorney Kent Alexander issued a statement saying Jewell "is not a target" of the bombing investigation and that the "unusual and intense publicity" surrounding him was "neither designed nor desired by the FBI, and in fact interfered with the investigation."

Eventually, the bomber turned out to be anti-government extremist Eric Rudolph, who also planted three other bombs in the Atlanta area and in Birmingham, Ala., that killed a police officer, maimed a nurse and injured several others. Rudolph was captured after spending five years hiding out in the mountains of western North Carolina, pleaded guilty to all four bombings last year and is serving life in prison.

Jewell told the AP last year that Rudolph's conviction helped, but he believed some people still remember him as a suspect rather than for the two days in which he was praised as a hero.

"For that two days, my mother had a great deal of pride in me - that I had done something good and that she was my mother, and that was taken away from her," Jewell said around the time of the 10th anniversary of the bombing. "She'll never get that back, and there's no way I can give that back to her."

(by Harry Weber and Greg Bluestein, AP)

Tyson Gay Is Crowned "Fastest Man In The World"

OSAKA, Japan (Aug. 26) - Tyson Gay is the world champion.

In a 100-meters final that delivered all it promised Sunday, Gay was slower out of the blocks. Once his legs got pumping, he caught and surged past Asafa Powell to claim his first gold medal at a major international championship in 9.85 seconds.

"After 60 meters I saw that I could catch him - and it worked," Gay said. "I stayed relaxed and believed in my top speed even though I had a bad start."

Powell, sensing defeat, was passed by Derrick Atkins of Bahamas at the tape in 9.91. Powell was third in 9.96, and even though he is co-holder of the world record at 9.77, admitted he ran scared.

"I panicked. I felt him coming on," Powell said. "That slowed me down ... I made a big mistake."

Gay, unbeaten this year coming into the championships, felt his composure beginning to slip Sunday morning. "I was wondering, 'Will people still respect me if I lose?"' he said. "I was wondering if anyone would still love me."

A call from his coach, Lance Brauman, who is nearing the end of a prison sentence for embezzlement, theft and mail fraud, calmed his nerves.

"This morning he called me around 11. He told me basically that he knows in the morning when he gets up that I'll be world champion," Gay said.

Some reassuring words from his mother, Daisy Gay Lowe, also helped.

"She talked to me and made me a believer. That's something I wasn't doing," he said.

Watched under a full moon by Japanese Emperor Akihito, Empress Michiko and some 40,000 fans at the Nagai stadium, Gay pumped his arms, beat his chest and shouted in delight in the victory that ended weeks of nervous preparations.

Powell showed little emotion - his sullen demeanor said it all.

Gay, regularly slower out of the blocks than Powell, had feared a false start, which would put him even more on edge. But the race went off smoothly. And with his head wobbling from side to side, Gay hit his groove.

But once he hits his stride, there is no stopping Gay. It is why he now is an overwhelming favorite to win the 200, too. With a bit of luck, he could also add a title in the 400 relays, where another battle with Powell looms.

"I'm just going to try to ice, get a massage, spend a little time with my family and really focus on the 200 now," Gay said. The 200 heats are set for Tuesday.

Both Gay and Powell were desperate to win their first global title Sunday and gain status as the favorite going into the 2008 Olympics in Beijing.

"Next year I will get him," Powell vowed. "But for now, I am very disappointed."

Powell barely showed emotion on the track- a sullen demeanor that said it all. He complained his blocks stumbled at the start.

Although the 100 was tough to predict, nothing was easier than picking Carolina Kluft for an unprecedented third straight heptathlon title. And the 24-year-old Swede did it with a European record, becoming the second best heptathlete of all time after American Jackie Joyner-Kersee.

Kluft easily stretched her five-year unbeaten streak, earning 7,032 points to eclipse Russian Nikitina Larisa's 18-year-old European record by 25 points.

Immediately after setting the record, Kluft led all her competitors hand in hand around the stadium, the gesture as much the essence of Kluft as the outstanding performances.

In a tense shot put final, New Zealander Valerie Vili overtook defending champion Nadzeya Ostapchuk of Belarus with her last attempt of 20.54 meters. Ostapchuk, who held the lead from the opening throw, had one attempt to go but was stranded just 6 centimeters short. Olympic silver medalist Nadine Kleinert of Germany took bronze with 19.77.

Misery came just as late to Bershawn Jackson, the defending champion in the 400 hurdles. The American was leading in his semifinal but stumbled on the last obstacle, totally lost his momentum and let two rivals pass. That result pushed him out of Tuesday's final. Olympic champion Felix Sanchez of the Dominican Republic led the way.

In the women's 100 second-round heats, Veronica Campbell of Jamaica cruised into the semifinals with a time of 11.08, hardly breaking a sweat in temperatures that soared into the high 80s late Sunday.

Her main rival, U.S. champion Torri Edwards, won her heat in 11.13, easing up at the finish. "I feel confident I can take this thing, the track is fast," she said. "It's hot, but sprinters like the hot weather."

Defending champion Lauryn Williams was second in her heat, advancing in 11.16.

Perez became the first man to win three successive 20-kilometer walk titles, enough to make him a star in his native Ecuador. Together with the 1996 Olympic title, the 33-year old became a quadruple gold medalist at major competitions.

"I knew I could be the first with three consecutive golds but shortly after the start I forgot about this - I needed to concentrate," he said. "One more medal is not that important."

Spain's Francisco Javier Fernandez was reinstated to silver in the walk after being disqualified for lifting over the final stretch to catch Tunisia's Hatem Ghoula.

In a sport notorious for its technical infractions, Fernandez had both feet off the ground as he raced past Ghoula. The jury of appeal ruled it was insufficient to merit a disqualification. Both racers were given the same time of 1 hour 22.40 minutes, 20 seconds.

The appeal cost Mexico's Eder Sanchez the bronze.

Civil Rights Group Weighs-in On Vicks' Behalf

ATLANTA (AP) - An NAACP leader said Michael Vick should be allowed to return to the NFL, preferably the Atlanta Falcons, after serving his sentence for his role in a dogfighting operation.

"As a society, we should aid in his rehabilitation and welcome a new Michael Vick back into the community without a permanent loss of his career in football," said R.L. White, president of the group's Atlanta chapter. "We further ask the NFL, Falcons, and the sponsors not to permanently ban Mr. Vick from his ability to bring hours of enjoyment to fans all over this country."

White said the Falcons quarterback made a mistake and should be allowed to prove he has learned from that mistake.

On Monday, Vick said through a lawyer that he will plead guilty to a federal charge of conspiracy to travel in interstate commerce in aid of unlawful activities and conspiracy to sponsor a dog in an animal fighting venture.

Three Vick associates have pleaded guilty to the conspiracy charge and say Vick provided nearly all the gambling and operating funds for the "Bad Newz Kennels" dogfighting enterprise. Two of them also said Vick participated in executing at least eight underperforming dogs, raising the possibility of the animal cruelty charges.

Last month, state and local leaders of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People urged the public not to rush to judgment in the Vick case. The civil rights organization said animal rights groups, talk radio and the news media were vilifying the embattled athlete, and that his team and corporate sponsors were prematurely punishing Vick.

White said the Atlanta chapter supports Vick's decision to accept a plea bargain if it's in his best interest, but he questioned the credibility of Vick's co-defendants, saying an admission of guilt might be more about cutting losses than the truth.

"At this point, you're not looking at guilt or innocence," White said, referring to the possible harsher sentence Vick could have received had he taken his case to trial and been found guilty. "You're thinking, 'What I better do is cut my losses and take a plea.' But if he saw this as the best thing to do at this point for his future, then I think he made the correct choice."

White said he regretted that the plea deal will mean all the facts of the case might never be known.

"Some have said things to save their own necks," White said. "Michael Vick has received more negative press than if he had killed a human being."

White said he does not support dogfighting and that he considers it as bad as hunting.

"His crime is, it was a dog," White said.

NBA Rogue Referee Set To Surrender

NEW YORK - Former NBA referee Tim Donaghy planned to plead guilty in federal court today to charges alleging he bet on games he officiated, a person familiar with the betting scandal probe said.
A graduate of Cardinal O'Hara High School and Villanova University, Donaghy was to surrender at Brooklyn federal court, the person, who was not authorized to speak about the case, said last night on condition of anonymity.

Donaghy's attorney, John Lauro, and federal prosecutors declined to comment. NBA spokesman Tim Frank told the Associated Press the league was informed yesterday that Donaghy would enter a plea today but was given no further information.

Investigators examined whether the 40-year-old Donaghy placed his own wagers and provided inside information, including referees' schedules. The referee had a gambling problem and was approached by low-level mob associates through an acquaintance, a law enforcement official said.

The FBI first contacted the NBA on June 20 to talk about a referee alleged to be gambling on games, and the two sides met June 21, NBA commissioner David Stern said last month.

Donaghy, a Delaware County native who spent 13 seasons as an NBA official, resigned July 9. Stern said he would have fired him sooner but was told it might affect the investigation.

Stern blamed a "rogue, isolated criminal" for the betting scandal, which has devastated the league and threatened the credibility of every referee.

Donaghy was rated in the top tier of officials, Stern said, and there was nothing suspicious about the frequency of his foul calls. He was assigned to work in the second round of the playoffs, with his last NBA game coming during the Phoenix-San Antonio Western Conference semifinal.

No other NBA officials or players were expected to be involved in the scandal, which Stern called the "most serious situation and worst situation that I have ever experienced either as a fan of the NBA, a lawyer for the NBA, or a commissioner of the NBA."

Federal agents investigating Donaghy said last month they had focused in part on his ties to sports bookmakers in the Philadelphia area, people close to the investigation said.

Several people from Delaware County who know either Donaghy or reputed Phoenixville bookmaker James "Baa Baa" Battista were subpoenaed in the case and traveled to New York to testify before a federal grand jury, a source said.

Battista, 42, attended Cardinal O'Hara with Donaghy in the mid-1980s. Battista was contacted by federal prosecutors a few months ago, his lawyer said.

Battista was one of five Delaware County men arrested in 1998 by Pennsylvania State Police on bookmaking and conspiracy charges, records show. Computers and records were seized, and authorities suspected they had come upon a major betting ring. But within months, the case devolved. Battista's case, for example, was transferred to an alternative-dispute resolution program, and he paid about $800 in court costs.

The investigation is being conducted by FBI agents in Brooklyn who work on an organized crime squad, but several people involved cautioned that this did not necessarily mean the case is mob-related.

Two people who spoke on condition of anonymity said that federal authorities suspect Donaghy provided inside information to sports bookies just minutes before NBA games he was refereeing began.

His former neighbors in West Chester, with whom the referee regularly feuded, have said Donaghy liked to gamble, particularly at the Borgata in Atlantic City.

Son of Nazi Architect To Design Beijing Olympic Route

THE son of Hitler’s favourite architect, who was ordered by the Führer to turn Berlin into the greatest city in the world, has designed a key route to the Beijing Olympic site.

Albert Speer Jr, who was born a year after Hitler came to power, was recruited by the Chinese authorities as lead designer on the huge architectural project to redesign the sprawling city ahead of the 2008 Games.

Their choice has stirred ghosts from the past. More than 70 years ago Speer’s father, dubbed the “Devil’s Architect”, was charged with a similar task of rebuilding the Reich capital and turning it into an unrivalled global metropolis.

It was to be called Welthaupt-stadt (World Capital) Germania and designed to be bigger, grander and bolder than any other city to fit Hitler’s obsession with the idea of creating a modern-day Rome as the capital of his empire.

Beijing’s radical reconstruction has been described as totalitarian architecture, similar to Speer the elder’s grandiose but unfulfilled plans.

The most distinctive feature of Speer Jr’s blueprint has been a central five-mile strip, running from a new railway station in the south of the capital past Tianan-men Square and the Forbidden City to the new Olympic Green.

The strip is known as the “central north-south axis” and is still under construction by armies of migrant workers working around the clock.

Critics have suggested an uncanny parallel between Speer’s Beijing axis and the three-mile north-south axis, also flanked by train stations, that was planned by his father for Hitler’s new Berlin.

The Berlin boulevard was never completed because of the outbreak of the second world war, although many of Berlin’s tenements were bulldozed to make way for it.

Speer has been blamed for the forced evictions of thousands of Jewish tenants, although some architectural historians claim he was simply a bureaucrat following orders. Others allege he personally signed the eviction and demolition orders.

A recent study by the Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions estimated that about 1.5m Beijing residents will be evicted or displaced by the project to rebuild the city.

The total cost of preparing the Olympics is expected to top £10 billion. The rapid construction of shopping arcades, a new central financial centre, expressways and an improved public transport system have evoked the remaking of Paris by Baron Haussmann between 1865 and 1887.

Speer Jr’s plans have not been without controversy. When he first submitted his proposal in 2003 it was greeted by hostility in the German press.

“His Beijing axis is reawakening old memories,” declared Die Welt. “Wasn’t there a legendary . . . north-south axis, planned by the elder Speer for Hitler’s new Berlin? Is his son to copy him or rather outdo him?”

Father and son also share an Olympic connection: Speer the elder designed the Zeppelintribune - the Nuremberg parade grounds - that Hitler planned to use for the site of the “Aryan Games” that were to replace the Olympics when he won the war.

Speer Jr, the eldest of six children, barely knew his father, who was in prison throughout his childhood.

By choosing a career in architecture he continued a family tradition that goes back at least three generations. Now 73, he is resigned to living in the shadow of his father, who died in 1981. In a recent interview, he recalled how he won an architectural prize at the start of his career.

“When they opened the envelope, everybody was baffled. ‘What?’ said one of the members of the jury. ‘Albert Speer? I thought he’s in jail!’ That’s how I began.”

Although he boasts that his plans are “bigger, much bigger” than his father’s design for Berlin, he rejects any parallels with his work but nonetheless admits, “Comparisons with my father are unfortunately unavoidable.” He added: “What I am trying to do in Beijing is to transport a 2,000-year-old city into the future. Berlin in the 1930s - that was just megalomania.”

His plans have created a stir of excitement within architectural circles in Beijing.

“I think it is fascinating that the son of a Nazi is rebuilding Beijing. Chinese people probably don’t know it, but Hitler was actually a great artist and his architectural vision for Berlin immense,” said Mi You, a 24-year-old architecture student.

The authorities have tried to play down the links with the Speer family’s dark past.

“We know about Mr Speer’s Nazi family but we don’t see its relevance to what is happening in Beijing,” said Shao Zi Qian, an Olympics committee spokesman.

“The axis is actually closely based on the ancient transport routes of the city and has been designed to incorporate the latest in modern design while providing space to preserve traditional parts of the city.”

(by Nicola Smith and Flora Bagenal)

Beijing Boycott Rumblings Pick Up Steam

OTTAWA -- At the birthplace of the Olympic movement, a former Canadian member of Parliament will today ignite what he hopes will become a global movement to boycott next year's summer Games in Beijing.

Calling the 2008 Games the "Bloody Harvest Olympics," former Edmonton MP David Kilgour is inviting the media to Athens, Greece, to cover a Global Human Rights Torch Relay. Once lit in Athens, the torch will travel through 100 cities around the world.

The year-long relay is designed to draw attention to allegations of crimes against humanity committed by the Chinese government against practitioners of Falun Gong.

The relay comes as China faces increasing scrutiny over human rights in the run-up to the Olympics. On Wednesday, China expelled three Canadians who had been detained after unfurling a banner on the Great Wall in protest over the occupation of Tibet.

Canada's Green Party on Wednesday called on the government to exert diplomatic pressure on China to keep the Games from being tarnished by human rights violations.

While today's torch-lighting is unlikely to spark a widespread boycott of the Games, it will help establish Kilgour's reputation as a leading voice for Falun Gong practitioners in their ongoing campaign against the Chinese government.

Followers describe Falun Gong as a peaceful belief system that preaches compassion and tolerance.

China considers it a dangerous cult that has led devotees to resist needed medical attention and, in rare cases, to self-immolate in protest.

Kilgour, who once served as secretary of state for the Asia-Pacific region, has a long record as a human rights advocate. In 2005, when sitting as an independent MP, he threatened to withdraw support for then-prime minister Paul Martin's narrow minority government if Canada did not do more to help the people of Darfur, in the Sudan.

Kilgour made international headlines last year with a report on the persecution of Falun Gong, co-written with Winnipeg lawyer David Matas.

While much of their work has been embraced by international human rights experts, others have raised doubts about some aspects of the report and its methodology.

The Chinese embassy in Ottawa dismissed it as "groundless" and "based on rumours and false allegations."

The United States is set to weigh-in on the subject of a Boycott, but Germany opposes the concept:

The German government opposes US calls for a boycott of the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing, China, over the human rights in that country.

Asked about his reaction to demands by the US Congress to boycott the Chinese Olympics, the human rights coordinator of the German government, Guenter Nooke told the Hamburg-based Welt newspaper on Thursday, "I think nothing of it at all."

The German official stressed China had fulfilled the criteria of the International Olympic Committee (OIC) to host the Olympics.

US legislators have introduced a resolution in the House of Representatives calling for a boycott of the 2008 Olympic games in Beijing unless it "stops engaging in serious human rights abuses," American news reports said Tuesday.

Supported initially by eight lawmakers from President George W Bush's Republican party, the resolution also urges China to "stop supporting serious human rights abuses by the governments' of Sudan, Myanmar and North Korea.

The resolution is slated to be discussed by the House foreign affairs committee when legislators return from their summer break in early September.

Comparing the 2008 games to the Berlin 1936 Olympics, which took place at the time of the peak of Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, the resolution said "the integrity of the host country is of the utmost importance so as not to stain the participating athletes or the character of the games."

The Beijing Games will kick off on August 8, 2008.

756 !!

SAN FRANCISCO (Aug. 8) - For one spectacular moment, Barry Bonds and everybody cheering him could forget about the controversy surrounding his chase and appreciate the phenomenal feat: 756.

Nobody in the majors - not Hank Aaron, not Babe Ruth - has ever hit more home runs than the San Francisco star.

On Tuesday night, in his home ballpark, it didn't matter how many of them might have been fueled by steroids or performance-enhancers. Bonds has the title of home run king all to himself, ending Aaron's 33-year reign.

"This record is not tainted at all. At all. Period," Bonds said.

And more than 43,000 adoring Giants fans, including his godfather, Hall of Famer Willie Mays, surely agreed.

Bonds raised both arms over his head like a prize fighter in victory, fists clenched - and then he took off. It was over at long last.

Bonds did it with a shot to the deepest part of the ballpark with one out in the fifth inning against Washington's Mike Bacsik.

Bonds sent the 84-mph fastball arcing high into the night, 435 feet into the right-center field seats. And then, the celebration began in force _ fireworks, streamers, banners commemorating the accomplishment, and even a party in McCovey Cove.

Conspicuous by their absence were the commissioner and Hammerin' Hank himself.

Though he was on hand for the tying homer three days ago, deciding to put baseball history ahead of the suspicions plaguing the Giants slugger, Bud Selig wasn't there for the record-breaker.

Instead, he sent two emissaries, Major League Baseball executive vice president Jimmie Lee Solomon and Hall of Famer Frank Robinson. Selig also issued a statement.

"While the issues which have swirled around this record will continue to work themselves toward resolution, today is a day for congratulations on a truly remarkable achievement," Selig said.

Bonds also heard personally from the commissioner with congratulations.

"I was very happy about that," Bonds said.

As for Aaron, he said all along he had no interest in being there whenever and wherever his record was broken. He was true to his word, but he did offer a taped message of congratulations that played on the stadium's video board during a 10-minute, in-game tribute.

"It is a great accomplishment which required skill, longevity and determination," he said.

"Throughout the past century, the home run has held a special place in baseball and I have been privileged to hold this record for 33 of those years. I move over now and offer my best wishes to Barry and his family on this historic achievement.

"My hope today, as it was on that April evening in 1974, is that the achievement of this record will inspire others to chase their own dreams."

A woman who answered the phone at Aaron's home in Georgia shortly after Bonds' homer said that Aaron was asleep.

"When I saw Hank Aaron that made everything," Bonds said. "We've always loved him. He's always the home run king."

With a long, satisfied stare, Bonds watched as the ball sailed over the fence and disappeared into the scrum in the first few rows. Then he raised both arms over his head like a victorious prize fighter, fists clenched, and took off.

"I knew I hit it," Bonds said. "I knew I got it. I was like, phew, finally."

His 17-year-old batboy son, Nikolai, was already bouncing on home plate as Dad rounded third and ran the final 90 feet to make it official. After a long embrace, the rest of the family joined in _ his mother, two daughters and wife. And then there was Mays, who removed his cap and congratulated his godson.

Bonds saved his most poignant words for last, addressing his late father, Bobby.

"My dad," he said, looking to the sky and choking back tears. "Thank you."

Bonds had wanted to break the record at home, where he would be assured of a friendly crowd. They were all right, unlike in San Diego where some fans held up signs with asterisks.

Bonds has always denied knowingly using performance-enhancing drugs.

After doubling and singling his first two times up, Bonds hit a solo home run. Bacsik put his left hand to the back of his head as soon as Bonds connected.

"I dreamed about it as a kid, but when I dreamed about it, I was the one hitting the home run and not giving it up," Bacsik said.

"I didn't really want to be part of history as a bad part, but I am," he said. "I'm OK with it."

Bacsik later spoke with Bonds and got an autographed a bat from the Giants star.

Bonds took his position in left field to start the sixth, then was replaced and drew another standing ovation. The Nationals won the game, 8-6.

A fan wearing a Mets jersey wound up with the historic ball. Matt Murphy of New York emerged from the stands with the souvenir and a bloodied face, and was whisked to a secure room.

Even with Bonds at the top of the chart, fans will surely keep debating which slugger they consider the true home run champion. Some will continue to cling to Aaron while other, older rooters will always say it's Babe Ruth.

"It's all about history. Pretty soon, someone will come along and pass him," Mays said before the game.

Aaron held the top spot for 12,173 days after connecting for No. 715 to pass the Babe on April 8, 1974.

"This is the greatest record in all of sports," Giants manager Bruce Bochy said. "We are all fortunate to witness it. It's awesome. This road to history has been a lot of fun."

Bonds homered exactly three years after Greg Maddux earned his 300th victory at the same ballpark. It's been quite a week of baseball milestones _ over the weekend, Alex Rodriguez hit his 500th home run and Tom Glavine won No. 300.

A seven-time NL MVP, the 43-year-old Bonds hit his 22nd home run of the year. Bonds broke Mark McGwire's single-season record by hitting 73 in 2001 and while he's no longer such a force, opposing pitchers remain wary.

Bonds and Giants management bickered in the offseason over contract issues. This big night was the main reason owner Peter Magowan brought back the star left fielder for a 15th season in San Francisco, signing him to a $15.8 million, one-year contract.

Bonds' once-rapid quest for the record had slowed in recent years as his age and balky knees diminished his pace. He hit 258 home runs from 2000-04, but has only 53 since then.

While steroids have tinged Bonds' pursuit, it was race that was the predominant issue when Aaron broke Ruth's mark in 1974. Aaron dealt with hate mail and death threats from racist fans who thought a black man was not worthy of breaking the record set by a white hero, the beloved Babe.

Bonds was destined for stardom at an early age. The son of All-Star outfielder Bobby Bonds and the godson of one of the game's greatest players, Bonds spent his childhood years roaming the clubhouse at Candlestick Park, getting tips from Mays and other Giants.

"I visualized him playing sports at a high level. He was 5 when he was in my locker all the time," Mays said.

In a matter of years, Bonds went from a wiry leadoff hitter with Pittsburgh in 1986 to a bulked-up slugger. That transformation is at the heart of his many doubters, who believe Bonds cheated to accomplish his feats and should not be considered the record-holder.

There are plenty of fans already hoping for the day that Bonds' total - whatever it ends up - is topped. Rodriguez may have the best chance, with his 500 home runs at age 32 far ahead of Bonds' pace.

Bonds said he hadn't yet thought beyond 756. He plans to play in 2008.

"I'll tell you one thing: I'm going to hit a lot better from now on," he said after a champagne celebration in the clubhouse.

Justin Gatlin Secretly Taped Conversations With Controversial Coach

Olympic 100-meter champion Justin Gatlin secretly recorded more than 10 telephone calls with his coach, Trevor Graham, to assist federal investigators in the Balco steroid probe and the calls produced no evidence that Gatlin took or received any banned substances, the lead Balco investigator told arbitrators during a closed-door hearing this week, according to three people in attendance at the hearing.

The testimony from the investigator, Jeff Novitzky, came via teleconference in an Atlanta courtroom as Gatlin mounted his defense of a positive test for steroids from April 22, 2006. The three-day arbitration came to an end with closing arguments last night. A decision is not expected for several weeks.

Novitzky, who testified for more than two hours Monday, described Gatlin as the only track and field athlete to provide undercover assistance willingly during the five-year Balco investigation of steroid use in sports, which has resulted in five criminal convictions and more than a dozen athlete bans, according to Gatlin's attorney, John P. Collins; his father, Willie Gatlin; and another source who did not wish to be identified.

Graham was indicted last fall on charges of lying to federal investigators.

Novitzky did not respond to a request for comment. U.S. Anti-Doping Agency general counsel Travis Tygart also declined to comment.

Gatlin's uncommon cooperation and Novitzky's unprecedented testimony -- no federal agent has ever testified on behalf of a U.S. athlete facing doping charges -- could be critical to Gatlin as he attempts to fend off a possible eight-year ban for last year's positive test for testosterone or its precursors.

Gatlin, who hopes to be able to compete at the 2008 Summer Games in Beijing, faces an eight-year ban instead of the standard two-year penalty for a steroid offense because this is his second positive test. Collins argued this week that the first violation, a 2001 positive test for a stimulant in the attention-deficit disorder medication Gatlin had been taking since childhood, should be thrown out. The arbitration panel that reviewed the case at the time called the violation "inadvertent" and said Gatlin, at that time a student at the University of Tennessee, neither cheated nor intended to cheat.

Gatlin, who matched the 100 world record of 9.77 seconds in May 2006, has said he did not knowingly take any banned drugs or allow them to be administered to him, but the international anti-doping movement has historically held athletes accountable for any substances in their bodies and rejected pleas for lenience regardless of individual circumstances.

This case, however, is unusual. Rather than arguing that his positive test for testosterone or its precursors was flawed or that he accidentally ingested a banned substance -- common refrains from accused athletes -- Gatlin accepted the test results but claimed he was neither guilty nor negligent and that the circumstances of his case deserved special consideration.

Should the three-member arbitration panel reviewing the case agree, the case would be referred to the anti-doping review board of the world track and field governing body (IAAF). If the IAAF agreed that special circumstances apply, the matter would be handed back to the arbitration panel and it would be free to recommend a reduced sanction.

Gatlin has said the cooperation with federal investigators and evidence that the positive test was a one-time occurrence -- the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency probed five of his urine samples after the positive test with the rarely used CIR, which distinguishes natural from artificial testosterone, and all were negative -- substantiate his claims of innocence.

Gatlin also contends that he might have been sabotaged by a massage therapist who could have rubbed a steroid-based cream on his legs during what appeared to be routine treatment sessions. Gatlin told The Post he could find no other explanation for the test results, which his medical experts testified were consistent with the application of a cream.

Gatlin speculated that the massage therapist, Chris Whetstine, might have held a grudge against him over his failure to reward him with a bonus in 2005.

Whetstine appeared as a witness via teleconference Tuesday and denied rubbing a steroid-based cream on Gatlin, according to two people who were present in the courtroom during his testimony. He also said he did not believe Gatlin had knowingly taken drugs, the people said.

A North Carolina-based massage therapist whom Gatlin visited when Whetstine was not available also testified, saying Gatlin's body showed no signs of steroid use. The massage therapist, Terri Blankenship, said she formerly worked as a police officer and state investigator with an emphasis on drug abuse, sales and steroids, so she was familiar with the common signs of steroid abuse.

"He never changed; he never really bulked up," Blankenship said in a phone interview. "There was never anything with Justin that made me even question he was using anything."

(by Amy Shipley)

Latest Inductees The Last of Their Kind?

Cal Ripken and Tony Gwynn will be inducted into the Hall of Fame on Sunday without a hint of suspicion. They were the living, breathing definitions of greatness.

They played by the rules. They appreciated the game's history. They honored that history -- and the millions who cheered them -- with the way they conducted themselves on and off the field.

This weekend may be the last time Cooperstown throws one of these parties without steroids being the elephant in the middle of the room. So let's pause from the national hand-wringing over Barry Bonds to celebrate what the Hall of Fame is supposed to be.

But before someone writes to challenge the notion that Ripken and Gwynn didn't cheat, let's look at the evidence.

There's none. Neither underwent the physical transformation tied to the use of steroids or human growth hormones.

Actually, both did gain some weight over the years. For several years, Ripken showed up at spring training five pounds heavier than he'd been the previous spring.

Later in his career, he stopped the gain through a relentless attention to detail, including his nutrition. In the end, his body never looked dramatically different.

Gwynn? He fought an expanding waistline his entire career. That waistline was one of the many reasons those of us in the media loved him. He was one of us.

What they had in common was a love and a respect for the game.

Gwynn made hitting an art. He was meticulous in caring for his bats, in studying video of his swing and in remembering pitchers, umpires, ballparks and the like. Like Ripken, he played his entire career in one place and apparently was never really tempted to move someplace else.

He was much more than a ballplayer in San Diego. He was a citizen of San Diego. Padres owner John Moores said this weekend that Gwynn was the person most responsible for the construction of Petco Park. He said Gwynn might even be the reason the Padres are still in San Diego.

"What a great ambassador," Moores wrote in an essay published by the San Diego Union-Tribune. "Tony's passion was always to do better, to be better. He is one of the squarest men I have ever known. What is right, is right. What works, works."

I knew Ripken far better because I covered the Orioles for both the Baltimore Sun and Washington Post.

His attention to detail was amazing. Once on a train ride in Japan, he asked about a quote he'd read from country music star Bill Anderson.

"He said he'd never turned down a fan for an autograph," Ripken said. "I just don't see how that's possible."

Ripken recounted how he signed hundreds of autographs, how he always tried to be sensitive to fans. But he didn't believe he ever could have fulfilled every request.

One of his routines was signing in the stadium parking lot at Memorial Stadium after home games. Fans gathered in larger and larger numbers knowing he -- and others -- would spend a few minutes there.

One time when he had someplace to be, he showed up, apologized and handed out some autographed pictures. One guy got angry.

"You've turned out just like the other rich jerks," the guy said (or something close to that).

Weeks later, as the Orioles toured Japan, Ripken was still bothered both by Anderson's quote and that man's reaction.

He was the same way on the field. He ate his pre-game meal at the same time every afternoon. He sat in on pre-game meetings because he wanted to know how that night's pitcher planned to pitch each opposing hitter.

Ripken had terrific range at shortstop, but he wasn't quick. He made up for it by positioning and anticipation.

He would go out to the field each afternoon during batting practice and take dozens of groundballs. He would begin with some short tosses to first base, then some longer ones.

He wanted to gauge how his arm felt that day. If his arm was feeling tired, he'd have to compensate by getting rid of the ball more quickly.

When Hall of Fame manager Earl Weaver shifted him from third to short, many people were skeptical, including Orioles general manager Hank Peters.

It was impossible for most baseball people to comprehend how a 6-4, 210-pound kid could play a position where the prototype had been Mark Belanger or Robin Yount.

But Ripken became as graceful and as superb as any defensive shortstop ever. When he made the switch, Weaver warned Ripken that there would be a downside.

"Listen, you're never going to make an All-Star team," Weaver said. "Not when (Robin) Yount and (Alan) Trammell are in the American League."

Weaver turned out to be wrong about that. Ripken was a 19-time All-Star.

He's exactly the kind of player who ought to be honored by the Hall of Fame. Let's hope he and Gwynn are not the last of this type.

Professional Sport Leagues Under Siege

America’s most popular games are outgrowing the sports pages -- for all the wrong reasons.

The country’s three leading sports leagues are embattled, enduring a flurry of negative news and a battery of federal investigations. Major League Baseball is aching for tormented slugger Barry Bonds, a central character in the steroids scandal, to expeditiously break the sport’s grandest record; the NFL is scrambling to clean up Michael Vick’s dog fighting mess; and the NBA is calculating ways to curb the damage of the FBI’s investigation that veteran NBA referee Tim Donaghy bet on games he officiated.

The timing couldn't be worse for the multi-billion dollar leagues.

Steroids remains the elephant in clubhouses until the slumping Bonds hits the three home runs needed to pass Hank Aaron. The excitement of NFL training camps are dulled by the dog distraction. As for the NBA, the magnitude of its scandal is just beginning to emerge.

So which league finds itself in the deepest hole?

3) Vick is the league’s highest-paid player, but he’s just one in a constellation of stars. Unlike the NBA, the NFL sells teams, not players. Stars naturally emerge -- Tom Brady, Peyton Manning, LaDanian Tomlinson, Julius Peppers, Champ Bailey -- but the league doesn't bank on individuals, which is why players are fined for taking off their helmets during a celebration.

The No. 1 pick in the 2001 NFL Draft, Vick has a slew of endorsement deals, and he's one of the game’s most electrifying players. But the NFL will survive the 2007 season if Vick never plays a down, and the Falcons are not as hopeless as, say, the Los Angeles Lakers would be sans Kobe Bryant or even the New York Yankees without Alex Rodriguez. The Falcons have no shortage of Pro Bowl talent, including cornerback DeAngelo Hall, return specialist Allen Rossum, defensive end John Abraham, defensive tackle Rod Coleman, linebacker Keith Brooking, running back Warrick Dunn, safety Lawyer Milloy, tight end Alge Crumpler and receiver Joe Horn.

While their playoff chances darkened minus Vick, the Falcons are not doomed.

Based on his action Monday, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell doesn't look as if he will wait for legal proceedings to play out. Goodell likely won't be sitting on his hands, especially since he encouraged Falcons owner Arthur Blank not to suspend Michael Vick. "We had gone so far as to draft a letter," Blank said "but the commissioner asked us not to take action until they complete their review."

In a letter to Vick, Goodell said: “While it is for the criminal justice system to determine your guilt or innocence, it is my responsibility as commissioner of the National Football League to determine whether your conduct, even if not criminal, nonetheless violated league policies, including the Personal Conduct Policy.”

The attention is unneeded and unwanted. But, in the end, Goodell can spin this as another example of his taking a tough stance to demand accountability from all league employees.

2) Baseball’s most hallowed records don't require explanations: 56; 2,632; 755.

The latter, of course, is Aaron’s home run record.

For decades, the number seemed untouchable, and the mythical day a person broke it would been projected as one of the most-celebrated moments in baseball, if not, sports history.

Instead, Commissioner Bud Selig can't wait for the day to come and go, with as little fanfare as possible.

Since 2003, when his trainer, Greg Anderson, was indicted by a federal grand jury for supplying athletes anabolic steroids, Bonds has been a key figure in the BALCO scandal. He has never failed a steroid test, but he is under investigation for perjury based on his reported denial in 2003 that he never knowingly used performance-enhancing drugs.

Selig barely acknowledges the home run chase, which is more than subtle indication that Bonds’ inevitable takeover of Aaron’s record is tainted. In the summer of 1998, Selig closely tracked Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa’s pursuit of the single-season home run record held by Roger Maris. Baseball’s resurgence can be credited to the buzz the muscle-bound duo created that year, and Selig happily embraced all of the interest.

Those were joyful times for Selig and the Sport, with only fleeting questions at the time about whether the players were juiced.

Now, Bonds is one of a handful of players linked to steroids, and Selig’s awkward handling of the issue only bolsters that the league and its players have something to hide. Selig is privy to sensitive information, and his decision not to sport a Giants’ hat and not to personally honor Bonds after hitting No. 756 is a telling indicator that something is amiss.

1) The NBA has long had to tolerate the offhand accusations that the league fixes games to favor certain players and teams. Now, with a veteran official being investigated by the FBI for allegedly betting on games he officiated and providing information to others for the purpose of placing bets, the conspiracy theorists are validated.

At least one NBA employee has apparently done the unthinkable, and Donaghy has dirtied 139 regular-season, eight playoff and four preseason games.

Stern didn't sugarcoat the matter Tuesday.

“This is the most serious situation and worst situation that I have ever experienced either as a fan of the NBA, a lawyer for the NBA or commissioner of the NBA,” Stern said at a news conference Tuesday. “I think it’s my obligation as Commissioner to retain the best outside experts in these matters, to advise the NBA on what we can do better to assure our fans that our games are being decided on their merits.”

Good luck.

Few officials have as much impact on the course and outcome of a game as those employed by the NBA. A couple extra free throws here, a borderline foul there... NBA officials can dramatically influence a game. If Donaghy, for instance, needed an underdog to lose by only three points, is it inconceivable to think that he might have whistled an extra foul to cover the spread? While Stern declined to talk about specific games Donaghy worked, most notably Game 3 of the playoff series between the Spurs and Suns, imagine how much money Donaghy stood to gain by having the Suns, the clear favorite heading into the matchup, lose to the Spurs?

Scoring is less plentiful in baseball, football, hockey and soccer, which puts the officials of those sports in a slightly less prominent role than their NBA counterparts. In football and baseball, there isn't much latitude for an official to subtly affect the score in a game. A pass interference call late in a game will be scrutinized, and so would a close force out baseball. But even then, the odds that the benefiting team scores isn't nearly as likely as a pair of free throws. In the NBA playoffs, Donaghy reportedly made a phantom call that rewarded Manu Ginobili with three free throws late in the third quarter against the Suns.

Stern struggled and staggered through his news conference Tuesday, and he seemed resigned to the fact that this scandal is a devastating blow to his sport. Stern called this an “isolated case” and called Donaghy a “rogue, isolated criminal.” But Stern and the league certainly know this debacle is only going to get uglier as more information is revealed.

Steroids has cast a skeptical cloud over power hitters, and even some pitchers, and baseball cannot wash its hands of the issue because of inept drug policies that were not tweaked until a few years ago. And the NFL certainly cannot be blamed for Vick’s problems.

But basketball faces the most insurmountable challenge because this crisis isn't about players or even a “rogue” official. This is about something far more important, the integrity of the game.

So for all the positives under Stern’s watch, his legacy will forever be reduced by this scandal, regardless of the outcome.

(by Sean Jensen)

Was Wrestlers' Murderous Actions Caused By "Roid-Rage"?

ATLANTA (June 26) - Pro wrestler Chris Benoit strangled his wife, suffocated his 7-year-old son and placed a Bible next to their bodies before hanging himself with a weight-machine pulley, authorities said Tuesday.

Wrestling Tragedy

Investigators found anabolic steroids in the house and want to know whether the muscle man nicknamed "The Canadian Crippler" was unhinged by the bodybuilding drugs, which can cause paranoia, depression and explosive outbursts known as "roid rage."

Authorities offered no motive for the killings, which were spread out over a weekend, and would not discuss Benoit's state of mind. No suicide note was found.

"I'm baffled about why anybody would kill a 7-year-old," District Attorney Scott Ballard said. "I don't think we'll ever be able wrap our head around that."

The Montreal-born Benoit was one of the stars of the WWE wrestling circuit and was known for his wholesome family-man image. His wife, Nancy, was a wrestling stage manager who worked under the name "Woman." They married in 2000.

When he won the world heavyweight championship in 2004, Benoit (pronounced ben-WAH) hoisted the belt over his head and invited his wife and child into the ring to celebrate. Asked by the Calgary Sun that same year to name his worst vice: Benoit replied: "Quality time with my family is a big vice. It's something I'll fight for and crave."

Nevertheless, Nancy Benoit filed for a divorce in 2003, saying the couple's three-year marriage was irrevocably broken and alleging "cruel treatment." She later dropped the complaint, as well as a request for a restraining order in which she charged that the 5-foot-10, 220-pound Benoit had threatened her and had broken furniture in their home.

In the divorce filing, she said Benoit made more than $500,000 a year as a professional wrestler and asked for permanent custody of Daniel and child support. In his response, Benoit sought joint custody.

The bodies were found Monday afternoon in the house, situated off a gravel road in this suburb about 20 miles south of Atlanta.

Benoit's 43-year-old wife was killed Friday in an upstairs family room, her feet and wrists were bound and there was blood under her head, indicating a possible struggle, Ballard said. Daniel was probably killed late Saturday or early Sunday, the body found in his bed, the district attorney said.

Benoit, 40, apparently hanged himself several hours and as long as a day later, Ballard said. His body was found in a downstairs weight room, his body found hanging from the pulley of a piece of exercise equipment.

A closed Bible was placed next to the bodies of the wife and son, authorities said.

The prosecutor said he found it "bizarre" that the WWE wrestling star spread out the killings over a weekend and appeared to remain in the house for up to a day with the bodies.

Toxicology test results may not be available for weeks or even months, Ballard said. As for whether steroids played a role in the crime, he said: "We don't know yet. That's one of the things we'll be looking at."

Steroids have been linked to the deaths of several professional wrestlers in recent years. Eddie Guerrero, one of Benoit's best friends, died in 2005 from heart failure linked to long-term steroid use.

The father of Curt "Mr. Perfect" Hennig blamed steroids and painkillers for Hennig's drug overdose death in 2003. Davey Boy Smith, the "British Bulldog," died in 2002 from heart failure that a coroner said was probably caused by steroids.

Benoit was a quiet, roughhewn figure amid the glitz and bluster of pro wrestling. He performed under his real name, eschewed scripted personas and didn't bother to fix a gap where he had lost one of his front teeth. (According to the WWE Web site, he lost the tooth while roughhousing with his pet Rottweiler.)

His signature move was the "Crippler Crossface," in which he would lock his hands around an opponent's face and stretch his neck.

He met his wife in the 1990s when she was married to rival wrestler Kevin Sullivan. As part of the scripted rivalry, Benoit and Nancy were supposed to act as if they were having an affair. A real romance blossomed, and she left Sullivan for Benoit.

Neighbors said the Benoits led a low-key lifestyle.

"We would see Chris walking in his yard from time to time. He wasn't rude, but he wasn't really outwardly warm," said Alaina Jones, who lives across the street.

Jimmy Baswell, who was Benoit's driver for more than five years, placed a white wreath at the Benoits' gate. "They always seemed like they were the happiest people," he said.

World Wrestling Entertainment said on its Web site that it asked authorities to check on Benoit and his family after being alerted by friends who had received "several curious text messages sent by Benoit early Sunday morning."

"He was like a family member to me, and everyone in my family is taking it real hard," said fellow Canadian Bret Hart, a five-time champion.

The WWE canceled its live "Monday Night RAW" card in Corpus Christi, Texas, after the bodies were discovered.

Monday's show was supposed to be a memorial service for WWE owner Vince McMahon. In a storyline concocted by the WWE, McMahon was supposedly "assassinated" in a limousine explosion two weeks earlier. McMahon appeared at the beginning of Monday's telecast and acknowledged the bombing was made up.

The McMahon storyline has been dropped.

(Associated Press writers Debbie Newby and Jason Bronis contributed to this report)

Sports Cream Blamed In Athletes' Death

NEW YORK (June 9) — A medical examiner blamed a 17-year-old track star's death on the use of too much muscle cream , the kind used to soothe aching legs after exercise.

Arielle Newman, a cross-country runner at Notre Dame Academy on Staten Island, died after her body absorbed high levels of methyl salicylate, an anti-inflammatory found in sports creams such as Bengay and Icy Hot, the New York City medical examiner said Friday.

The medical examiner's spokeswoman, Ellen Borakove, said the teen used "topical medication to excess." She said it was the first time that her office had reported a death from using a sports cream.

Newman, who garnered numerous track awards, died April 13. She had gone to a party the night before, then returned home and spent hours talking with her mother.

Methyl salicylate poisoning is unusual, and deaths from high levels of the chemical are rare.

"Chronic use is more dangerous than one-time use," Edward Arsura, chairman of medicine at Richmond University Medical Center, told the Staten Island Advance on Friday. "Exercise and heat can accentuate absorption."

Dr. Ronald Grelsamer, of Mount Sinai Medical Center, said Newman had a very abnormal amount of methyl salicylate in her body.

"She either lathered herself with it, or used way too much, or she used a normal amount and an abnormal percentage was absorbed into her body," he said.

Her mother, Alice Newman, said she still couldn't believe her daughter's death was caused by a sports cream.

"I am scrupulous about my children's health," she told the Advance. "I did not think an over-the-counter product could be unsafe."

Large Number of Beijing Residents To Be Displaced For Olympic Games

Some 1.5 million residents of Beijing will be displaced by the time it hosts the 2008 Olympics, many of them evicted against their will, a rights group said on Tuesday, prompting a sharp denial by China.

The Geneva-based Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions said residents were often forced from their homes with little notice and little compensation, as the government embarks on a massive city redevelopment to accommodate the Games.

"In Beijing, and in China more generally, the process of demolition and eviction is characterized by arbitrariness and lack of due process," the group said in a report.

After demolition, inhabitants were often "forced to relocate far from their communities and workplaces, with inadequate transportation networks adding significantly to their cost of living," the group said.

Beijing's Olympic organizing committee and China's Foreign Ministry said the report was groundless and the figures vastly inflated, with only 6,037 people displaced since 2002 for the construction of Olympic stadiums.

"During the process, the citizens have had their compensation property settled. No single person was forced to move out of Beijing," Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu told a regular news conference.

Across China, battles between residents and property developers have become commonplace as breakneck development swallows up swathes of rural land and as cities raze sections to make way for skyscrapers and shopping malls.

LIVELIHOODS LOST

Recourse to adequate compensation varied widely, the housing rights watchdog said, adding that those who suffer a significant decline in their living conditions as a result of their relocation could be as high as 20 percent.

"As soon as you are evicted, you lose part of your livelihood," the group cited one resident as saying.

In one neighborhood, many who were relocated complained that even if they received compensation they could not afford to pay management fees and unsubsidized electricity and water charges.

While dislocations were common among cities around the world hosting major events, the group noted that in China, where the Communist Party keeps a tight rein on dissent, there was only a limited role for the media or grassroots groups to publicize abuses or advocate change.

Residents who spoke to COHRE's researchers also alleged corruption on the part of local governments, which they said accepted illegal payments from developers.

The group noted several cases of housing rights lawyers and activists who were imprisoned, including Ye Guozhu, who was sentenced to four years in jail in December 2004 for organizing protests against forced evictions.

Particularly vulnerable to abuses were Beijing's population of poor, rural migrants, who often live in urban villages on the city's outskirts.

The International Olympic Committee said it was seeking a better understanding of how mega-events like the Olympics impact displacement through a meeting with the U.N. Special Rapporteur for Adequate Housing.

"As a matter of principle, how the Olympic Games impact people's lives is an important matter for the IOC," its communications director, Giselle Davies, said in an e-mail.

The Fastest Man On "No Legs"...Curse, Or Unfair Advantage?

MANCHESTER, England (May 14) - As Oscar Pistorius of South Africa crouched in the starting blocks for the 200 meters on Sunday, the small crowd turned its attention to the sprinter who calls himself the fastest man on no legs.

Olympic Dream

Pistorius wants to be the first amputee runner to compete in the Olympics. But despite his ascendance, he is facing resistance from track and field’s world governing body, which is seeking to bar him on the grounds that the technology of his prosthetics may give him an unfair advantage over sprinters using their natural legs.

His first strides were choppy Sunday, a necessary accommodation to sprinting on a pair of j-shaped blades made of carbon fiber and known as Cheetahs. Pistorius was born without the fibula in his lower legs and with other defects in his feet. He had both legs amputated below the knee when he was 11 months old. At 20, his coach says, he is like a five-speed engine with no second gear.

Yet Pistorius is also a searing talent who has begun erasing the lines between abled and disabled, raising philosophical questions: What should an athlete look like? Where should limits be placed on technology to balance fair play with the right to compete? Would the nature of sport be altered if athletes using artificial limbs could run faster or jump higher than the best athletes using their natural limbs?

Once at full speed Sunday, Pistorius handily won the 100 and 200 meters here at the Paralympic World Cup, an international competition for disabled athletes. A cold, rainy afternoon tempered his performances, but his victories came decisively and kept him aimed toward his goal of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, even though international track officials seek to block his entrance.

Since March, Pistorius has delivered startling record performances for disabled athletes at 100 meters (10.91 seconds), 200 meters (21.58 seconds) and 400 meters (46.34 seconds). Those times do not meet Olympic qualifying standards for men, but the Beijing Games are still 15 months away. Already, Pistorius is fast enough that his marks would have won gold medals in equivalent women’s races at the 2004 Athens Olympics.

Pistorius’s time of 46.56 in the 400 earned him a second-place finish in March against able-bodied runners at the South African national championships. This seemingly makes him a candidate for the Olympic 4x400-meter relay should South Africa qualify as one of the world’s 16 fastest teams.

“I don’t see myself as disabled,” said the blond, spiky-haired Pistorius, a former rugby and water polo player who declines to park in spaces reserved for the disabled. “There’s nothing I can’t do that able-bodied athletes can do.”

An Equalizer or an Edge?

Still, the question persists: Do prosthetic legs simply level the playing field for Pistorius, compensating for his disability, or do they give him an inequitable edge via what some call techno-doping?

Experts say there have been limited scientific studies on the biomechanics of amputee runners, especially those missing both legs. And because Pistorius lost his legs as an infant, his speed on carbon-fiber legs cannot be compared with his speed on natural legs.

Track and field’s world governing body, based in Monaco and known by the initials I.A.A.F., has recently prohibited the use of technological aids like springs and wheels, disqualifying Pistorius from events that it sanctions. A final ruling is expected in August.

The International Olympic Committee allows governing bodies to make their own eligibility rules, though it can intervene. Since 2004, for example, transgender athletes have been allowed to compete in the Olympics.

“With all due respect, we cannot accept something that provides advantages,” said Elio Locatelli of Italy, the director of development for the I.A.A.F., urging Pistorius to concentrate on the Paralympics that will follow the Olympics in Beijing. “It affects the purity of sport. Next will be another device where people can fly with something on their back.”

Others have questioned the governing body’s motivation.

“I pose a question” for the I.A.A.F., said Robert Gailey, an associate professor of physical therapy at the University of Miami Medical School, who has studied amputee runners. “Are they looking at not having an unfair advantage? Or are they discriminating because of the purity of the Olympics, because they don’t want to see a disabled man line up against an able-bodied man for fear that if the person who doesn’t have the perfect body wins, what does that say about the image of man?”

According to Gailey, a prosthetic leg returns only about 80 percent of the energy absorbed in each stride, while a natural leg returns up to 240 percent, providing much more spring.

“There is no science that he has an advantage, only that he is competing at a disadvantage,” Gailey, who has served as an official in disabled sports, said of Pistorius.

Foremost among the I.A.A.F.’s concerns is that Pistorius’s prosthetic limbs may make him taller than he would have been on natural legs and may unfairly lengthen his stride, allowing him to lower his best times by several seconds in the past three years, while most elite sprinters improve by hundredths of a second.

“The rule book says a foot has to be in contact with the starting block,” Leon Fleiser, a general manager of the South African Olympic Committee, said. “What is the definition of a foot? Is a prosthetic device a foot, or is it an actual foot?”

I.A.A.F. officials have also expressed concern that Pistorius could topple over, obstructing others or injuring himself and fellow competitors. Some also fear that, without limits on technological aids, able-bodied runners could begin wearing carbon-fiber plates or other unsuitably springy devices in their shoes.

Olympic Dream

Among ethicists, Pistorius’s success has spurred talk of “transhumans” and “cyborgs.” Some note that athletes already modify themselves in a number of ways, including baseball sluggers who undergo laser eye surgery to enhance their vision and pitchers who have elbow reconstruction using sturdier ligaments from elsewhere in the body. At least three disabled athletes have competed in the Summer Olympics: George Eyser, an American, won a gold medal in gymnastics while competing on a wooden leg at the 1904 Games in St. Louis; Neroli Fairhall, a paraplegic from New Zealand, competed in archery in the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles; and Marla Runyan, a legally blind runner from the United States, competed in the 1,500 meters at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. But Pistorius would be the first amputee to compete in a track event, international officials said.

A sobering question was posed recently on the Web site of the Connecticut-based Institute for Ethics and Emerging Technologies. “Given the arms race nature of competition,” will technological advantages cause “athletes to do something as seemingly radical as having their healthy natural limbs replaced by artificial ones?” wrote George Dvorsky, a member of the institute’s board of directors. “Is it self-mutilation when you’re getting a better limb?”

Limits and Accommodations

Historically, the I.A.A.F. has placed limits on devices that assist athletes. It prohibits an array of performance-enhancing drugs. And it does not allow wheelchair athletes into the Olympic marathon, given that wheels provide a clear advantage in speed.

But the governing body has also embraced technological advances. For instance, it permits athletes to sleep in tent-like devices designed to simulate high altitude and increase oxygen-carrying capacity.

As disabled athletes improve their performances, the I.A.A.F. is certain to be faced with more decisions about accommodating them. Last February, Jeff Skiba, who has one leg amputated below the knee, competed in the high jump at the United States indoor track and field championships.

Some I.A.A.F. officials say Pistorius’s application should not be treated dismissively. Although he would not be considered a medal candidate, his appearance at the Beijing Games could provide an inspiring story.

Fastest Man on No Legs

“There is no real grounds to say he should not be allowed to compete” in the Olympics, said Juan Manuel Alonso of Spain, who heads the I.A.A.F.’s medical and antidoping commission. “We’d like to have more information and biomechanical studies.”

His own fear, Pistorius said, is that the governing body, which has not contacted him, will ban him on supposition, not science.

“I think they’re afraid to do the research,” Pistorius, a business student at the University of Pretoria, said. “They’re afraid of what they’re going to find, that I don’t have an advantage and they’ll have to let me compete.”

Pistorius, whose stated height is 6 feet 1 ¼ inches while wearing his sprinting prosthetics, says that the devices are within an allowed range determined by the length of his thighs. The peak length of his stride, he said, is 9 feet, not 13 feet as some I.A.A.F. officials suggest.

There are many disadvantages to sprinting on carbon-fiber legs, Pistorius and his coach said. After a cumbersome start, he needs about 30 meters to gain his rhythm. His knees do not flex as readily, limiting his power output. His grip can be unsure in the rain. And when he runs into a headwind or grows fatigued, he must fight rotational forces that turn his prosthetic devices sideways, said Ampie Louw, who coaches Pistorius.

“The I.A.A.F. has got no clue about disabled sport,” said Louw, who has coached Pistorius since 2003.

Insufficient credit is given to Pistorius’s resolve in the weight room and on the track, Louw said, describing one intense workout that requires him to run 350 meters in 42 seconds; 300 meters in 34.6 seconds; 200 meters in 22 seconds and 150 meters in 15.4 seconds. “The kid is a born champion,” Louw said. “He doesn’t settle for second best.”

Having worn prosthetics since infancy, Pistorius did not have to adjust to artificial legs after he began competing, as many disabled athletes do. He won a gold medal in the 200 at the 2004 Paralympics in Athens.

“These have always been my legs,” he said. “I train harder than other guys, eat better, sleep better and wake up thinking about athletics. I think that’s probably why I’m a bit of an exception.”

One who is attempting to broaden the definition of an Olympic athlete.

“You have two competing issues - fair competition and basic human rights to compete,” said Angela Schneider, a sports ethicist at the University of Western Ontario and a 1984 Olympic silver medalist in rowing.

The I.A.A.F. must objectively define when prosthetic devices “go from therapy to enhancement,” Schneider said. The danger of acting hastily, she said, is “you deny a guy’s struggle against all odds - one of the fundamental principles of the Olympics.”

(by Jere Longman, NY Times)

Olympic Swimmer To Pose For Playboy...Pros & Cons

Amanda Beard, a swimmer who has won seven Olympic medals, is planning to pose in Playboy, and Swimming World Magazine says that fact is "dominating discussion among the swimming community."

Is a swimmer posing in Playboy really such a big deal that it should dominate the discussion among the swimming community? I don't think it is, but With Leather cites someone who thinks it's a very big deal:


What upsets some people like Dr. Mary Jo Kane, director of the Tucker Center for Research on Girls & Women in Sport at the University of Minnesota, as she told the New York Daily News, is that "It used to be that female athletes were portrayed as wholesome, All-American girls. Now you get female athletes in GQ, Playboy and the Swimsuit issue. The result of it is coverage that is very damaging-that trivializes and marginalizes women athletes because it does not give them the respect they deserve as competent athletes."

I get what Dr. Kane is saying, but I don't agree with it. There's no reason you can't be a wholesome, All-American girl and still be attractive to men, and the fact that women with athletic bodies are considered attractive is a step forward, not a step backward.

A man saying Serena Williams is fat could be described as "coverage that is very damaging." But a man saying an Olympic swimmer is attractive is a good thing.

Steve Nash Takes One On the Nose, Then Raises Question

It only takes the confluence of a celebrated moment in time, and a popular figure to get us to reinvestigate things we think are tried & true. Such is the case, as Phoenix Suns' two-time MVP, Steve Nash, suffered a very nasty gash on the bridge of his nose in the opening game of the teams' second round series with the San Antonio Spurs.

When Nash and Spur point Guard, Tony Parker collided with 2:53 seconds left in the 4th quarter, leading to a 45 second lapse in which Nash had to sit out because trainers were unable to stop the bleeding, the bigger question of whether players should be allowed to continue to compete once someone is bleeding was broached.

They call it "unofficially", the Magic Johnson Rule. In the decade and ahalf since the Laker legend was diagnosed with HIV, much has been learned about the disease and some say it's now time to put away a rule that was mostly founded on myths, misunderstandings and bigotry.

In the case of the Phoenix Suns, who went on to lose the crucial first game of the best of seven series, they hope that an outdated rule hasn't cost them the prize they so covet.

(by Len Webb, MTR)

Read About Sprinter Extraordinaire, Mike Mitchell and His South Bay Track Club Teammates On The Club's Very Own Page (Click Link on Left)

Baseball Honors Jackie Robinson 60 Years After Breaking "Color Barrier"

Legendary Grambling Football Coach, Eddie Robinson Dies

After a long battle with Alzheimer’s, Eddie Robinson, one of the most influential coaches in football history, went home last night.

For African Americans, the former, long-time Grambling coach is the most significant figure in football history - and perhaps second only to Jackie Robinson as the most influential black sports figure ever.

He won 408 games during his coaching tenure, between 1941 (six years before Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier) and 1997. He had 45 winning seasons, won nine National Black College championships and 17 Southwestern Athletic Conference titles. “I’m no better than any other coach,” he said prior to his final season. “But I’ve heard the best coaches in America and learned from them for close to 60 years.”

The list of Grambling players who were drafted into the NFL is staggering, the most among any historically black college. Four former Tigers - Buck Buchanan, Willie Davis, Willie Brown and Charlie Joiner - are in pro football’s Hall of Fame.

No doubt the most celebrated among his pupils, Doug Williams, will someday join them.

Robinson believed in “the system,” even as it worked against him, denying him opportunities beyond Grambling. “The framers of this Constitution, now they did some things,” Robinson said. “If you aren’t lazy, they fixed it for you. You’ve got to understand the system. It’s just like in football, if you don’t understand the system, you haven’t got a chance.”

Amen. R.I.P., Coach

IAAF COUNCIL RESOLUTION ON BETTING IN ATHLETICS

26 March 2007

Mombasa -The IAAF Council, meeting in Mombasa, Kenya, has resolved that all members of the IAAF Family including, but not limited to officials, athletes, athlete representatives, managers, coaches, meeting organizers and trainers, should be forbidden from taking part, either directly or indirectly, in betting, gambling and similar events or transactions connected with athlete competitions under the rules of the IAAF or its Members. Such persons should further be forbidden from having active stakes in companies, concerns, partnerships, joint ventures or other organizations that promote, broker, arrange or conduct such events or transactions. The Juridical Commission has been given the mandate to draw up appropriate regulations, guidelines and rules.

Athletics' world governing body showed an unusual burst of speed in offsetting a potential betting scandal by adopting a hard line on gambling.

The IAAF resolution also barred the same people from "having active stakes in companies, concerns, partnerships, joint ventures or other organisations that promote, broker, arrange or conduct such events or transactions".

The ban comes less than two months after the launch of athleticbet.com, a gambling website owned by the Austrian agent Robert Wagner and backed by one of his former clients, Colin Jackson.

Monaco-based Wagner, who has been an agent since 1988 and represents 27 athletes, including Britain's Jason Gardener, launched his website at the end of January as "the world's No 1 betting site for track and field".

According to Wagner, one of the aims was to create more interest in the sport, and a quarter of the profits were to go to the IAAF's charitable foundation. It was understood that with a cap on winnings of $5,000, the website would not attract high-rollers.

The IAAF initially showed little concern, even though Wagner's company accepted bets on races in which his own athletes were taking part.

Wagner said yesterday: "I have been expecting this and I understand the IAAF's position. I will just not be an agent any more. I will sit down with the IAAF and find a solution. They cannot stop me from running a betting website.

"Among the clients of this company, there are people from the IAAF, so we will have to sort that out, too."

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New 'Man' In Charge, Same Old Masters

AUGUSTA, Georgia (Feb. 6) - For the last eight years, a corner coffee table in the chairman's office at Augusta National held a framed photograph that illustrated the powerful heritage at the home of the Masters.

It showed a stone-faced Clifford Roberts standing next to a smiling Hootie Johnson, both in their green jackets, the chairman in memoriam and the chairman emeritus, No. 1 and No. 5 in the 74-year lineage of the club.

The sixth chairman is Billy Payne, who is two months away from presiding over his first Masters.

On the corner coffee table is a picture of his grandchildren.

Payne is the first Masters chairman who never met Roberts, the man who ruled the club and its tournament with an iron fist, and who many believe still rules in spirit. He died in 1977, 10 years before Payne first played the course as a guest of Charlie Yates - a former British Amateur champion who learned golf from Bobby Jones and played in the first Masters.

"Let me make it clear," Payne said, leaning forward in his chair. "History will never forget Cliff Roberts and his contributions to this club and this tournament. He will always be the chairman. I will be nothing more than someone who appeared on the list. Maybe there will be an asterisk by it that said, 'First Georgia resident.'

"But other than that," he added, "there's so much preservation of custom and tradition that's such an important part of the job. Just to be among the list of men whose lives have been so dedicated to this place, that's enough."

OK, so don't hold your breath on that first woman in a green jacket.

When he accepted the job eight months ago, Payne didn't see any reason to open a dialogue with Martha Burk about her protest of Augusta National's male-only member policy, and that hasn't changed. Members will deliberate and decide all issues related to membership, and the club doesn't discuss membership.

"And I don't have anything to add to that," he said.

Payne is hardly a puppet. He combines hard work with big dreams. Proof of that comes from a vision he had leaving church in 1987 that grew into reality when Atlanta hosted the 1996 Olympics.

There will be changes at Augusta. They will not be made overnight.

"We are not compelled ever to move too quickly," he said.

Payne, however, has shown to be a quick study. The club has enormous archives of its history, and the chairman rarely goes to sleep without delving into Roberts' files. He has tried to learn what made Roberts tick, how he communicated and how people responded. He was amazed at the attention Roberts paid to even the most minor detail, such as knowing the exact metallic weight of trophies.

"I would have liked him," Payne said. "I'm sorry I didn't have the opportunity to know him."

No doubt he stumbled across Roberts' desire to keep the Masters the most exclusive major championship, which is guiding Payne as he prepares for his first significant change.

The other majors have 156-man fields. The Masters had only 92 players tee off last April, typical of a tournament that never has had more than 109 players in its field.

"The player field being small, many tournament formalities and regulations are eliminated," Roberts once wrote. "The first consideration is to provide a first-class golf course in as beautiful and nearly perfect condition as effort can make it; and secondly, to show our player-guests every possible courtesy."

Payne wants to restore starting in 2008 the eligibility criteria that U.S. PGA Tour winners receive an automatic invitation to the Masters. Johnson did away with the category after the '99 Masters when the tour began scheduling events - usually with weak fields - the same week as the World Golf Championships and the Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup.

But bringing back the "win-and-you're in" category is not that simple.

Should the Masters recognize winners from opposite-field events in Mexico, Milwaukee and Reno, not to mention the seven events after the FedExCup? And does it continue to take the top 40 on the U.S. PGA Tour money list or the top 30 in the FedExCup? Or both?

"There's a lot of arithmetic in this," Payne said. "What you don't want is all of a sudden to have 100 playing participants, and we have arguably eroded the quality of the tournament. Notwithstanding folks' opinion of how the best way to get there is, we're going to do the best we can."

His goal is to keep the field around 90 players, and "anything that puts that number at significant threat has got an uphill battle."

The other change will be in new media coverage of the Masters. There was streaming video of Amen Corner on the Masters' Web site last year, and Payne said that likely will be expanded.

"I think you'll see more toes in the water, testing our theories," he said. Payne didn't elaborate - another trait of chairmen at the Masters - although he is not convinced Web-based video competes with a network telecast.

He does believe his mandate is to bring the Masters to a larger audience, just as Roberts made sure the tournament had radio coverage when it began in 1934, television coverage in 1956 and then catered to the international press to expand its worldwide coverage.

"We treasure our reputation in the media world of being, in many cases, the first to do things, and consistently, the best," he said. "That same philosophical approach will dictate through time how we utilize these new media opportunities."

Any changes will reflect a new generation at the Masters, even if old traditions die hard.

2006 Kentucky Derby Winner Euthanized

KENNETT SQUARE, Pa. (Jan. 29) - Kentucky Derby winner Barbaro was euthanized Monday after complications from his breakdown at the Preakness last May.

"We just reached a point where it was going to be difficult for him to go on without pain," co-owner Roy Jackson said. "It was the right decision, it was the right thing to do. We said all along if there was a situation where it would become more difficult for him then it would be time."

Roy and Gretchen Jackson were with Barbaro on Monday morning, with the owners making the decision in consultation with chief surgeon Dean Richardson.

It was a series of complications, including laminitis in the left rear hoof and a recent abscess in the right rear hoof, that proved to be too much for the gallant colt, whose breakdown brought an outpouring of support across the country.

"I would say thank you for everything, and all your thoughts and prayers over the last eight months or so," Jackson said to Barbaro's fans.

On May 20, Barbaro was rushed to the New Bolton Center, about 30 miles southwest of Philadelphia in Kennett Square, hours after shattering his right hind leg just a few strides into the Preakness Stakes. The bay colt underwent a five-hour operation that fused two joints, recovering from an injury most horses never survive. Barbaro lived for eight more months, though he never again walked with a normal gait.

The Kentucky Derby winner suffered a significant setback over the weekend, and surgery was required to insert two steel pins in a bone - one of three shattered eight months ago in the Preakness but now healthy - to eliminate all weight bearing on the ailing right rear foot.

The procedure on Saturday was a risky one, because it transferred more weight to the leg while the foot rests on the ground bearing no weight.

The leg was on the mend until the abscess began causing discomfort last week. Until then, the major concern was Barbaro's left rear leg, which developed laminitis in July, and 80 percent of the hoof was removed.

Richardson said Monday morning that Barbaro did not have a good night.

Brilliant on the race track, Barbaro always will be remembered for his brave fight for survival.

The story of the beloved 3-year-old bay colt's fight for life captured the fancy of millions and drew an outpouring of support unrivaled in sports.

When Barbaro broke down, his right hind leg flared out awkwardly as jockey Edgar Prado jumped off and tried to steady the ailing horse. Race fans at Pimlico wept. Within 24 hours the entire nation seemed to be caught up in a "Barbaro watch," waiting for any news on his condition.

Well-wishers young and old showed up at the New Bolton Center with cards, flowers, gifts, goodies and even religious medals for the champ, and thousands of e-mails poured into the hospital's Web site just for him.

"I just can't explain why everyone is so caught up in this horse," Roy Jackson, who owned the colt with his wife, Gretchen, has said time and again. "Everything is so negative now in the world, people love animals and I think they just happen to latch onto him."

Devoted fans even wrote Christmas carols for him, sent a wreath made of baby organic carrots and gave him a Christmas stocking.

Although the get-well cards and banners eventually will fade or be trashed, the biggest gift has been the $1.2 million raised since early June for the Barbaro Fund. The money is put toward needed equipment such as an operating room table, and a raft and sling for the same pool recovery Barbaro used after his surgeries.

The Jacksons spent tens of thousands of dollars hoping the best horse they ever owned would recover and be able to live a comfortable life on the farm - whether he was able to breed or not.

The couple, who own about 70 racehorses, broodmares and yearlings, and operate the 190-acre Lael Farm, have been in the horse business for 30 years, and never had a horse like Barbaro.

As the days passed, it seemed Barbaro would get his happy ending. As late as December, with the broken bones in his right hind leg nearly healed and his laminitis under control, Barbaro was looking good and relishing daily walks outside his intensive care unit.

But after months of upbeat progress reports, including talk that he might be headed home soon, news came Jan. 10 of a serious setback because of the laminitis. Richardson had to remove damaged tissue from Barbaro's left hind hoof, and the colt was placed back in a protective sling.

On Jan. 13, another section of his left rear hoof was removed. After Barbaro developed a deep abscess in his right hind foot, surgery was performed Saturday to insert two steel pins in a bone, one that was shattered but now healthy, to eliminate all weight bearing on the ailing foot.

This after Richardson warned last December that Barbaro's right hind leg was getting stronger and that the left hind foot was a "more formidable long-term challenge."

In the end, the various complications from the breakdown at the Preakness were too much.

Limbaugh At It...Again!

In 2003, Rush Limbaugh resigned from ESPN after creating a controversy with his comments that Donovan McNabb got too much credit because, he said, "The media has been very desirous that a black quarterback do well.'' Limbaugh no longer works as an NFL commentator, but his latest comments about football are sure to get more scrutiny.

Limbaugh's web site includes the following two statements that he made on his Friday show:

"There is a cultural problem in the NFL that has resulted in a total lack of class on the part of professional players. I love the game of football, but after every sack players are acting like they've won the Super Bowl; they're prancing around with these idiotic dances."

And...

"Look, let me put it to you this way: the NFL all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips without any weapons. There, I said it."

Limbaugh has a fair, legitimate point with his first statement. Limbaugh's "lack of class" comment is quite similar to LaDainian Tomlinson's comments after the Chargers lost to the Patriots, although we should add that Tomlinson's teammate Shawne Merriman is as guilty as anyone when it comes to prancing around with idiotic dances after sacks.

Limbaugh undermines that legitimate point with his second statement, though. To compare NFL players to gang members is to display willful ignorance about the men who play in the league. Which of the top players in the game act like gang members on the field? Peyton Manning and Marvin Harrison? Tom Brady and Richard Seymour? Drew Brees and Reggie Bush? Thomas Jones and Brian Urlacher? All of those players and nearly all of the 180 or so players on the four teams we'll watch tomorrow are class acts. If Limbaugh doesn't know that, he doesn't know much about football. Which leaves me still scratching my head, three years later, as to why ESPN hired him.

The Beckham Phenomenom

LOS ANGELES (Jan. 12) - David Beckham has conquered the rest of the world as the most recognized soccer player around. Now, he's ready to take on America.

Wearing a black suit with white shirt and black tie, Beckham shared his thoughts a day after agreeing to a five-year contract with the LA Galaxy that could be worth $250 million.

"I'm coming there to make a difference. I'm coming there to play football," Beckham said Friday via satellite from Madrid. "I'm not saying me coming to the States is going to make soccer the biggest sport in America.

Those who orchestrated the deal are convinced Beckham not only will raise soccer's profile in America but help the Galaxy win.

"David is still a very good player," said Tim Leiweke of AEG, the sports and entertainment company that runs the Galaxy. "Peyton Manning in football, the other football, Allen Iverson in basketball and Tiger Woods in golf are all the same age (31) as Beckham.

"Certainly, he will bring an audience, a fan base and an intensity to our sport that we've never had."

The Galaxy didn't say exactly what they'll pay him. The $250 million figure includes salary and commercial endorsements over the length of his contract. In other words, his move could be worth $1 million a week.

"I'm coming there not be a superstar," Beckham said. "I'm coming there to be part of the team, to work hard and to hopefully win things."

He's also coming as the most recognizable soccer player in the world who just happens to be married to the former Posh Spice of The Spice Girls and counts Tom Cruise among his closest friends.

Biggest Sports Contracts

Beckham said he talked on the phone with Cruise the past two nights seeking advice about life in LA.

"He's a good friend of mine and I told him a deal may be near," Beckham said. "It's a big help to have friends in LA."

After all, Beckham's cult of personality has few believers in America. The superstar, whose best playing days are likely behind him, has helped sell millions of European tabloids but has been able to walk American streets in relative anonymity.

"I realize I'm not as recognized in the U.S. as I am around Europe, around other parts of the world," he said. "Hopefully playing for the Galaxy will change that."

His mandate calls for raising the profile of an average team in a soccer league that has little respect overseas and less recognition than the University of Southern California football team.

On Friday, Beckham returned to his daily routine training with Real Madrid for nearly two hours. The British player smiled to reporters upon his arrival and left the training ground in the outskirts of Madrid before his global news conference.

In Los Angeles, the Beckham effect was felt immediately: The Galaxy sold 1,000 new season tickets Thursday morning. Their season begins April 8.

The team averages 22,000 to 24,000 fans in its 27,000-seat stadium in suburban Carson, although attendance was down last season when the Galaxy missed the playoffs.

Seeking Bang for Their Bucks

"They know we Latinos are filling the soccer stadiums. That's why they want to bring stars here," said Juan Munguia, a 30-year-old Mexican hotel cook. "I will go just to see Beckham."

Already in the works is a 2008 Galaxy tour of Asia, where Beckham is wildly popular. A new team logo will be unveiled this summer and the Galaxy's owner is nearing a deal to slap a prime sponsor's name on its jerseys.

"We will absolutely market the Galaxy as a global brand," Leiweke said.

Beckham will become the biggest star to play U.S. professional soccer since Pele and Franz Beckenbauer were in the now-defunct North American Soccer League in the 1970s.

"David Beckham is a global sports icon who will transcend the sport of soccer in America," gushed Major League Soccer commissioner Don Garber.

But Beckham hasn't won a major trophy since joining the Spanish team Real Madrid in 2003 from Manchester United, where he won six league titles, two FA Cups and the Champions League title.

Beckham started only five of 25 matches for Real Madrid this season. He turned down a two-year contract extension from Real Madrid, where his fading skills left him on the bench.

Last Aug. 11, the former England captain was dropped from his national team altogether, signaling the end of his international career.

It came after a dismal 2006 World Cup. He led England to the quarterfinals last summer, scoring from a free kick in the second round to beat Ecuador 1-0. But he was taken off the field early in the second half against Portugal with ankle and Achilles tendon injuries, and then watched as his team was eliminated in a penalty shootout.

A day after the game, Beckham stepped down as captain of the team - a post he had held for 58 of his 94 international appearances.

But he'll start for the Galaxy.

"He's coming here to make a difference," Galaxy coach Frank Yallop said. "He's not coming here on vacation."


(AP Sports Writer Ronald Blum in New York and AP Writers Raphael Satter in London, Harold Heckle in Madrid, Erin Carlson in New York and Peter Prengaman in Los Angeles contributed to this report.)

New Troubles For Barry Bonds

NEW YORK (Jan. 10) - Barry Bonds said he did not get amphetamines from teammate Mark Sweeney, but did not deny a report Thursday saying he tested positive for the drugs last season. According to a story in the New York Daily News, the San Francisco slugger failed an amphetamines test in 2006. The newspaper reported that when first informed of the positive result, Bonds attributed it to a substance he had taken from Sweeney's locker.

"He is both my teammate and my friend," Bonds said in a statement. "He did not give me anything whatsoever and has nothing to do with this matter, contrary to recent reports.

"I want to express my deepest apologies especially to Mark and his family as well as my other teammates, the San Francisco Giants organization and the fans," he said.

That's all the Giants star, shadowed by steroids allegations and only 22 home runs from breaking Hank Aaron 's career home run record, said about the alleged positive drug test. Bonds has steadfastly denied used performance-enhancing drugs.

"Obviously, we're pleased that Barry has straightened this out," said Sweeney's agent, Barry Axelrod.

Bonds' reported positive test could be another snag in contract negotiations with the Giants. The sides reached a preliminary agreement on a $16 million, one-year contract Dec. 7, but the seven-time NL MVP still hasn't signed the deal or taken the mandatory physical that is part of the process.

The sides have been working to finalize complicated language in the contract that concerns the left fielder's compliance with team rules, as well as what would happen if he were to be indicted or have other legal troubles.

"Last night was the first time we heard of this recent accusation against Barry Bonds," the Giants said in the statement. "Under Major League Baseball's collective bargaining agreement with the Major League Baseball Players Association, clubs are not notified after a player receives a first positive test for amphetamines."

Rob Manfred, baseball's executive vice president for labor relations, refused comment, according to spokesman Rich Levin.

I don't comment on the drug program, and I've never heard Barry Bonds blame anybody for anything," Gene Orza, the union's chief operating officer, said in an e-mail to The Associated Press.

San Francisco's front office and fan base long have stood by Bonds through his off-the-field problems and injuries. So have his teammates, deciding in spring training last year to support him every step of the way.

"There are so many substances out there right now you don't know what you should take or what you should not," Giants shortstop Omar Vizquel said Thursday. "Right now, I'm afraid to take vitamins for the same reason. You don't know what's going to be positive or what's going to be negative. The best way for players is to stay natural. Anything with chemicals in it can be bad. I know what I do. I don't know what the other guys do, and I don't really care.

"I tell the younger guys, but you don't need to be telling Barry Bonds and Mark Sweeney what they should take or what they should not."

There's a long history of amphetamines - or speed and more commonly called "greenies" in the baseball world - fueling generations of baseball players. Many turned to the stimulants for a way to get pepped up when their bodies couldn't do so on their own during a long season.

The pills, widely used even until recently, helped with energy for day games following night games and other times when players were short on sleep, such as after a long cross-country flight.

Baseball banned the uppers for the first time starting last season. A player is not identified until after failing two amphetamines tests, which also results in a 25-game suspension. The first failed steroids test, by comparison, is a 50-game suspension.

A first amphetamines offense, however, does require six additional drug tests over the following six months.

Bonds did not appeal the positive test, according to the Daily News, which said Sweeney learned of Bonds' positive test from Orza. The newspaper reported Orza told Sweeney he should remove any troublesome substances from his locker and should not share said substances. Sweeney then said there was nothing of concern in his locker.

Before Bonds' statement, Axelrod told the AP that his client received a call informing him that his name had come up in regard to the testing.

"He responded at that time ... he did not give anything to anybody and he doesn't have anything illegal," Axelrod said. "That was the end of it, as far as we were concerned, until yesterday. We thought it was just a sort of procedural thing."

A federal grand jury is investigating whether Bonds perjured himself when he testified in 2003 in the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative steroid distribution case that he hadn't knowingly taken any performance-enhancing drugs. He told that 2003 grand jury he believed his trainer, Greg Anderson, had given him flaxseed oil and arthritic balm, not steroids.

Bonds, who's coming off October surgery on his troublesome left elbow, played regularly in 2006.

After missing all but 14 games in 2005 following three operations on his right knee, Bonds batted .270 with 26 homers and 77 RBI in 130 games last year. He passed Babe Ruth to move into second place on the career home run list May 28.

Bonds has spent 14 of his 21 big league seasons with San Francisco and helped the Giants draw 3 million fans in all seven seasons with them. The team is counting on him to be part of the hype leading up to its hosting of the All-Star game in July.

Bonds said he noticed an improved vibe in the clubhouse last season with the additions of Steve Finley, Sweeney and Todd Greene. The slugger was more sociable too, playing cards or chess with his teammates or trainers before games - and even making a rare appearance in the team photo.

Bonds and Sweeney appeared to be good friends, with Sweeney speaking to the slugger by phone recently this offseason.

"This year we had the best chemistry on the team. I felt like the team was clicking," Vizquel said. "It's sad a stupid instance like this might rupture something that was going pretty good. I don't think the players will turn on each other. We are a veteran team. We should know what (substance) is good and what is bad."

(AP Baseball Writer Ronald Blum in New York contributed to this story.)

Texas Cheerleaders Terrorize High School

(Jan. 4) -- At a high school in McKinney, Texas, officials say a group of five cheerleaders recently got out of control.

Rosalind Wiseman, an educator on teens and parenting, says the cheerleading debacle in McKinney, Texas, is part of a wider problem with kids and power.

Dubbed the "Fab Five," they acted like they could get away with almost anything and refused to bend to authority. They repeatedly skipped class, insulted their instructors, and terrorized their coach, their fourth coach in just one year.

The Fab Five even posted sexually suggestive pictures of themselves on MySpace, but that still wasn't enough for the school to take their pompoms away.

In an exclusive interview with "Good Morning America," Michaela Ward, the coach that the Fab Five drove out, said the girls were beyond discipline.

"Unfortunately these girls were given power that any teenager would have completely abused. They were untouchable. They were invincible. The rules did not apply to them," Ward said. "There was no accountability. They knew that I had absolutely no power to discipline."

The school finally took action. Now, two questions are being asked: What took so long? And who is to blame?

Some are pointing fingers at the mother of the clique's ringleader, who was also the school's principal.

"This culture developed where the principal's daughter and her friends were above consequences," said attorney Harold Jones, who was hired by the school district to look into complaints about the cheerleaders.

In his report, Jones found the girls' influence at their high school was pervasive. There seemed to be no limits to their shenanigans.

"They took my cell phone and sent dirty text messages to my husband and to another coach," Ward said.

Though Ward was the cheerleading coach, she felt incapable of disciplining the girls.

"Everything I did, I was undermined by the principal and the administration. I was never kept in the loop," she said.

"Right after some risque photos are placed on MySpace in their cheerleader uniforms and they're on probation, it takes a whole week to decide that they won't be kicked off the squad," Jones said.

In December, the principal resigned as part of a settlement in which she received $75,000 and a letter of recommendation for her next job. The former principal's attorney says she denies shielding her daughter from punishment.

But Jones says it wasn't just the principal who was at fault.

He says the entire school administration and parents who didn't enforce the rules are also to blame.

"Kids are going to be kids. They're going to figure out ways to push your limits," Jones said. "Adults have to be adults."

Rosalind Wiseman, an educator on teens and parenting, and author of the book "Queen Bees and Wannabee's," sees the Texas cheerleading debacle as part of a wider problem with kids and power.

"This is about kids having more power than adults, and them getting away with things no matter how old they are," she said.

Wiseman said that if parents wanted to prevent their kids from running amok, they couldn't be afraid to punish them.

"Some parents today feel that their No. 1 job is to protect their child, and it's not," she said. "Their job is to raise an ethical child, which means holding them accountable for bad behavior."

When it comes to conflicts in school, Wiseman said parents should steer clear of direct involvement, if possible.

"Parents should only get involved if their child is being humiliated or ridiculed. But if it's a content issue, meaning a grade or a performance in sports or something else, you need to work with your child to articulate what the problem is and to speak to the coach or the teacher themselves," she said. "You should not do the talking for your child. Let your kid work it out when it comes to grades and playing time."

Being comfortable talking to people in positions of power can be a valuable skill, one that parents can teach kids early.

"If your child learns to speak to people in a position of power about something they feel is not right and to articulate how they feel about it, you are teaching your child a very powerful life lesson," Wiseman said.

Jim Lampley Arrested On Domestic Violence Charges

The woman who filed the domestic violence complaint against sportscaster Jim Lampley claims he repeatedly threw her against the wall of her apartment after drinking heavily and smoking pot.

In documents obtained by reporters, Candice Sanders claims that on New Year's Eve, Lampley and his son Aaron joined her for dinner. Sanders says she was engaged to Lampley, who she claimed lived with her in the apartment.

Sanders alleges after dinner, at their apartment, Lampley "was drinking vodka and whiskey and became drunk." She adds in the document that "he was also high on pot."

Sanders, Miss California USA 2003, says in the complaint that the trouble began when she wanted to finish watching a movie. Lampley then "pulled me from the sofa I was on" and "began to yell at me and chased me around the apartment."

Sanders says at that point all hell broke loose. She alleges, "He grabbed me and threw me against a wall. He then threw me against another wall. He then threw me against the door and I collapsed."

Sanders goes on to say that 14-year-old Aaron saw her on the floor and she asked him to call the police. She writes in the document," Jim beat Aaron to the phone and kept Aaron from getting [to the phone]. She says Lampley then drove away with Aaron. Sanders claims she suffered head, neck and back injuries.

The 57-year-old Lampley was arrested last night on one felony count of domestic violence/corporal injury. He was also arrested for two misdemeanor counts of violating a restraining order and dissuading a witness.

Cops told reporters that the restraining order was issued on January 2. The next day (yesterday), Lampley showed up at Sanders' apartment as cops were investigating. That is the basis of the arrest for allegedly violating the restraining order.

The Original Super-Marvels' Slow Ride Into The Sunset

The crippled grandfather of extreme sports inhales deeply. He sits in his leather easy chair, mind clouded by meds, bones throbbing with arthritis. As he watches an NFL game, on which he has bet $1,000, the cantankerous stuntman clutches oxygen tubes supplying life to hardening lungs.
It is a shock to the senses, if not the sensibilities, to see ultra-cool Evel Knievel, 68, looking so feeble, so frayed around his graying daredevil edges, right down to his gnarled knuckles and wobbly gait.

His ravaged, 155-pound body isn't composed of original parts. He has a new liver and a replacement hip, and most recently doctors inserted a drug pump in his abdomen. It gives little reprieve from the excruciating pain in a fused spine mangled by hundreds of perilous, cringe-inducing motorcycle jumps from the 1960s and '70s.

"Ever see one of them before?" Evel asks, lifting a pajama top to reveal a pain-relief gizmo under his pale skin. "This sends morphine and synthetic heroin into my back 24 hours a day. It's awfully strong - it affects your thinking, your brain."

For years he cheated death, sometimes spectacularly so. Numerous crashes cemented his legend and all but guaranteed premature infirmity. These days, in what might be his last great gamble, Evel flies down the cosmic ramp of his final jump - the leap of faith.

While he has avoided the inevitable countless times, he no longer feels invincible. In fact, the bank robber-turned-international icon sounds apprehensive. After decades of hard jumps and harder living, including bouts with alcoholism, Evel tries to bridge the psychological chasm between mortality and eternity.

He figures he will be judged not just as a cult-like figure, but also as Robert Craig Knievel, the temperamental show-biz performer from the wrong side of the tracks in Butte, Mont.

"I think about God a lot more than ever," he says, "though I used to ask him, 'Help me make a good jump.' I'm awfully tough to get along with, but I'll tell you what: I am a good person. I wish there was such a thing as reincarnation."

Suffering from the aftereffects of a stroke, Evel bets that a life of crime, fame and indulgence can be outweighed by his good works to those he inspired: children in burn wards, the downtrodden, soldiers.

"Veterans have told me that, for some reason, I made a difference in their lives, that they were headed for disaster," he says. "God, at least I have done something."

His hair is thinning, his face remarkably unmarked yet gaunt. Evel looks nothing like the handsome, devil-may-care Western buck with the swept-back mane, walking stick, flying cape and - to the chagrin of hardened bikers everywhere - the white leather jumpsuit, festooned with stars and stripes and inspired by Liberace.

Evel was a gritty caricature of a superhero whose outfit was as ostentatious as his act was audacious. For decades, he was lampooned in pop culture, but there is no doubt the charismatic showman had a definable aura and mass appeal.

Men admired him. Their sons wanted to be like him. Women just wanted him. (And according to Evel, thousands got their wish.)

Tending the Evel Legend

The swagger has been reduced to a struggle simply to get up in the morning and get to the phone. He is a stickler about extending the Evel legend, preserving the Evel persona and creating new business, long after the end of his lucrative stuntman paydays and afternoons of high-stakes golf in which he would bet up to $100,000.

In true Knievelian style, he is determined to stave off the effects of pulmonary fibrosis, a condition that involves scarring of the lungs for which there is no cure.

"God," Evel says, "never made a tougher son of a bitch than me."

Nor a more skilled self-promoter, a man who unintentionally spawned a phrase for the generations: "Who do you think you are - Evel Knievel?"

There is only one Evel, and he knows it. He retains a sense of self-importance as expansive as Idaho's Snake River Canyon, the site of his famously failed hurtle 32 years ago. He retains tightfisted control of everything, and everyone, around him. He can be charming and pseudo-gruff. It might be a photographer ("I don't smile. Kiss my ass.") or a buddy talking point spreads ("You can take your newspaper 'line' and shove it - how's that?").

Last month, Evel sued Kanye West and AOL over the rapper's use of his trademark name and likeness in a music video that parodied the Snake River Canyon jump. Two years ago, a judge ruled the cult hero could not hold ESPN liable for publishing a photo of him with two women and the caption: "You're never too old to be a pimp."

He battled the IRS and Montana over allegedly unpaid taxes; survived abandonment by his parents, who left him with grandparents at 6 months old; endured jail, bankruptcy and divorce - he even ran over a Hells Angel. He continues to fight today -- to live a little longer, for better deals, for the affection and respect of friends and family.

"All (my grandmother) wanted was to talk with me and to rub her feet. I just hate myself for not spending (more) time with her and telling her 'I love you' one more time," Evel says. "The saddest thing is when a guy is paying so much attention to the world and everything going by that he can't take the time for his own mother," which is what he considered his grandmother.

Last summer, he and his youngest son, Robbie, 44, who traced his dad's professional footsteps, appeared back home at Evel Knievel Days after years of feuding. The father's on-again, off-again relationship with his son bears the emotional scars of a lifetime because, as Robbie says, "I'm the only one in the family who stood up to him."

Now, he says, "My dad realizes love is everything. To do what he's doing now - to have a talk with God and be loving to his family - I love him to death for it. God loves Evel. Figure that one out."

"I love Robbie," Evel says.

Kelly, Evel's oldest son, owns a construction firm in Las Vegas. (In 1995, Kelly's telemarketing company was sued by Missouri for targeting senior citizens with high-pressure calls. He agreed to stop the calls, and the company paid $150,000 in restitution.)

Evel's family includes daughters Alicia and Tracey, 11 grandchildren and ex-wives Linda Knievel and Krystal Kennedy, 37, the former Florida State golfer who remains his caregiver and companion despite their brief, troubled marriage.

He says he thinks often about his creator and prays for forgiveness.

"If there is a heaven, I don't know anything else I can do to get there - and neither do you," he says. "There are some personal things that I would never do again. -- God made us. He's in charge of everything, right? If he didn't like us, why didn't he change us?

"Hey, I faced every challenge that came along. I just did everything. I have no regrets."

Driven to Be the Best Ever

A longtime friend, Jack Ferriter, 72, says he regularly traveled cross-country with Evel and Linda and remembers their animated discussions involving the spiritual.

"She always was trying to promote (him) being a nice guy and to straighten up his act, preaching to him about heaven," Ferriter says. "He would say, 'Linda, I'm not so sure I'm interested in heaven (unless) they've got beautiful women up there and golf courses.' She was a Holy Roller, and he resented it."

The cruel irony for the Knievel clan is watching its willful patriarch slowly waste away. At his madcap zenith, Evel could have met his demise on any of his failed motorized leaps over rattlesnakes, cars, water fountains or double-decker buses.

"He never wanted anyone to surpass him," Robbie says. "For years, it seemed like my dad was pushing me off, like I was his competitor. He just never wanted to move over. I could never fill his shoes, anyway. It's like being Elvis' daughter or Muhammad Ali's son."

With age and debilitating injury, Evel eventually became quite the uneasy rider. He formally retired in 1981. During his wild and woolly years, he broke nearly 40 bones, including his back seven times.

He was in a coma for weeks in 1968 when he crashed after jumping over the fountain at Caesars Palace. The $3 million, closed-circuit TV caper propelled his popularity and fueled record audiences for ABC's Wide World of Sports, where Evel and his act became a fixture.

The old daredevil's crashes are now positively pedestrian: slipping in a Jacuzzi, falling on a golf course. The last time he rode a motorcycle, a few years ago at a mall appearance, he snapped his left ankle. "It's no laughing matter when they put me under the gas," Evel says. "I gave at the office already."

A Fortune Won and Lost

Back in the '70s, promoter Billy Rundle recalls Evel telling adoring fans of his next planned exploit: "I am going to jump from an airplane from 40,000 feet without a parachute and land in a haystack." Offstage, Rundle asked him about his sincerity. "I'm serious - you can bet on which haystack I'm going to land on," Evel said. Rundle remembers thinking, "This guy's crazy."

Marketing risk is what he did for a living. One of the all-time self-promoters, Evel still loves being in the entrepreneurial mix. One potential venture is the Knievel Motorcycle Co., to be based out of Pittsburgh, 30 years after his last major show, a flopped practice run over a tank of sharks in Chicago.

The phone rings. It's a memorabilia dealer. "You want me to sign 1,500 pictures? How much you gonna pay me?" Evel asks. "You're going to pay me $30,000? Well, I'd rather you come in December. I might be dead in January."

His popular stunt cycle toy was reintroduced in 2005 after, he says, various Knievel toys grossed $300 million. He says he earned $30 million over his peak years but lavish spending - big-boy toys included yachts and Ferraris - whittled much of it. In his modest condo, he shows off his latest version of the cycle, an Evel bobble-head and a bottle of Evel hot sauce.

"I was the first one to ever do a wheelie on a motorcycle while standing on a seat - ever," he says.

Today's Gen-X motorcycle performers don't conduct themselves properly, he says. "One kid looked at the camera and stuck out his tongue and made a goofy face. A young man's brain is no more developed than his body. They say with age comes wisdom, right?"

Maybe. It didn't help when Evel imbibed long after his doctors told him to quit, before his liver transplant seven years ago. At the time, doctors told him he had less than six months to live. (For years, his favorite cocktail was a "Montana Mary," a scorching blend of Wild Turkey, beer and tomato juice.)

Perhaps his vices can be traced to a hardscrabble youth, when he frequently ran afoul of the law. Fame and prosperity often were tough to handle, he says.

"You feel important when you're not," he says. "That's the point I reached. I actually had a talk with myself years ago (after) I punched a maitre d' in the puss. I said to myself, 'Who do you think you are?' "

The quest to uncover value and meaning from his earthly existence has greater urgency these days. Evel takes a notepad off a chair-side table and begins to read something that sounds like a eulogy, which friends say he has written.

"I hope I have lived a life that matters -- I am ready to leave my loved ones --

"My wealth, my fame will amount to naught -- My grudges, frustrations, resentments and jealousies will finally disappear."

Evel glances at his visitor, who asks him if he ever thought life on Earth might be heaven, after all.

"No," he says, staring death in the face with a weary smile. "God wouldn't do that to us."

Broncos Player Killed in Drive-By Shooting

DENVER (Jan. 1) - Denver Broncos cornerback Darrent Williams was shot and killed in a drive-by shooting early Monday, his limousine sprayed with bullets in downtown Denver.

Hours after the Broncos are eliminated from playoff contention, cornerback Darrent Williams is shot and killed in a drive-by shooting.

Team spokesman Jim Saccomano said police called him about 3 a.m. from the scene and told him three people had been shot, and the 24-year-old Williams had been killed. The killing came hours after the Broncos were eliminated from the playoff race.

A little after 2 a.m., a white Hummer limousine was fired on from a vehicle that pulled up along its side, police spokesman Sonny Jackson said. There were at least eight bullet holes in the limo.

Three people in the limo were hit and were taken to hospitals, where one man was pronounced dead, Jackson said. The other man and woman who were shot were not identified.

Jackson said police were searching for suspects and interviewing witnesses.

"We have no motive yet," Jackson said. "We're hoping to talk with witnesses to find out where they were coming from, and that might give us some clues."

Saccomano said he spoke with coach Mike Shanahan and others in the organization. Hours earlier, the Broncos lost to San Francisco 26-23 in overtime.

"Complete shock. We're speechless. It takes words away. A terrible tragedy," Saccomano said.

Pro Bowl player Champ Bailey was among the players and team staff members who gathered at Denver Health Medical Center, where Williams' body was taken.

"He had a big heart and a lot of courage," said Cedric Smith, assistant strength and conditioning coach. "It's a tragedy, a complete tragedy. It's sickening."

Williams teamed with Bailey to give Denver one of the top cornerback tandems in the NFL. Williams finished the season with 88 tackles, 78 of them solo, and four interceptions.

Players and coaches are off Monday. They were scheduled to meet Tuesday before heading home for the offseason.

On Sunday against the 49ers , Williams had three tackles and returned two punts for 50 yards before leaving the game with a shoulder injury late in the second half. After the game he said he was planning to wait a few weeks before determining if he needed an operation.

In December, Williams spoke of his desire to return to his hometown of Fort Worth, Texas, this offseason to talk to kids about staying out of gangs.

Williams, a second-round draft pick out of Oklahoma State in 2005, made an immediate impact on the Broncos. He started nine times in his rookie season following a stellar college career.

(by Pat Graham,AP)

Has Title IX Spun Out of Control?

NEVADA -- "We talkin' about practice! Not a game. We talkin' about practice, man. We ain't talking about the game. But we talkin' about practice!"

No, we are not talking about the infamous press conference in May of 2002 and Allen Iverson's response to questions as to why he missed practices with his Philadelphia 76ers teammates.

Yet, in hindsight and compared to the esteemed wisdom of the NCAA's Committee on Women's Athletics (CWA) and their recent revelation, Iverson's response seems quite apropos.

In a world where political correctness has run amok in every facet of U.S. society, why should the NCAA be any different than any other bureaucratic organization or private corporation?

In fact, the NCAA in its efforts to try to separate itself from the image of it being an elitist governing body and only about the scholastic educations of our collegiate athletes, it once again fails us.

While trying to convince educators and the public-at-large that it is all about the institution of education, as it prevails by operating similarly to a revenue generating entity, it continues to stumble upon its own misguided principles.

Title IX was enacted into law in 1972 in order to promote sports scholarships and equity for female student athletes seeking a secondary education.

NCAA division schools received revenue to support various women's team and sports commensurate to the men's athletic programs. Yet, in its latest attempt to show how it is conscious of gender-equity in Title IX compliance, the CWA has hijacked Title IX and has misappropriated its original intent.

In fact, the CWA needed the past two years to study the latest twist on gender equity or gender-bias, depending upon from which vantage point it is seen, on the issue of the use of male varsity athletes as volunteer practice players primarily for Division I women's basketball teams.

The CWA recommended on December 13, 2006 to ban the use of non-scholarship eligible enrolled male varsity athletes from participating from any practices or training within women's intercollegiate athletics programs at Division I or Division II NCAA colleges or universities. Division III already adheres to such a regulation.

Although not yet a mandate, the CWA believes that, "The use of male practice players violates the spirit of gender equity and Title IX and that any inclusion of male practice players results in diminished participation opportunities for female student athletes, contrary to the NCAA's principles of gender equity, non-discrimination, competitive equity and student athlete well-being".

But contrary to what the CWA believes, most Division I and successful women's basketball coaches of both genders, coaches of soccer and volleyball teams as well as the Women's Basketball Coaches Association (WBCA) believe that such a requirement would interfere with the development of female athletes and would provide a diminished return to their star athletes, should they be forced to eliminate the male practice players.

Fortunately, NCAA committees, conferences and schools will be able to make proposals on the subject during the next year. A vote on the issue by the NCAA would not take place until at least January 2008.

But players such as Alana Larkin and Ivory Latta, both All-Americans and stars of the elite women's basketball program at the University of North Carolina, relish the time they have playing against the guys.

Their practices are intense and the height and strength of the men enhance their training drills, thus rewarding them in actual games. "Love 'em", says Latta. "That's how they make us better. They give us attitude. They give us the killer instinct".

And Larkin agrees. "I don't see us getting any better with girls practicing against us and practicing against our teammates".

Likewise, Duke Basketball coach, Gail Goestenkors, endorses the practice of the men players and questions how they would get enough women players to challenge the height and jump capabilities of the very tallest and most accomplished female basketball players.

And it is in that regard that the CWA overlooked the subtle accomplishments in women's sports since 1972. There are remaining gripes about shortages and inequities in the number of female coaches and the inability of women's sports, other than women's basketball, still receiving little attention or enough scholarships.

Yet, when it comes to basketball, it has led the way in women's collegiate athletics. And so, if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Steeped in its own myopia, CWA committee members such as Patrick Nero, Commissioner of the America East Conference laments, "How are they to get better if they're sitting in practice? It's one thing to not be playing in a game because they haven't reached that level yet, but for them to sit through an entire practice while men run up and down with their teammates, we just think it's really against the spirit of Title IX".

But to assume that because two or three male practice players equates no practice time for bench or second team players is misguided and gives little credit to the individual coaches who stand to lose games unless they practice all of their players.

Just because the starters are practicing with men, does not mean that the bench players are not practicing with them at all. For the most part, they are actually practicing against the starters who are only made better by practicing at a higher level.

Also not given credence is the problem of the number of scholarships offered to female athletes. Not every school has the resources. According to Goestenkors, she only has 11 or 12 players on scholarship. "Now I have to have 15 on scholarships just so I can [have enough] to practice".

And who can argue with Tennessee coach, Pat Summitt, who has won more games than any other coach in the history of women's basketball. She weighed in last week and said, "I think it would be detrimental to women's basketball".

"If you look at what has happened, the parity in the game, the fact that we have male practice players, they challenge us. It's not like they take away opportunities. On the contrary, they provide opportunities for our teams to work on specific game preparation".

And also probably unknown to most people, according to Coach Summitt, when she coached the U.S. Olympic Women's Basketball team as far back as 1984 she recalls, "We played against one female team in the exhibition games. The rest of the time, we played against males. The guys made us better".

Russ Rose, women's basketball coach at Penn State University notes, "I feel comfortable that every player in my gym has the opportunity to make progress because they are allowed to come in and get individual instruction anytime they want".

"I think it would do more damage to my second team to have the first team beat the heck out of them every day. Now, the second team has a chance to beat the first team on a daily basis, and some of those second team kids get a chance to elevate their play. You need your starting team on one side and a formidable opponent on the other".

And Stanford University women's volleyball coach, John Dunning, although he does not use male practice players says, "Good coaching is learning how to balance: to create in players a sense of self-esteem balanced with pushing them to get better".

"If you can create a setting in practice that's harder than games by having better people on the other side of the net, as long as that's managed properly, then that certainly make sense".

While the NCAA remains dismayed about the lack of women's coaching opportunities, it props up its ill-serving methodology on gender equity through statistics which do not paint the entire picture.

For example, in 1972 more than 90% of women's teams were coached by women. In 2006, this number has fallen dramatically to 42.4%. In 1972, more than 90% of women's athletic programs were administered by female athletic directors.

In 2006, 92% of Division I Athletic Directors are male and 8% are female. Yet, since 1972, the quality of the play of female athletes and the strength of individual programs has improved significantly.

The silver lining, which the NCAA and CWA need to take a serious look at, is the actual realized accomplishment of the women athletes in these programs, who exemplify the true meaning of the student athlete.

With the exception of the WNBA, which after 10 years is running on fumes going into 2007, there are no professional athletic opportunities for women athletes. For those who are lucky enough to reach the Olympics in individual sports such as track and field or swimming, it is a long, long road, and they rarely ever reach the compensation or notoriety of their male counterparts.

College is the time for female athletes to shine, be it from the expertise of a male coach, female coach, or male practice players. And with the advent of the NCAA Final Four Basketball Championship, by way of the success of the men's tournament, the women's NCAA Final Four focuses more attention on women's sports than any other event with the exception of the Olympics.

By extension, a positive and supportive environment for the future of all girls across the U.S. from all walks of life is finally emerging. And those girls in search of all kinds of future endeavors are no longer pure fantasy but translate into real possibilities.

And for those of you too young to remember or not born yet, there was a time when a male coach would never want to be associated with coaching women. They would not take those coaching jobs because they thought it was a step down, that women were not worth the effort and looked upon it as a humiliation.

And there certainly was a time when you would never get an undergraduate male athlete willing to volunteer his free time to play basketball with a girl. In fact these guys are not just practice players but have become the designated cheerleaders for the women. They then encourage their male friends to go to games and support women's sports at their schools.

So, there are hidden trade offs too.

Women's sports will continue to thrive because of the attention paid and insight given by men in collaboration with women. Gender equity will not evolve without the support of men.

Its intent was not to bar men. Its intent was to help women succeed. And unless the NCAA realizes that, Title IX will not fulfill its intended purpose.

(by Diane M. Grassi)

Was Gatlin The Offender Or The Red Herring? (The Plot Thickens)

The news that came six months ago seemed all too familiar: A champion athlete tests positive for a performance-enhancing drug. The athlete immediately professes his innocence and vows to clear his name. And one day, sprinter Justin Gatlin will perhaps be remembered as nothing more than another cheat busted in the steroid era.

But an examination of Gatlin's case finds nothing routine. What emerges is a convoluted web of poorly fitting pieces of evidence that lead to no clear conclusions. It's a tale that includes an unlikely rules violator, a renegade coach, a masseur, an assault, private investigators and a strange-looking tube of cream.

The only thing not in dispute is this: All parties agree that Gatlin did indeed fail a drug test. A possible punishment is an eight-year suspension from the sport.

Gatlin, 24, arrived in Lawrence, a city in northeastern Kansas, for the Kansas Relays last April, at the forefront of a new generation of competitors who pledged to clean up the sport by proving they could win without cheating.

The Kansas Relays is a second-tier track event used primarily by American athletes as a tuneup for the European summer circuit. Gatlin anchored a winning relay, then in May traveled to Qatar, where he equaled the 100-meter world record of 9.77 seconds. It set the stage for a showdown with co-record holder Asafa Powell of Jamaica to see who was the fastest man on Earth.

They never got to race.

On June 15, Gatlin was informed that a urine sample taken from him in Kansas had shown evidence of a steroid. Like many before him, Gatlin said he was innocent. Except here the story took its first strange turn: Gatlin and his lawyers didn't dispute the test result. They said someone had managed to sneak a steroid into Gatlin's system.

The case has attracted the attention of federal investigators, according to several sources, and the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has allowed an unusual extension to give Gatlin's lawyers time to assemble their client's defense.

The idea that Gatlin was doped without his knowledge has been dismissed by some as implausible and a smokescreen. Others, however, have raised questions about the chain of events in Kansas that illuminate the more sordid side of big-time track and field.

"I would find it really hard to believe" that Gatlin was doped unknowingly, said Peter Stubbs, an agent who represents more than a dozen track and field athletes but not Gatlin. "On the flip side, I believe pretty strongly that Justin is a clean athlete . . . and there's a problem here somewhere."

Gatlin, who won three medals at the 2004 Olympics in Athens, tested negative on at least six other occasions this year, according to USADA and the IAAF, the world track and field governing body.

When Gatlin, who would not comment publicly for this article, learned of the positive result for testosterone or its precursors, his supporters at first looked with suspicion at Trevor Graham, his North Carolina-based coach. Graham gained fame for giving USADA a steroid-filled syringe in 2003 that led to the Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative (BALCO) sports doping case. The BALCO probe has ensnared more than a dozen athletes, among them track and field champion Marion Jones and baseball slugger Barry Bonds.

But Graham, who like Gatlin was under contract with Nike before Gatlin's positive test, also has coached more than a half-dozen athletes charged with doping violations. In November, he was indicted on federal charges of lying to investigators in the BALCO probe and faces a possible 15 years in prison.

Graham denied any involvement in doping Gatlin. A day after Gatlin announced the positive test result, however, Graham claimed he knew who was responsible. "We know who the person is who actually did this," Graham said. ". . . We hope this individual has the guts to come forward and say he did it."

In subsequent interviews, Graham pointed to Chris Whetstine, a massage therapist who Graham said lathered the runner's legs with what he believes was a steroid-based cream at the race in Kansas. Graham said he believed Whetstine had sabotaged Gatlin in an act of vengeance, possibly over a months-old financial dispute between the two or as part of a deeper plot to get back at Graham for his role in setting off the BALCO probe.

Whetstine, who lives in Eugene, Ore., denied the accusation through an attorney. Others ridiculed Graham's assertions as preposterous. Unsure what to believe, Gatlin's attorneys hired a private investigator in June to trail both Graham and Whetstine, though the probe turned up little.

If there was a conspiracy, the trail had seemingly gone cold. Except for one interesting fact: The results of the lab report on Gatlin's urine sample, which was obtained by The Washington Post, were consistent with the heavy application of the type of steroid cream that Graham said he saw Whetstine rub on Gatlin, according to two chemists who reviewed the results. The lab report showed the presence of small amounts of synthetic testosterone precursors in Gatlin's urine. Both chemists added that it was impossible to state conclusively that the cream was the source.

The chemists, who have no connection to Gatlin or his legal team, spoke on condition of anonymity because they did not want to be publicly associated with the case.

One of the chemists said Gatlin would have been foolish to have allowed himself to be massaged with the product Graham said Whetstine was using -- and that Graham would have been foolish to have sanctioned its use on his star sprinter, for that matter -- because its active ingredient was Dehydroepiandrosterone, also known as DHEA.

DHEA is not known to enhance athletic performance. On top of that, according to specialists in the field, it is easily detected.

"The only reason someone would give DHEA to an athlete," one of the chemists said in an e-mail, "would be to assure a positive test."

A Controversial Massage

Elite track and field athletes are massaged nearly every day during the competitive season, often with anti-inflammatory creams. Massage therapists are considered so vital to helping athletes recover that some shoe and management companies sign them to contracts and pay for them to travel with their athletes.

Gatlin made regular visits to a personal massage therapist during the winters in Raleigh, N.C., and in the spring and summer took advantage of the services of Whetstine, who was under contract with Nike and has worked with Nike-sponsored athletes since at least 1998.

Whetstine arrived in Raleigh in late March, Graham said, and was the only one who massaged Gatlin before the Kansas Relays. In the days leading to the April 22 drug test, Whetstine massaged Gatlin two or three times, Graham, a track official and athletes from Gatlin's group recalled.

Cedric Walker, USA Track and Field's former relay program manager, said he observed Whetstine working on sprinter Shawn Crawford and Gatlin after a training session in Lawrence. Walker said he noticed that after Whetstine finished with Crawford he reached in his bag for a different cream to rub on Gatlin.

"All I saw was the massage therapist go into a bag and bring out something else," Walker said. "He rubbed something else on Justin. . . . It was right there in front of me. It wasn't what he used on Shawn."

Whetstine massaged Gatlin the day before the race, applying cream so heavily it seeped through his warmup pants, Graham said. After Gatlin competed, Whetstine approached him as he was heading to the drug-testing station and ushered him to his table underneath the stadium scoreboard for another massage, Graham said. There, Graham said, Whetstine applied a cream to Gatlin's inner thighs and behind his knees. Graham said he didn't see what was written on the white tube of cream, though he remembered it had a pink squiggle on it.

Graham said he asked Whetstine what was in the tube and that Whetstine refused to tell him, stuffing it into his pocket. As Graham tried to grab the tube, Graham recalled, Gatlin looked behind him, apparently unclear what the fuss was about, and said, "Let him do his job, man!"

Graham said he dropped the matter, not wanting to overreact. But after he learned Gatlin had tested positive, he said, he searched the Internet for testosterone creams until he found a photo that showed a white tube that was just like the one he had seen being used by Whetstine. The pink squiggle, he said, was actually the letter S for Sarati Laboratories. The cream, Deep Hydrating Essential Aloe Cream by Sarati, contains DHEA and is marketed to menopausal women as an alternative to traditional hormone therapy. Available over the Internet, a two-ounce tube costs $21.95.

Whetstine declined to comment for this story. His attorney, Rick Roseta, issued an "absolute, vehement denial" of Graham's allegations. Said Roseta: "I think probably [Whetstine's] position is borne out by the recent indictment [of Graham] by a federal grand jury, which seems to indicate he has a problem with the truth."

Whetstine previously worked on several athletes sanctioned in the BALCO case, including Kelli White and Chryste Gaines. Their coach, Remi Korchemny, pleaded guilty to misbranding a prescription drug as a result of the probe.

"Chris is a very honest and a very good guy," Korchemny said of the massage therapist. "I doubt he would ever commit anything related to unprofessional behavior."

In 2003, however, Whetstine was disciplined by the Oregon Board of Massage Therapists for "unprofessional conduct that could endanger the health or safety of a client or the public," according to the settlement order. The board declined to reveal the details of the case.

Who Was the Target?

After blaming Whetstine, Graham at first theorized that Whetstine was angry because Gatlin refused to give him a bonus on top of what Nike paid him for his work the previous year. The dispute, Graham said, was followed by unexplained absences by Whetstine and caused his track group to advertise for another therapist.

Later, Graham speculated that he -- not Gatlin -- might have been the target because of anger in the track and field world surrounding his decision to send the syringe filled with steroids to USADA in 2003. The federal investigation that Graham launched resulted in five criminal convictions and more than a dozen athlete suspensions. According to that theory, Graham's enemies wanted to take him down by implicating Gatlin, his star runner.

"He sold all of us for the benefit of himself," Korchemny said of Graham and his role in the BALCO case. But "everything comes back. It's like a boomerang. . . . He threw it against us, but it will hit him."

Those around Gatlin say he didn't seem to understand how poorly Graham was perceived outside his camp of runners. Citing the success he had achieved under Graham and their friendship dating from his departure after two years from the University of Tennessee in 2002, Gatlin rejected the advice of his agent, former track star Renaldo Nehemiah, who suggested after the Athens Olympics that he find another coach.

But Gatlin's supporters say Gatlin did understand the implications of a positive drug test. A stimulant in his attention-deficit disorder medicine had triggered a positive in 2001. Though anti-doping officials ruled he did not intend to cheat in that instance, the violation remained on his record. Another positive could bring a lifetime ban.

Gatlin was known to order room service when traveling to avoid the possibility of ingesting contaminated food. He kept his luggage and sports bags locked and avoided cold and flu medication, for fear they could contain banned substances.

A month after Gatlin's positive test result was announced, Nike suspended Gatlin's contract and fired Graham. It has taken no public action and made no comment regarding Whetstine.

There was, however, a public dispute between Whetstine and one of his Nike supervisors. The supervisor, Llewellyn Starks, is alleged to have assaulted Whetstine outside an Indianapolis hotel last June during the U.S. track and field championships, according to the police report. The incident occurred less than a week after Gatlin was notified of the positive test.

Using a profane expression, Starks accused Whetstine of messing with Nike's athletes, Whetstine and his girlfriend told police, according to detective Philip Beaver. Starks, who once worked with Gatlin's former management team, declined to comment. Nike Global Sports Marketing Director John Capriotti did not return numerous phone messages seeking comment.

Though Gatlin's case could go to arbitration with USADA as early as next month, his legal strategy remains a mystery. USADA rules provide for the possibility of reduced sanctions for athletes who provide information against their coaches or other sources of drugs, but Gatlin and his attorneys have not revealed what he will tell the panel.

Some of Gatlin's supporters say they question whether the evidence points to Graham. Others say the massage therapist theory -- even if true -- would be difficult to prove.

Those who know Gatlin well, however, agree on this: He is innocent.

"I have no doubt in my mind he didn't do anything," said Robin Beamon, the ex-wife of legendary long jumper Bob Beamon and a friend of Gatlin's who is involved in youth track and field in Miami. "It just goes against everything this kids stands for. Once you wade through all the craziness, what did he stand to lose or gain? It was the Kansas Relays. He was . . . at the top of the world."

All of which leaves Cedric Walker, like many others in the track and field world, scratching his head.

"I believe in my heart something's wrong," Walker said. This is starting to look more every day like 'All the President's Men.'

WCSN Becomes Home To "Fringe Sports"

When the Olympics end, millions of Americans, who for 17 days have avidly followed sports they would not normally watch, stop watching them, as if breaking a habit cold turkey. But do they stop watching because networks barely carry any Olympic sports except for gymnastics, figure skating, skiing and snowboarding, or do the networks stop showing them because they figure that so few will watch? Clearly, a dog show is bound to snare more viewers in non-Olympic years than a nice curling tournament.

Track and field, the core of the Summer Games, is a sometime thing; sometimes NBC, the Olympic network through 2012, carries the world track and field championships, sometimes it doesn’t. It will next year.

“If you suffocate these sports, how can they be popular?” asked Carlos Silva, the president of World Championship Sports Network, or WCSN.

WCSN’s business is to make many of these Olympic events (but not the Olympics) available in streaming video to broadband users. Yesterday, I watched the Asian Games from Doha, Qatar. I saw Zou Kai of China win the men’s floor exercise. I watched highlights from previous days’ coverage of swimming, diving, volleyball and chess. Yes, chess. I also saw this alluring tease: “Catch all the sepaktakraw action only on wcsn.com!” (Sepaktakraw, which dates back to at least the 15th century, is a volleyball-soccer mix played on a badminton-sized court.)

In a couple of years, WCSN has inexpensively acquired video streaming and other online rights from 20 international federations that feed the Olympics and packaged them into a Web site with news, blogs, standings and a broadband video network.

Throughout the year (for $4.95 a month), wcsn.com shows live track and field, badminton, basketball, volleyball, cycling, fencing, wrestling, snowboarding, tae kwon do, swimming and rowing, plus non-Olympic sports like karate, water skiing, wakeboarding and A1 Grand Prix auto racing, a year-old open-wheel series in which nations compete as teams. So far, it has no deals for figure skating, soccer or tennis.

“I think what we have is diversity,” said Claude Ruibal, WCSN’s chief executive and its co-founder. “What is YouTube if not diversity?” A more sports-oriented analogy is CSTV, which has combined the rights to carry dozens of colleges’ sports on its Web site and its cable network.

WCSN’s universe — a modest 10,000 subscribers that has been built with little marketing — is served by the productions of the host broadcasters at each event; in Doha, the Asian Games’ host feed is produced by IMG. In most cases, WCSN adds its announcers, but in Doha, it is using IMG’s. The Web site carries numerous Asian Games events, but not all of them. WCSN has singled out those that are of most interest to United States viewers like baseball, swimming, gymnastics, equestrian and table tennis.

“But I said, ‘Please make sure we have sepaktakraw,’ ” Ruibal said.

Silva, a former AOL executive, said that some of the site’s feedback indicates that fans want an unfiltered entry into the sports they love.

“People are thrilled to see all of a 10,000-meter race,” he said.

The Web site originally charged subscribers by event, but in July, it moved to the $4.95 monthly fee (for the live events and video-on-demand) figuring that it would be better to feed an appetite whetted for one sport by letting users roam freely to other events.

“We wanted to create a fairly low-priced basis of entry,” Silva said.

Geoff Mason, a former ABC Sports and NBC Sports executive, now a consultant to ESPN and the NFL Network, was asked for advice by Ruibal a few years ago when WCSN’s goal was to be a cable network (which is still an aspiration).

Until yesterday, Mason did not know what had become of the venture.

“If I can watch when I want to watch and what I want to watch, it’s a hell of a service; I give them credit for doing this,” he said by telephone. “I’m a big skiing fanatic, and I want to watch the World Cup live. And if they tied down the rights to the America’s Cup, I’d watch every race.”

Ruibal said he would like to add America’s Cup, lacrosse and others sports, if they became available and were affordable. “And if they’re still diving off the cliffs in Acapulco, I’d buy that in a heartbeat,” he said.

WCSN is not alone in thinking that using the rights to numerous Olympic sports might provide the basis for a cable or broadband network. The United States Olympic Committee is contemplating such a venture, using the sports rights and archives it owns to break into the digital world.

Ruibal knows that he has a relatively short window to produce. His rights last for three or four years, and if his idea proves to be successful, wealthier competitors might try to duplicate his formula.

“NBC or ABC could catch up to us in a heartbeat,” he said.

He hopes that ESPN, NBC or Yahoo would prefer to augment their online coverage of so-called minor sports with links to wcsn.com rather than leap into a niche that is almost his own.

(by Richard Sandomir)

"Dirty Laundry" Becomes Historic Memorabilia

SAN JOSE — It is nothing more than an old bedsheet, yellowed with age, creased permanently, inked roughly with the words "Let Us March."
But as an artifact from the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, it conjures the story of one tumultuous week 38 years ago when two San Jose athletes thrust the United States' struggle for racial justice onto the world stage.

Now, this twin-sized top sheet is being considered as the focal point of an important exhibit at History San Jose, scheduled to open in January. Called "Speed City: From Civil Rights to Black Power," the show chronicles the rich history of social activism in San Jose State University's athletic department.

The protest banner is now in San Jose — on loan from its Mexico City owner — and local officials said they're interested in finding a patron who will pay to acquire it for the museum.

"There's no memorabilia related to this from the Games," curator Urla Hill said, watching last week as museum acquisition director Monica Tucker unwrapped the box that contained the sheet.

"It's a major, major big deal for me," Hill said.

For Hill and other historians, the protest banner is an important remnant of a critical period. On Oct. 16, 1968, San Jose State sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos — shoeless, black-gloved and wearing black scarves — raised their clenched fists during a medal ceremony in a controversial silent protest for civil rights. Both had won medals in the 200-meter dash.

The athletes were expelled from the Games by Olympic Committee President Avery Brundage for mixing politics with sports. In the days that followed, other athletes in the Olympic Village expressed their solidarity. One archival photo from Mexico City shows a sheet, hanging from an Olympic Village window, emblazoned with the message: "Down with Brundage."

No one knows what happened to the Brundage banner, and no one is certain what role the "Let Us March" banner played in the protests. It was found 38 years ago by Jorge Gonzalez, 71, who was at the time supervisor of the laundry department in the Olympic Village. He oversaw the washing of tens of thousands of bedsheets and clothes during the Games.

Gonzalez, who is now retired and lives in Mexico City, said he doesn't remember the exact day he saw the sheet in a pile of dirty laundry.

"But I saw it had black marks, looking more dirty than the others," he said.

Examining it later that day, he saw the writing for the first time. After the Olympic Games were over, Gonzalez said, he received permission from Olympic officials to keep the blanket.

"I knew that people were fighting for human rights," he said. "I thought there might have been a relation between the blanket and the protests. I didn't think at that moment it was something great."

The banner — Gonzalez and others in Mexico refer to it as a blanket — first drew public notice in 2003, when newspapers and other Mexico publications were preparing stories about the 35th anniversary of the Olympics in Mexico City. Gonzalez called the Mexico City newspaper El Universal and thus unfolded, literally, the 35-year-old story.

Shortly after that, Gonzalez took the banner to Montreal for safekeeping by his son, Carlos, and his wife, Hilda Oliver.

Oliver then began a search for a home for the banner. Her search led her to Urla Hill.

Hill, 43, had been doing dissertation research on the story of "Speed City," a term coined for the group of San Jose State University athletes, including Carlos and Smith, who excelled in track events. The exhibit that Hill is curating begins after World War II, when San Jose State began recruiting minority athletes shunned by other universities and colleges.

Tommie Smith, 62, reached by telephone at home in Atlanta, said he does not remember any protest banners from the Olympics. Smith retired last year from coaching track and field at Santa Monica College.

"During that time, I was getting out of Dodge," he joked, "not signing blankets."

Smith returned to San Jose last year for the unveiling of a sculpture at San Jose State — depicting him and Carlos making their defiant power salute. He said he would be interested in seeing an artifact from that time in his life.

The small non-profit museum does not have an acquisition budget, Tucker said. Gonzalez is asking for $5,000. Museum officials said they hope that a donor will come forward.

Tucker and other museum officials said they've no reason to doubt the authenticity of the banner. In the world of museum collecting, "a primary source," like Gonzalez is hard to beat.

"Who would make up a story like that?" she said.

If you were a part of the "Speed City" era at San Jose State University, the museum would like to hear from you. Contact Monica Tucker, History San Jose collections manager, at (408) 521-5022 or mtucker@historysanjose.org. The "Speed City" exhibit opens Jan. 12 at History San Jose in Kelley Park.

(by Jessie Mangaliman)

SUPPORT FOR LONDONS' 2012 OLYMPICS EBBING

According to the London Observer a report by members of the London Assembly says that public support for the 2012 Olympics is in danger of draining away because costs are likely to reach an “astonishing” eight billion pounds.

The newspaper reports it has seen a document that says the spiralling cost to the taxpayer and secrecy surrounding how the money will be spent threaten the enthusiasm generated at the time London won the 2012 Summer Games over Paris.

The Olympic Village, the largest construction contract for the Games, was originally to be built by a private company at a cost of one billion pounds and then converted into 5,000 homes that would be sold after the Games are over. The cost of the village is not included in the budget of the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), which oversees all construction work, reports the newspaper.

An ODA spokesman said, “negotiations are continuing in relation to the construction of the Olympic Village”.

The Budget Committee is to meet Wednesday and is expected to demand greater openness from Olympic leaders about the financing of the Games. Its report says that speculation about an extra 250 million pounds needed to cover VAT on building the venues for the Games “adds urgency to our call for more public information”.

Assembly members say the 2.4 billion pound figure was at best unrealistic and at worst an attempt to appeal to both the public and the International Olympic Committee (IOC).

The Guardian reports that Assembly members said Saturday they fear that the London 2012 Games could end up being the most expensive ever.

On Tuesday Olympics minister Tessa Jowell will likely face tough questioning from MP’s on the Commons culture select committee to explain the spiralling cost of the Games. But last night Jowell said the public and media should distinguish between the narrow costs of putting on the 2012 Games and the much larger expense of regenerating a section of the East End alongside the building of the Olympic venues.

She said, “people should bear in mind that the assembly budget committee haven’t factored into their report the large sums of money we will recoup from our investment now from selling land and, for example, turning the 2012 International Broadcast Centre into offices and light industrial units. We are conducting a fundamental review of the costs that were carefully constructed as part of the original bid to take account of changes since we won the bid, such as increases in commodity prices, the increased cost of security since the 7/7 bombings and our bigger ambition now to realize the price of regeneration”.

WORLD ANTI-DOPING AGENCY EXPLORING A CHANGE IN DIRECTION

MONTREAL (AFP) - Boosting minimum doping bans from two years to four and using only one urinalysis sample rather than "A" and "B" tests to decide positives are among topics the World Anti-Doping Agency is discussing.

WADA's executive committee meets here Sunday and Monday to talk about future anti-doping regulations, but moves such as longer doping ban minimums and a one-step doping process will need more scrutiny before being considered.

While second-test "B" samples seldom differ from "A" samples, it now takes both being positive for a doping test to be considered positive, although some critics say the time lag between tests allows banned substances to dissipate.

"There is a body of thought among some of our stakeholders that 'A' should be enough. There is another body of thinking that 'B' is a safeguard for some," WADA president Dick Pound said at a press conference here.

"It's far too soon to say there will be a change. We're looking to develop a consensus on it. There would have to be to make a change."

Some see two tests of the same urine sample as a waste of time and money, but American sprinter and long jumper, Marion Jones, would not be among them.

Triple Olympic champion Marion Jones had a high-profile "B"-sample negative in September after newspaper reports of an "A"-sample positive. WADA is still looking into that matter, waiting for information on Jones' tests.

"We haven't got all the information we've requested from the lab yet," Pound said. "We continue to have that as an investigation in progress."

Testing veracity would be a major issue, although Pound pointed out that the science of dope testing has made great leaps since the current A-B test system was adopted.

"There would be no recommendation for a change if these tests could not be relied on," Pound said. "When that system was put into effect the science was not as advanced as it is now."

Because some studies have shown the benefits of taking steroids can last longer than two years, WADA is looking at boosting the minimum doping ban.

"Some very important federations think we should increase it," Pound said. "That's a suggestion that has come forward and it will be reviewed by the code revision committee.

"I'm not sure what the decision on that will be. We will have to wait and see what the research shows."

One concern is that a four-year ban might conflict with human rights laws in several European nations, the same worry as when two-year bans were adopted.

"We have to go through pretty much the same exercise so we don't turn out to have a document that is unenforcable to the domestic courts of a country," said Pound.

"It's a considerable legal issue that we'll have to study very carefully before we come down on it and we'd have to have some legal opinions that this is enforcable."

Human Growth Hormone (HGH) is a growing problem and the only reliable tests for it are blood tests rather than urine tests.

Pound said there is less HGH testing and that a major problem is the lack of sufficient amounts of antibodies used in HGH tests, in part because so little is needed that it is hardly worth the effort to produce them commercially.

"I hope in the near future we will have mass quantities of these antibodies available," he said. "(I'm) very concerned. We think there's far more use out there than most people suspect.

"Some people have gotten comfortable because there is not much testing out there. We hope to create as much discomfort as soon as we can."

Pound held out hope of future WADA cooperation with US-based sports leagues that are not subject to WADA rules, although he sees no hope WADA rules will be adopted by leagues he has often criticized for major anti-doping loopholes.

"Adopt no, but work with maybe for verification," he said. "We can do some things working together with the ban list or testing or results. There's always a possibility of cooperation. Some leagues could adopt certain language."

With news that South Korea plans an anti-doping agency, Pound said that 91 countries are covered by national or regional anti-doping organizations and that he dreams every nation can be so regulated by 2010.

"We hope by 2010 to have the whole world covered one way or the other," said Pound. "Larger and more organized countries are more likely to have their own anti-doping agencies and that's what's called for.

"For other countries that is beyond their abilities. There are a huge number of small countries in the Olympic movement that realistically could never do that. We have to provide them with that service."

Pound said WADA has received 92 percent of its operating budget for the year but noted, "We're disappointed that a few countries, particularly Mexico, have not been paying their share ... That's the fuel we need to carry on this fight."

More Questions Than Answers In Tillman Probe

In a remote and dangerous corner of Afghanistan, under the protective roar of Apache attack helicopter and B-52 bombers, special agents and investigators did their work.

They walked the landscape with surviving witnesses. They found a rock stained with the blood of the victim. They re-enacted the killings - here the U.S. Army Rangers swept through the canyon in their Humvee, blasting away; here the doomed man waved his arms, pleading for recognition as a friend, not an enemy.

"Cease fire, friendlies, I am Pat (expletive) Tillman, damn it!" he shouted, again and again.

The latest inquiry into Tillman's death by friendly fire should end next month; authorities have said they intend to release to the public only a synopsis of their report. But The Associated Press has combed through the results of 2 1/4 years of investigations - reviewed thousands of pages of internal Army documents, interviewed dozens of people familiar with the case - and uncovered some startling findings.

One of the four shooters, Staff Sgt. Trevor Alders, had recently had PRK laser eye surgery. Although he could see two sets of hands "straight up," his vision was "hazy," he said. In the absence of "friendly identifying signals," he assumed Tillman and an allied Afghan who also was killed were enemy.

Another, Spc. Steve Elliott, said he was "excited" by the sight of rifles, muzzle flashes and "shapes." A third, Spc. Stephen Ashpole, said he saw two figures, and just aimed where everyone else was shooting.

Squad leader Sgt. Greg Baker had 20-20 eyesight, but claimed he had "tunnel vision." Amid the chaos and pumping adrenaline, Baker said he hammered what he thought was the enemy but was actually the allied Afghan fighter next to Tillman who was trying to give the Americans cover: "I zoned in on him because I could see the AK-47. I focused only on him."

All four failed to identify their targets before firing, a direct violation of the fire discipline techniques drilled into every soldier.

There's more:

Tillman's platoon had nearly run out of vital supplies, according to one of the shooters. They were down to the water in their Camelbak drinking pouches, and were forced to buy a goat from a local vendor. Delayed supply flights contributed to the hunger, fatigue and possibly misjudgments by platoon members.

A key commander in the events that led to Tillman's death both was reprimanded for his role and meted out punishments to those who fired, raising questions of conflict of interest.

A field hospital report says someone tried to jump-start Tillman's heart with CPR hours after his head had been partly blown off and his corpse wrapped in a poncho; key evidence including Tillman's body armor and uniform was burned.

Investigators have been stymied because some of those involved now have lawyers and refused to cooperate, and other soldiers who were at the scene couldn't be located.

Three of the four shooters are now out of the Army, and essentially beyond the reach of military justice.

Taken together, these findings raise more questions than they answer, in a case that already had veered from suggestions that it all was a result of the "fog of war" to insinuations that criminal acts were to blame.

The Pentagon's failure to reveal for more than a month that Tillman was killed by friendly fire have raised suspicions of a coverup. To Tillman's family, there is little doubt that his death was more than an innocent mistake.

One investigator told the Tillmans that it hadn't been ruled out that Tillman was shot by an American sniper or deliberately murdered by his own men - though he also gave no indication the evidence pointed that way.

"I will not assume his death was accidental or 'fog of war,"' said his father, Pat Tillman Sr. "I want to know what happened, and they've clouded that so badly we may never know."

And so, almost two years after three bullets through the forehead killed the star defensive back - a man who President Bush would call "an inspiration on and off the football field" - the fourth investigation began.

This time, the investigators are supposed to think like prosecutors:

Who fired the shots that killed Pat Tillman, and why?

Who insisted Tillman's platoon split and travel through dangerous territory in daylight, against its own policy? Who let the command slip away and chaos engulf the unit?

And perhaps most of all: Was a crime committed?

The long and complicated story of Pat Tillman's death and the investigations it spawned began five years ago, in the smoking ruins of the World Trade Center.

"It is a proud and patriotic thing you are doing," Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld wrote to Tillman in 2002, after Tillman - shocked and outraged by the Sept. 11 attacks - turned down a multimillion-dollar contract with the Arizona Cardinals to join the elite Army Rangers.

The San Jose, Calif. native enlisted with his brother Kevin, who gave up his own chance to play professional baseball. The Tillmans were deployed to Iraq in 2003, then sent to Afghanistan.

The mission of their "Black Sheep" platoon in April 2004 sounded straightforward: Divide a region along the Pakistan border into zones, then check each grid for insurgents and weapons. They were to clear two zones and then move deeper into Afghanistan.

But a broken-down Humvee known as a Ground Mobility Vehicle, or GMV, stalled the unit on an isolated road. A mechanic couldn't fix it, and a fuel pump flown in on a helicopter didn't help.

Hours passed. Enemy fighters watched invisibly, plotting their ambush.

Tillman's platoon must have presented an inviting target. There were 39 men - including six allied Afghan fighters trained by the CIA - and about a dozen vehicles.

Impatience was rising at the tactical operations center at Forward Operating Base Salerno, near Khowst, Afghanistan, where officers coordinated the movements of several platoons. Led by then-Maj. David Hodne, the so-called Cross-Functional Team worked at a U-shaped table inside a 20-by-30-foot tent with a projection screen and a satellite radio.

(Hodne, now a lieutenant colonel and executive officer for the 75th Ranger Regiment, declined to be interviewed on the record by the AP - as did nearly every person involved in the incident.)

When the Humvee broke down, the Black Sheep were nearing the end of their assignment; all that was left was to "turn one last stone and then get out," Hodne would testify. The unit was then to head for Manah, a small village where it would spend the night.

The commanders had already given the Black Sheep an extra day to get into its grid zones. High-ranking commanders were "pushing us pretty hard to keep moving," said Hodne.

"We had better not have any more delays due to this vehicle," he told his subordinates.

At the operations center, the Black Sheep's company commander, then-Capt. William C. "Satch" Saunders, was feeling the heat to get the platoon moving.

"We wanted to make sure we had a force staged to confirm or deny any enemy presence in Manah the next day, so we would not get ourselves too far behind setting ourselves up for our next series of operations," he recalled later to an investigator.

The order came down to split the platoon in two to speed its progress.

Saunders initially told investigators that Hodne had issued the order, but later, after he was given immunity from prosecution, he acknowledged it was his decision alone.

Hodne later said he was in the dark - "I felt like the village idiot because I had no idea what they were doing," he recalled. The decision was foolhardy, he said. Divided in two, "they didn't have enough combat power to do that mission" of clearing Manah, he testified. (Other commanders have insisted that splitting the platoon was perfectly safe and a common practice.)

One thing is clear: The order sparked a flurry of activity by the Black Sheep.

One of the gunners who shot Tillman said his unit didn't even have time to look at a map before getting back on the road.

"We were rushed to conduct an operation that had such flaws," said Alders. "Which in the end would prove to be fatal."

"If anything, this sense of urgency was as deadly to Tillman as the bullet that cut his life short," Alders wrote in a lengthy statement protesting his expulsion from the Rangers. "We could have conducted the search at night like we did on the follow-up operations or the next morning like we ended up doing anyway. Why, I ask, why?"

An investigator, Brig. Gen. Gary M. Jones, would later agree that an "artificial sense of urgency" to keep Tillman's platoon moving was a crucial factor in his death: "There was no specific intelligence that made the movement to Manah before nightfall imperative."

An officer involved in the incident told AP there was, however, general intelligence of insurgent activity in this region, historically a Taliban hotbed.

That suspicion would be confirmed when the Black Sheep drove through a narrow canyon, its walls towering about 500 feet, and came under fire from enemy Afghans. Chaos broke out and communications broke down.

After the platoon split, the second section of the convoy roared out of the canyon, into an open valley and straight at their comrades a few minutes ahead. A Humvee packed with pumped-up Rangers opened fire, killing the friendly Afghan and Tillman, though he desperately sought to be recognized.

Later, at least one of the same Rangers turned his guns on a village where witnesses say civilian women and children had gathered. The shooters raked it with fire, the American witnesses said; they wounded two additional fellow Rangers, including their own platoon leader.

Had it happened in the United States, police would have quickly cordoned off the area with "crime scene" tape and determined whether a law had been broken.

Instead, the investigations into Tillman's death have cascaded, one after another, for the past 30 months.

For Mary Tillman, getting to the bottom of her son's death is more than a personal quest.

"This isn't just about our son," she said. "It's about holding the military accountable. Finding out what happened to Pat is ultimately going to be important in finding out what happened to other soldiers."

In the days after the shootings, the first officer appointed to investigate, then-Capt. Richard Scott, interviewed all four shooters, their driver, and many others who were there. He concluded within a week that the gunmen demonstrated "gross negligence" and recommended further investigation.

"It could involve some Rangers that could be charged" with a crime, Scott told a superior later.

Then-Lt. Col. Jeffrey Bailey - the battalion commander who oversaw Tillman's platoon - later assured Tillman's family that those responsible would be punished as harshly as possible.

But no one was ever court martialed; staff lawyers advised senior Army commanders reviewing the incident that there was no legal basis for it.

Instead, the Army punished seven people; four soldiers received relatively minor punishments known as Article 15s under military law, with no court proceedings. These four ranged from written reprimands to expulsion from the Rangers. One, Baker, had his pay reduced and was effectively forced out of the Army. The other three soldiers received administrative reprimands.

Scott's report circulated briefly among a small corps of high-ranking officers.

Then, it disappeared.

Some of Tillman's relatives think the Army buried the report because its findings were too explosive. Army officials refused to provide a copy to the AP, saying no materials related to the investigation could be released.

The commander of Tillman's 75th Ranger Regiment, then-Col. James C. Nixon, wasn't satisfied with Scott's investigation, which he said focused too heavily on pre-combat inspections and procedures rather than on what had happened.

Scott "made some conclusions in the document that weren't validated by facts" as described by the participants, Nixon would tell later investigators.

Nixon assigned his top aide, Lt. Col. Ralph Kauzlarich, to lead what became the second investigation. Kauzlarich harshly criticized Baker and the men on his truck.

Among other things, Baker should have known that at least two of his subordinates had never been in a firefight, and should have closely supervised where they shot.

"His failure to do so resulted in deaths of Cpl. Tillman and the AMF soldier, and the serious wounding of two other (Rangers)," Kauzlarich concluded. "While a great deal of discretion should be granted to a leader who is making difficult judgments in the heat of combat, the command also has a responsibility to hold its leaders accountable when that judgment is so wanton or poor that it places the lives of other men at risk."

Still, the Tillman family complained that questions remained: Who killed Tillman? Why did they fire? Were the punishments stiff enough?

"I don't think that punishment fit their actions out there in the field," said Kevin Tillman, who was with his brother the day Pat was killed but was several minutes behind him in the trailing element of a convoy and saw nothing.

"They were not inquiring, identifying, engaging (targets). They weren't doing their job as a soldier," he told an investigator. "You have an obligation as a soldier to, you know, do certain things, and just shooting isn't one of your responsibilities. You know, it has to be a known, likely suspect."

And so, in November 2004, acting Army Secretary Les Brownlee ordered up yet another investigation, by Jones.

The result was 2,100 pages of transcripts and detailed descriptions of the incident, but no new charges or punishments. The report, completed Jan. 10, 2005, was provided - with many portions blacked out or removed entirely - to the Tillman family. It has not been released to the public; the family found it wanting.

Pressed anew by the Tillmans, the Pentagon inspector general announced a review of the investigations in August 2005. And in March 2006, they launched a new criminal probe into the actions of the men who shot at Tillman.

The veteran Pentagon official who is overseeing these latest inquiries, acting Defense Department Inspector General Thomas Gimble, has called the Tillman probe the toughest case he has ever seen, according to people he recently briefed.

Investigators are looking at who pulled the triggers and fired at Tillman; they are also looking at the officers who pressured the platoon to move through a region with a history of ambushes; the soldiers who burned Tillman's uniform and body armor afterward; and at everyone in the chain of command who deliberately kept the circumstances of Tillman's death from the family for more than a month.

Military investigators under Gimble's direction this year visited the rugged valley in eastern Afghanistan where Tillman was killed. It was a risky trip; the region is even more dangerous today than it was in 2004.

According to one person briefed by investigators, the contingent included at least two soldiers who were there the day of the incident - Staff Sgt. Matthew Weeks, a squad leader who was up the hill from Tillman when he was shot, and the driver of the GMV that carried the Rangers who shot Tillman, Staff Sgt. Kellett Sayre.

When the current inquiry began, the Pentagon projected it would be completed by September 2006. Now Gimble and the Army's Criminal Investigation Command, known as CID, are aiming to finish their work by December, say lawmakers and other officials briefed by Gimble.

CID is probing everything up to and including Tillman's shooting. The inspector general's office itself has a half-dozen investigators researching everything that happened afterward, including allegations of a coverup.

The investigators have taken sworn testimony from about 70 people, some of whom said they were questioned for more than six hours. But Gimble said investigators have been hindered by a failure to locate key witnesses, even some who are still in the active military.

Moreover, those who are now out of the Army, including three of the four shooters, can't be court martialed. They could be charged in the civilian justice system by a U.S. attorney, but such a step would be highly unusual.

The law that allows it, the Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act, has been invoked fewer than a half-dozen times since its enactment in 2000, said Scott Silliman, executive director of Duke Law School's Center on Law, Ethics and National Security and a high-ranking Air Force lawyer until his retirement in 1993.

The investigation, Gimble has said, is also complicated because of "numerous missteps" by the three previous investigators, particularly their failure to follow standards for handling evidence.

Gimble promised lawmakers in a series of briefings this fall that his investigation "will bring all to light." He has committed to releasing his detailed findings to key legislators, Pentagon officials and the Tillman family, as well as a synopsis to the general public, congressional aides said.

Gimble declined an AP request for an interview.

To date, a total of seven soldiers have been disciplined in Tillman's death.

Bailey, the 2nd Ranger Battalion commander who was camped out about two miles down the road with another unit the night Tillman died, surveyed the shooting scene hours after it occurred.

"I don't think there was any criminal act," he said. "It was a fratricide based upon a lot of contributing factors, confusion," he testified to an investigator in late 2004.

Some high-ranking officers, including Bailey, believe a lack of control in the field was to blame - starting with the platoon leader and including the soldiers who didn't identify their targets.

Bailey, who approved punishments for several of the soldiers, said he disagreed with the platoon's protests that they were "doing what we asked them to do under some very difficult circumstances, and that there were mistakes made but they weren't negligent mistakes."

He also testified that "three gunners were, to varying degrees, culpable in what had happened out there." And he said he wanted a fourth soldier involved - the squad leader, Baker - "out of the military."

Baker soon left the Army.

As for others involved:

The three other shooters - Ashpole, Alders and Elliott - remained in the service initially but Elliott and Ashpole have since left. Elliott struck a deal with authorities; in exchange for his testimony to investigator Jones, the Army gave him immunity from prosecution "in any criminal proceedings."

The platoon leader, Lt. David Uthlaut, was later bumped down from the Rangers to the regular Army for failing to prepare his men prior to the shootings, according to Bailey.

"They didn't do communications checks. They didn't check out their equipment. So they'd been there 24 hours," Bailey testified. "For example, some of the weapons systems weren't even loaded with ammunition. Many of the soldiers didn't know where they were going. They didn't have contingency plans."

A non-commissioned officer on the ground that day, however, testified that the unit carried out required communications checks.

Uthlaut was also wounded by fellow Rangers in the incident. He was awarded the Purple Heart and later promoted to captain.

Saunders, the company commander, was given the authority to punish three soldiers - even though he himself was reprimanded for his own poor leadership. Both Saunders and Hodne received formal written reprimands for failing to "provide adequate command and control" of subordinate units - administrative punishments lighter than the Article 15s handed down to the soldiers who shot at Tillman. This obviously hasn't hurt Hodne's career; he has since been promoted.

"I thought it was (the commanders') fault, or part of their fault that we were even in this situation, when they're telling us to split up," said Ashpole.

Some lawmakers have warned that if this probe does not clear up all questions on Tillman's death, they may press for congressional hearings. Others have said Congress could call for an independent panel of retired military officers and other experts to conduct an outside probe.

Rep. Mike Honda, a Democrat who represents the San Jose district where Tillman's family lives, has pressed the Pentagon for answers on the status of its investigations.

"I'm very impatient and at times cynical," Honda said. But, he said, the honor of the military - and the confidence of the public in the military and the government - are at stake.

"So if we pursue the truth and wait for it," he said, "it may be worthwhile."

(Among Those Contributing To This Story, Scott Lindlaw and Martha Mendoza, AP)

MORE WISDOM ON THE IRAQ WAR (From an Unlikely Source)

Love him or loathe him, he nailed this one right on the head..........

By Rush Limbaugh:

I think the vast differences in compensation between victims of the September 11 casualty and those who die serving our country in Uniform are profound. No one is really talking about it either, because you just don't criticize anything having to do with September 11. Well, I can't let the numbers pass by because it says something really disturbing about the entitlement mentality of this country. If you lost a family member in the September 11 attack, you're going to get an average of $1,185,000. The range is a minimum guarantee of $250,000, all the way up to $4.7 million.

If you are a surviving family member of an American soldier killed in action, the first check you get is a $6,000 direct death benefit, half of which is taxable.

Next, you get $1,750 for burial costs. If you are the surviving spouse, you get $833 a month until you remarry. And there's a payment of $211 per month for each child under 18. When the child hits 18, those payments come to a screeching halt.

Keep in mind that some of the people who are getting an average of $1.185 million up to $4.7 milli on are complaining that it's not enough Their deaths were tragic, but for most, they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. Soldiers put themselves in harms way FOR ALL OF US, and they and their families know the dangers.

We also learned over the weekend that some of the victims from the Oklahoma City bombing have started an organization asking for the same deal that the September 11 families are getting. In addition to that, some of the families of those bombed in the embassies are now asking for compensation a s well.

You see where this is going, don't you? Folks, this is part and parcel of over 50 years of entitlement politics in this country. It's just really sad. Every time a pay raise comes up for the military, they usually receive next to nothing of a raise. Now the green machine is in combat in the Middle East while their families have to survive on food stamps and live in low-rent housing Make sense?

However, our own US Congress voted themselves a raise. Many of you don't know that they only have to be in Congress one time to receive a pension that is more than $15,000 per month. And most are now equal to being millionaires plus. They do not receive Social Security on retirement because they didn't have to pay into the system. If some of the military people stay in for 20 years and get out as an E-7, they may receive a pension of $1,000 per month, and the very people who placed them in harm's way receives a pension of $15,000 per month.

I would like to see our elected officials pick up a weapon and join ranks before they start cutting out benefits and lowering pay for our sons and daughters who are now fighting.

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