Major League Baseball

KANSAS CITY, Mo. (AP)-Looking ahead to next season, the Kansas City Royals are thinking about a substantial payroll spending boost in hopes of retaining more of their top players.
The Kansas City Star reported Wednesday that the team was tentatively planning a 27 percent payroll hike to $45 million.
“We’ve talked in that range,” owner David Glass confirmed. “That’s probably realistic for us, although it pushes our outer limits and we’ll probably lose a little money. But I’m more interested right now in winning than I am in whether we break even or not.”
“We not only need to keep the nucleus of what we’ve got, but we need to improve,” said Glass, whose struggling team is 57-87 after losing 11-2 Tuesday night at Cleveland.
Raising the payroll to $45 million would represent a 92 percent increase since Glass bought the Royals in April 2000. Only two other American League clubs, the Oakland A’s and Minnesota Twins, have payrolls below $45 million.
The Royals hope to get a financial boost in the form of increased revenue sharing in the new collective-bargaining agreement between owners and players. The current agreement expires Oct. 31.
“If everything stays the same, I know our club is not going to have a $60 million or $70 million payroll,” general manager Allard Baird told The Star. “But I’m willing to be creative.”
The Royals are already obligated to spend $26.1 million next season in contracts for seven players: First baseman Mike Sweeney ($8 million), closer Roberto Hernandez ($6 million), third baseman Joe Randa ($4 million,) starter Jeff Suppan ($3.8 million), reliever Jason Grimsley ($1.9 million), reliever Doug Henry ($1.55 million) and first baseman Dave McCarty ($850,000.)
The club would also like to keep catcher Brent Mayne, whose contract contains a mutual option at $3.25 million for next season.
Eight players, including outfielder Carlos Beltran, are eligible for arbitration. Beltran, making just $425,000 this year, figures to get a major increase.
Shortstop Neifi Perez, who makes $3.55 million, is also on the arbitration list. The cost of keeping him, Beltran and Mayne is likely to run around $10 million.
The Royals also would like to keep three other players eligible for arbitration – starting pitcher Paul Byrd, second baseman Carlos Febles and outfielder Raul Ibanez.
That would probably cost them at least $2.5 million, which would leave just $6.4 million for the remaining 12 players in.
One of those is starter Jose Rosado, a two-time All-Star who hasn’t pitched in the majors since April 30, 2000, because of a shoulder injury. He is making $3.25 million this year and is eligible for arbitration.
Catcher Gregg Zaun, making $1.15 million, and infielder Luis Alicea, at $850,000, are both eligible for free agency but say they’d like to be able to stay with the Royals.
“It’s going to be a little tough to keep all of these guys,” Baird said. “It may not sound like much – $500,000 here and $500,000 there – but that’s an extra million.”

ST. LOUIS (AP)-Albert Pujols of the St. Louis Cardinals drove in three runs in his first two at-bats Wednesday, setting an NL rookie record with 120 RBIs.
Pujols broke the mark of 119, by Wally Berger of the Boston Braves in 1930. The 21-year-old Pujols had a run-scoring groundout in the first and a two-run double in the third off Jeff D’Amico of the Milwaukee Brewers, giving him nine RBIs in the three-game series.
Pujols has at least one RBI in 11 of his last 15 games.
He became only the fourth Cardinals rookie to score 100 runs when he came around on Craig Paquette’s single in the third. The last was Vince Coleman with 107 runs in 1985; and John Heidrick holds the team rookie record of 109 runs in 1899.
On Tuesday, Pujols drove in a career-best five runs and established team rookie records for RBIs and doubles. He’s hit 43 doubles this season.
With 334 total bases, Pujols was 18 shy of Dick Allen’s NL rookie record, set in 1964 for the Phillies.
National Football League

NEW YORK (AP)-The NFL will go with a 16-game schedule, making up the games suspended as a precaution against terrorism last weekend on Jan. 6. But the league is still considering ways to have full 12- team playoffs.
“We believe that a full 16-game regular-season schedule is vital to our fans and the integrity of our season,” NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue said. “Each team needs to be guaranteed the same number of home and away games plus an equal number of divisional games. The NFL Competition Committee was unanimous on that point.”
Tagliabue said the committee was studying ways to get 12 teams into the playoffs, even though the second week’s games will be played on what would have been wild-card weekend, Jan. 7. Without a week off before the Super Bowl, that would be hard.
“If we cannot resolve our entire postseason lineup in a satisfactory fashion, we then will go to a system of six division winners and two wild-card teams for this one season only,” he said.
The league had been considering two options: playing just 15 games and keeping the 12-team playoff format, or retaining the 16-game schedule.
From the start, there appeared to be more sentiment toward retaining the full slate of games, shifting those called off last week after terrorist attacks on New York and Washington to the weekend originally scheduled for wild-card games.
There were several reasons for avoiding a reduced schedule, including the fact that San Diego, last week’s bye team, would have played 16 games – one more than the other 30 teams.
The league also wanted to provide each team with eight home games and eight away games, feeling that was important for competitive balance and because half the teams would lose the money from a home game.
The new schedule is just one facet of the new NFL, changed drastically by the terrorist bombings in New York and Washington.
Things will be a lot less comfortable.
When fans get to stadiums Sunday – early, the league urges – their cars will be checked, the parking zones will be farther from stadiums and they’ll be checked again going through the gates. There will be a lot more uniformed police around, too.
The teams probably will be seeing the regular officials, too.
According to a league source, the two sides worked out an agreement pending a ratification vote by the union, which has been locked out since the final week of exhibition games.

National Basketball Association

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif. (AP)-Dennis Rodman has been charged with three misdemeanors for allegedly speeding through Newport Harbor in his 47-foot boat.
The former NBA star was cited on Aug. 3 for speeding in his boat, Sexual Chocolate, after the Orange County Sheriff’s Department said its Harbor Patrol clocked him doing more than 20 mph in a 5 mph zone.
Rodman, who played college basketball at Southeastern Oklahoma, was cited and released after docking the boat at Josh Slocum’s, a restaurant he co-owns.
He was charged on Monday and scheduled to appear in court Wednesday, but prosecutors said they plan to ask the judge to hear the speeding case and another one pending against Rodman next month.
Rodman is set to return to court on Oct. 1 for allegedly making too much noise during a 40th birthday party at his Newport Beach home in May.
If convicted on the harbor speeding charges, Rodman could be sentenced to up to one year in jail. Conviction on the noise charges, which include disturbing the peace and two counts of illegally using sound amplification equipment, could bring him another 18 months in jail and a $3,000 fine.
Police have visited Rodman’s home more than 70 times because neighbors have complained about his parties. He has been fined more than $3,000 for noise ordinance violations. Earlier this year, city officials changed its noise ordinance partly because of Rodman.

NEW YORK (AP)-He’s back! He’s back!
Oops, well, he’s almost back.
For 90 minutes Monday, Michael Jordan was listed as an active player for the Washington Wizards on the team’s Web site. Apparently, someone pressed a button
a little too soon.
“Just a clerical error,” NBA spokesman Tim Frank said. “Our Internet department was making preparations in case he comes back.”
Jordan had all but confirmed he would announce a comeback at a news conference as early as this week. Because of the terrorist attacks, he is now more likely to announce his decision in a more low-key manner, such as a faxed news release, in the next two weeks.
Wizards spokesman Matt Williams said he was inundated with phone calls after Jordan was included on the Web page, tucked alphabetically between Popeye Jones and Christian Laettner.
Jordan was listed as a 6-foot-6 guard, 198 pounds. The uniform, of course, was No. 23.
The Web site also included a brief biography, complete with his career statistics down to such trivial information as the fact that he wore his blue North Carolina shorts underneath his Bulls shorts when he played for Chicago.
Jordan’s name was taken off the active roster late in the afternoon by the NBA, which controls the rosters on the Web site.
This would be the second comeback for the 38-year-old Jordan, who led the Bulls to six NBA championships. He retired in October 1993 to play minor league baseball and returned to the Bulls in March 1995. He retired again in January 1999.
At the NBA Store in Manhattan, employees said they were stocking several blank Wizards jerseys that will be embroidered with Jordan’s name and number when the comeback is official.

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