Former Packers Charles Woodson, Leroy Butler among nominees for Pro Football Hall of Fame
Peyton Manning and Charles Woodson are among 14 first-year eligible candidates for the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
Joining the two-time Super Bowl champion quarterback and the star cornerback/safety on the ballot are receivers Calvin Johnson, Wes Welker and Roddy White; running back Steven Jackson; tight end Heath Miller; offensive linemen D’Brickashaw Ferguson and Logan Mankins; defensive linemen Jared Allen, Justin Tuck and Kevin Williams; linebacker Jerod Mayo; and defensive back Charles Tillman.
In all, there are 130 nominees for five modern-era spots. The roster of nominees consists of 65 offensive players, 49 defensive players and 16 special teams players. The list will be reduced to 25 semifinalists in November and to 15 finalists in January. A maximum of five modern-era players will be chosen when the selection committee meets the Saturday before the Super Bowl in Tampa, Florida.
Eighteen finalists will be presented to the full 48-member panel: the 15 modern-era finalists, and the recently nominated Drew Pearson (senior); Bill Nunn (contributor); and Tom Flores (coach).
Enshrinement at the hall in Canton, Ohio, will take place next August, when members of the 2020 class and a special centennial class also will enter the football shrine. The 2020 class could not be enshrined due to the coronavirus pandemic and will be honored next summer.
That class has players Steve Atwater, Isaac Bruce, Harold Carmichael, Jimbo Covert, Bobby Dillon, Cliff Harris, Winston Hill, Steve Hutchinson, Edgerrin James, Alex Karras, Troy Polamalu, Donnie Shell, Duke Slater, Mac Speedie and Ed Sprinkle; coaches Bill Cowher and Jimmy Johnson; and contributors Steve Sabol, Paul Tagliabue and George Young.
Returning finalists from last year are receivers Torry Holt and Reggie Wayne; offensive linemen Tony Boselli and Alan Faneca; defensive linemen Richard Seymour and Bryant Young; linebackers Sam Mills and Zach Thomas; and defensive backs John Lynch and LeRoy Butler.
Giannis Antetokounmpo a unanimous first-team All-NBA pick
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (AP) — LeBron James now stands alone in All-NBA recognition history, getting there unanimously.
James was revealed Wednesday as an All-NBA player for a record 16th time, breaking the mark he shared with Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Kobe Bryant and Tim Duncan. He was a first-team pick on all 100 ballots, joining Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo as the only unanimous first-team selections this season.
Joining them on the first team: Houston guard James Harden, Lakers forward Anthony Davis and Dallas guard Luka Doncic, who got the nod in just his second season in the NBA — becoming the first player to do that since Duncan in 1998-99.
The 21-year-old Doncic is the sixth player to make All-NBA at that age or younger, joining Kevin Durant, James, Duncan, Rick Barry and Max Zaslofsky.
James is a first-team pick for the 13th time in his career, extending his record there. Bryant and Karl Malone were 11-time first-teamers. Antetokounmpo, the reigning MVP and the frontrunner to win the award again this season, was picked unanimously for the second consecutive year.
Los Angeles Clippers forward Kawhi Leonard, Denver center Nikola Jokic, Portland guard Damian Lillard, Oklahoma City guard Chris Paul and Toronto forward Pascal Siakam were on the second team.
The third-team picks were Boston forward Jayson Tatum, Miami forward Jimmy Butler, Utah center Rudy Gobert, Philadelphia guard Ben Simmons and Houston guard Russell Westbrook.
Paul and Westbrook are now nine-time All-NBA players, Harden a six-time choice, Lillard is a five-timer and Antetokounmpo, Leonard and Davis are four-time selections. Butler and Gobert are three-time selections, Jokic a two-time choice and Siakam, Tatum and Simmons all joined Doncic as being on the team for the first time.
Harden and Doncic appeared on all 100 ballots — though only James and Antetokounmpo were unanimous as first-team choices on every ballot. Davis and Jokic were on 99 ballots, and Leonard appeared on 98.
The voting was conducted based on regular-season games played through March 11, and voters had to choose two guards, two forwards and one center for each team. Milwaukee forward Khris Middleton did not make All-NBA even though he appeared on more ballots (60) than Simmons (43) and Westbrook (38); they made the team as guards. Philadelphia’s Joel Embiid got 39 votes and did not make the team either, after finishing fourth among centers.
Middleton led forwards who didn’t make the team in votes, Embiid did the same for centers and Washington’s Bradley Beal (26 votes) did the same for guards.
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Brewers no-hit by Chicago Alec Mills in 12-0 loss
MILWAUKEE (AP) — From college walk-on to major league starter, Chicago Cubs right-hander Alec Mills had to earn most every break he got.
On the brink of big league history, he was happy to welcome this bit of luck: expecting to see two-time batting champion Christian Yelich in the on-deck circle, Mills looked over and saw his backup instead.
“That kind of surprised me,” he said.
This one surprised just about everyone.
Mills cruised through baseball’s second no-hitter this season in just the 15th start of his career, completing the gem in a 12-0 romp over the Milwaukee Brewers on Sunday.
Mills got Jace Peterson — who replaced Yelich, the 2018 NL MVP, on defense late in the blowout — to hit a routine grounder to shortstop Javier Baez with two outs in the ninth. Baez completed the play, and the Cubs swarmed around Mills, tearing off his cap and pulling at the smiling right-hander’s uniform after his first career complete game.
“It just hasn’t really hit me yet,” the 28-year-old said. “It’s kind of crazy, I didn’t even know how to celebrate. Just something that all came together today. Obviously a memory I’ll have forever.”
Mills (5-3) threw 114 pitches and hardly had any close calls in Chicago’s 16th no-hitter.
Mills struck out five and walked three. His five strikeouts are the fewest in a Cubs no-hitter since Ken Holtzman in 1969. He only induced five swings and misses, tied with Oakland’s Dallas Braden during his perfect game in 2010 for fewest in a no-hitter since at least 1988, per Stats Inc.
“I can promise you it was not a slow heartbeat,” Mills said. “I had to kind of take a seat and calm myself down. It was tough. I had to take a lot of deep breaths and get into a good mindset.”
Chicago White Sox ace Lucas Giolito threw baseball’s other no-hitter this season against the Pittsburgh Pirates on Aug. 15.
Milwaukee had not been held hitless since Detroit’s Justin Verlander pitched the first of his three no-hitters on June 12, 2007. It’s the fourth time the Brewers have been no-hit.
Held without a hit through three innings, the Cubs broke through against Milwaukee in the fourth against starter Adrian Houser (1-5) due in large part to shoddy fielding by the Brewers. Kyle Schwarber drew a one-out walk, Baez reached on an error and Jason Heyward followed with a bloop double to left to drive in a run.
With the infield in, Jason Kipnis hit a ball directly to Brewers second baseman Keston Hiura, who had it slip out of his hand as he tried to rush a throw to the plate, allowing a run to score.
Victor Caratini followed with a run-scoring bloop single and Ian Happ connected for a two-run single as the Cubs scored five runs in the inning, all unearned.
“Nothing went right today. We didn’t play a good game,” Counsell said. “We played a poor game and we lost. We have to turn the page and know that there’s still a lot of important baseball left in front of us.”
AP: Bucks hoping to see Antetokounmpo play Game 5 vs. Heat
LAKE BUENA VISTA, Fla. (AP) — The Milwaukee Bucks will play another day.
They’re waiting to see if reigning NBA MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo will join them.
It’s still a dire situation for the team that had the league’s best regular-season record this season — they’re down 3-1 in the Eastern Conference semifinals to the Miami Heat, with another win-or-go-home test awaiting in Game 5 on Tuesday night. And they don’t know if Antetokounmpo, who sprained his right ankle in Game 3 and then again in Game 4, will be ready.
“There’s hope,” Bucks coach Mike Budenholzer said. “We’re not ruling him out, so I guess until he’s ruled out you have hope. He’s going to do everything he can to make himself available.”
Antetokounmpo was with the Bucks for their light practice Monday. He got treatment on the ankle, then left wearing a protective boot over his right foot — a standard practice with sprains to keep the injured area from bearing weight.
The Bucks won Game 4 without him for the most part, beating the Heat in overtime. The NBA acknowledged Monday that two fouls should have been called on the Bucks late in regulation, including one that would have put Jimmy Butler on the foul line with 24 seconds left and the Heat leading by a point. Donte DiVincenzo made a free throw on the next Milwaukee possession to force overtime.
“Our veteran players are experienced enough to know how difficult it is to win in the playoffs and how challenging it is just to win one game,” Miami coach Erik Spoelstra said. “Each game has been like that. There have been these moments of truth and for three straight games we were able to win those moments of truth.”
In Game 4, it was Milwaukee’s turn. And with or without Antetokounmpo, the Bucks still believe they can extend the series.
“Did we put ourselves in a hole? Absolutely,” Milwaukee’s Wesley Matthews said. “Are we going to be punks about it? Absolutely not.”
Brewers designate Smoak for assignment, add Vogelbach
MILWAUKEE (AP) — The Milwaukee Brewers claimed first baseman/designated hitter Daniel Vogelbach off waivers and designated Justin Smoak for assignment as they attempt to boost their struggling lineup and make another September surge.
Smoak, 33, had been hitting .186 with five homers, 15 RBIs and 40 strikeouts in 113 at-bats. Smoak went 1 of 21 over his last eight games, though he did walk twice and score two runs Wednesday in an 8-5 victory over the Detroit Tigers.
“Determining whether and the likelihood of a player snapping out of a slump is always a really tough judgment call,” Brewers general manager David Stearns said. “In this case, with the volume of playing time that Justin had to try to get this going and where we are in the season, we felt like it was the right time.”
The Brewers are taking a leap of faith in regard to Vogelbach, who made the All-Star Game last year but has struggled ever since.
Vogelbach, 27, has batted .088 (5 of 57) in a combined 20 games this season with Seattle and Toronto, who both designated him for assignment. He has walked 12 times.
Last year, Vogelbach batted .208 with 30 homers, 76 RBIs, 92 walks and a .780 OPS for Seattle. But he hit just .143 (19 of 133) with five homers and 12 RBIs in August and September of last season.
“The underlying skills are still there,” Stearns said. “He still has a really solid understanding of the strike zone. He understands what strikes and balls are, and he controls the zone very well, and he still has the same impressive raw power that allowed him to hit 30 home runs last year and have a really good first half. Those are still there.”
Vogelbach has played first base in the past but has exclusively been a DH so far this season. Stearns said Vogelbach could play some first base for Milwaukee but added that “I wouldn’t expect him to see the bulk of the time there.”
Milwaukee is seeking a third straight postseason berth, something it has never accomplished in franchise history. The Brewers got to the playoffs each of the last two years thanks to strong finishes, and they’ll need another big September to get back to the postseason.
The Brewers (17-19) are third in the NL Central, 4½ games behind the Chicago Cubs and one game behind St. Louis. Milwaukee is averaging just four runs per game to rank 27th out of 30 major league teams, ahead of only Cincinnati, Kansas City and Texas.
“We have to recognize that we haven’t scored enough runs this year to this point to win the number of games that we’d like to win,” Stearns said. “This is a reflection of trying to find a fit that could potentially help our offense.”
Milwaukee’s decision to designate Smoak for assignment comes after the Brewers already designated first baseman/outfielder Logan Morrison for assignment and released utilityman Brock Holt. Morrison became a free agent while Holt landed in Washington. The Brewers had added all three players before this season.
In other moves, the Brewers reinstated pitcher Brandon Woodruff from the paternity list and optioned reliever Phil Bickford to their alternate training site.
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AP: Brewers strand 13 runners in 5-1 loss to Pittsburgh
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Josh Bell and Gregory Polanco homered off Brandon Woodruff and the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the Milwaukee Brewers 5-1 on Sunday.
Bell broke a 1-all tie in the fourth with a towering, two-run blast that hit an SUV parked well above the wall in right-center as part of a promotion.
The Pirates stayed in front the rest of the way to hand Woodruff (2-3) a rare loss at Miller Park. The right-hander entered Sunday having gone 10-0 with a 2.89 ERA in 16 home starts over the past two seasons. He struck out seven but allowed four runs, four hits and three walks in five innings.
Polanco opened the scoring in the second inning with his fifth homer of the year and third against the Brewers.
Milwaukee tied it with an unearned run in the third when Keston Hiura’s two-out single brought home Luis Urias after Bell committed an error at first base earlier in the inning..
Bell quickly redeemed himself.
After Kevin Newman hit a leadoff single in the fourth, Bell put Pittsburgh back ahead with a drive that bounced off the hood of the promotional SUV.
When former Brewers slugger Mike Moustakas hit a Toyota RAV4 in the same location last year, a Brewers fan won a RAV4 as part of a promotion.
Pittsburgh extended the lead to 4-1 in the fifth as Newman hit an RBI single after Woodruff issued two-out walks to Erik Gonzalez and Adam Frazier, though a baserunning mistake nearly wiped out the run. The ruling on replay was that Gonzalez crossed the plate moments before Frazier was tagged out at third.
The Pirates capped the scoring in the seventh as Frazier’s two-out single brought home Jason Martin.
Pirates starter Steven Brault pitched three innings, and four relievers took over from there. Nick Tropeano (1-0) pitched 2 2/3 innings of shutout relief.
Milwaukee left 13 men on base and went 1 of 9 with runners in scoring position. The Brewers’ best shot at a rally came in the seventh.
After retiring the first two batters of the inning, Tropeano walked Jedd Gyorko and hit Ryan Braun with a pitch. Geoff Hartlieb plunked Hiura to load the bases before striking out Justin Smoak to end the threat.
AP: Gyorko, Burnes come up big as Brewers trounce Pirates 9-1
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Jedd Gyorko homered twice and Corbin Burnes struck out 10 in six innings, helping the Milwaukee Brewers pound the Pittsburgh Pirates 9-1 on Friday night.
Burnes (1-0) gave up three hits and walked one as the Brewers bounced back after dropping six of their previous eight games. They were swept in a three-game series at Pittsburgh last weekend.
“Today I think definitely was the best I’ve commanded the baseball,” Burnes said. “All four or five pitches, I was able to throw them where I wanted to. I made very few mistakes tonight.”
Gyorko hit solo shots in the first and seventh innings for his sixth career multihomer game. His last one came against the Brewers on May 1, 2017, when he was playing for the St. Louis Cardinals.
Ryan Braun and Jacob Nottingham also homered for the Brewers. JT Riddle connected in the seventh for Pittsburgh.
Braun hit a three-run shot to left in the third on a 3-2 pitch from left-hander Derek Holland. The 2011 NL MVP joined Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera and Robinson Cano as the only active players with at least 800 extra-base hits.
The only player to collect more extra-base hits for the Brewers is Hall of Famer Robin Yount with 960 from 1974-93.
“He’s been a guy that’s absolutely hammered left-handed pitching,” Brewers manager Craig Counsell said. “That’s been a trademark. ... When I remember the prime of Ryan’s career — I’m getting nostalgic with Ryan right now — this is what he would do. If there was a left-handed starter in the game, he was going to deliver a big hit. It’s cool to see it tonight.”
Braun said he hoped this game could spark another late surge for the Brewers. The team is seeking its third straight playoff berth but is only 14-17 after Friday’s victory.
“We had a really good hitters’ meeting today,” Braun said. “We kind of viewed today as the start of our September. We’ve been very successful obviously (in September) the last few years. We’ve been really able to flip that switch and be at our best down the stretch. For us, I think we recognize that starts today.”
Holland (1-2) faced Milwaukee for the third time this season. In his first two starts against the Brewers, Holland allowed a total of three runs over 10 2/3 innings.
He wasn’t nearly as effective this time. Holland struck out eight, but gave up eight runs, six hits and four walks over five innings.
Gyorko gave the Brewers a rare early lead with a two-out drive just inside the left-field foul pole in the first. The Brewers had been outscored 17-3 in the first inning before Friday.
After Braun’s blast extended the lead to 4-0, Nottingham crushed a 0-2 pitch to left-center in the fourth for his second career homer. Nottingham had been called up earlier in the day to replace catcher Manny Piña, who went on the injured list with torn meniscus in his right knee.
Holland also gave up a two-run double to Mark Mathias with two outs in the fifth.
“We gave up eight (runs) with two outs, and seven with two outs and two strikes,” Pirates manager Derek Shelton said. “We didn’t finish at-bats. (Holland) did a good job getting to two strikes and then left balls in the middle of the plate, and they hit them hard and obviously hit some of them out of the ballpark.”
Riddle homered against David Phelps in the seventh, but Pittsburgh finished with just four hits.
MLB, players agree to expand playoffs to 16 teams
NEW YORK (AP) — Major League Baseball and the players’ union agreed Thursday to expand the playoffs from 10 teams to 16 for the pandemic-delayed season, a decision that makes it likely teams with losing records will reach the postseason.
The agreement was reached hours before the season opener between the New York Yankees and World Series champion Washington Nationals. The deal applied only for 2020.
Sixteen of the 30 teams will advance to a best-of-three first round: the first- and second-place teams in every division and the next two clubs by winning percentage in each league. Those winners move on to the best-of-five Division Series, where the usual format resumes. The final four teams are in best-of-seven League Championship Series, and the pennant winners meet in the best-of-seven World Series.
“It’s such a unique season, why not try a little something different and make it as exciting as possible,” said Colorado shortstop Trevor Story, whose team has never won a World Series title. “I know it’s going to be such a sprint with the 60-game season; adding more playoff teams will just add to the fire and the excitement and the fandom around the game. Anything can happen in a 60-game season. I’m all for it.”
In each league, the division winners will be seeded 1-3, the second-place teams 4-6 and the teams with the next two-best records 7-8, which means up to four teams in one division could be in the postseason. The first round pairings will be 1 vs. 8, 2-7, 3-6 and 4-5.
The higher seed in the first round will host all games.
“This season will be a sprint to a new format that will allow more fans to experience playoff baseball.,” baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred said in a statement.
Tiebreaker games, which have produced famous home runs by Bobby Thomson and Bucky Dent, are eliminated. Ties would be broken by head-to-head record, followed by better record within a team’s division and record in the last 20 games within the division. If still tied, the standard would be last 21 games within a division, then 22, etc.
As part of the deal, MLB agreed to guarantee a postseason pool that would be $50 million: $20 million in the first round is played and $10 million for each additional round. The postseason pool usually comprises ticket money from the postseason, but baseball anticipates playing the entire year in empty ballparks due to the coronavirus.
“The opportunity to add playoff games in this already-abbreviated season makes sense for fans, the league and players,” union head Tony Clark said in a statement. “We hope it will result in highly competitive pennant races as well as exciting additional playoff games to the benefit of the industry.”
ESPN was given rights to seven of eight first-round series and TBS the other for no additional money as a makeup for missed games. ESPN and TBS were to have split the two wild-card games in the original format.
The change means 53% of the 30 teams reach the playoffs. If eight teams qualified for the playoffs in each league from 1995 through 2019, 46 teams at or below .500 would have made it, according to the Elias Sports Bureau, an average of just under two per season. Those teams included 25 from the AL.
There would have been only three seasons in which all playoff teams would have had winning records, Elias said: 2000, 2003 and 2009.
“From a selfish, White Sox standpoint, I’m certainly in favor of it just for the mere fact that it enhances the possibilities that this group’s going to get exposed to October baseball,” Chicago White Sox general manager Rick Hahn said. “We’ve talked over the years of this rebuild and into this next stage that learning how to win is part of that. And certainly learning how to win in October is very much part of getting us to our ultimate goals.”
Two additional NFL teams reach the playoffs this season for a total of 14 of 32 NFL teams (44%) in the playoffs. Sixteen of 30 (53%) usually go to the playoffs in the NBA and 16 of 31 in the NHL (52%), which expands to 32 franchises next season.
MLB long restricted its postseason to just the pennant winners facing each other in the World Series. Postseason teams doubled to four with the split of each league into two divisions in 1969, then to eight with the realignment to three divisions and the addition of a wild card in 1995, a year later than planned due to a players’ strike. The postseason reached 10 with the addition of a second wild card and a wild-card round in 2012.
The 2006 St. Louis Cardinals hold the mark for the lowest winning percentage of a World Series champion, according to Elias, after going 83-78 for a .516 clip. The lowest percentage for a pennant winner was .509 for the 1973 New York Mets, who went 82-79 in a strike-shortened season.
“There’s no question that by definition, it gives you more of a safety net,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said. “I hope they they continue to put a premium on winning divisions.”
The new format created a minimum 14 additional postseason games and as many as 22 if each first-round series goes the distance. The plan was part of MLB’s proposal last month to restart the season, but the union ended those talks and told MLB to unilaterally announce a schedule. That move preserved the union’s right to file a grievance claiming MLB did not negotiate in good faith to play as long a regular season as economically feasible, subject to conditions set in a March 26 agreement between the feuding sides.
“It would be a great way to keep fan bases engaged throughout the entire season,” Milwaukee Brewers star Christian Yelich said. “You’d have a really tight race all the way down to the last day of the season. I think there’d be a lot of teams in it within a game or two of each other going into that final day.”
AP Sports Writers Pat Graham, Steve Megargee and Andrew Seligman contributed to this report.
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Pandemic can’t stop Uecker from 50th year in Brewers’ booth
MILWAUKEE (AP) — Bob Uecker describes the most unique season of his half century as a Milwaukee Brewers’ broadcaster with the wit that has helped make him one of the game’s most recognizable voices.
“All of this stuff for me is totally new,” Uecker said Wednesday during a Zoom session with reporters. “What we’re doing here tonight, Zoom, I didn’t know what that was. That was some guy when I played who ran fast. I didn’t know anything about Zooming.”
The 86-year-old announcer will be back on the airwaves for a 50th season of broadcasting Brewers baseball. This marks his 65th season in baseball overall, including a six-year playing career with the Milwaukee/Atlanta Braves, St. Louis Cardinals, Philadelphia Phillies from 1962-67.
As long as he was healthy, Uecker wasn’t going to let even a pandemic keep him from the job he loves.
“I couldn’t wait to get back to work,” Uecker said. “If I didn’t feel good — if I felt bad — I would not come back here and work. I’m not going to embarrass myself. I’m not going to embarrass the team by any means. I would never do that. I know when it’s time. And as long as I feel good and I’m capable of doing the broadcast, I’m going to try to work.”
Uecker expects to be on the radio broadcast team for all home games and maybe a few road games here and there, including Friday’s season opener with the Chicago Cubs at Wrigley Field.
But he’s coming back to a job that’s not quite the same.
As part of the protocols in place due to the coronavirus pandemic, the Brewers and other Major League Baseball teams will conduct both their home and road broadcasts from their home ballparks. That means Uecker will be working Friday’s road game with the Cubs while staring at monitors from his booth at Miller Park.
Safety precautions also will prevent Uecker and other broadcasters from chatting with players and coaches around the batting cage or in the locker room.
“I can’t go in the clubhouse. It brings back such great memories of teams I was playing on telling me the same thing, but somehow I worked my way around it,” Uecker quipped.
That sense of humor has helped make Uecker one of the most beloved figures in Wisconsin.
Ever since April 2014, Miller Park has included a statue of Uecker in the back seats of the uppermost level behind home plate, an homage to the commercial from the 1980s in which he says, “I must be in the front row” as he gets ushered out of his seat.
With no fans permitted in stadiums due to the coronavirus, the Brewers are selling fans cardboard cutouts of their likenesses that will be scattered next to the Uecker statue this season.
“There’s no single person in this franchise’s history who has been as iconic and as important as Bob Uecker,” said Jeff Levering, a member of the Brewers’ radio broadcast team since 2015. “To feel what a season would have been like without him is really difficult to fathom.”
The only people to have longer tenures calling games for one team are Los Angeles Dodgers broadcasters Vin Scully (1950-2016) and Jaime Jarrin (1959-present) and Kansas City Royals broadcaster Denny Matthews (1969-present).
Brewers manager Craig Counsell grew up in the Milwaukee area and remembers spending summer days throwing a baseball against the roof and catching it while listening to Uecker’s broadcasts.
“He’s meant so much to the Brewers,” Counsell said. “There’s a great new picture in the clubhouse of a celebration last year in Cincinnati, and he’s right in the middle of it. That, for me, is the best way to honor him. He’s right in the middle of everything we do. That’s what you’ve earned for 50 years of being a great Brewer.”
Uecker also has worked as a national color commentator for ABC and NBC baseball telecasts and earned fame beyond that of the usual broadcaster following his appearances in late-night talk shows, beer commercials and the movie “Major League.” He starred in “Mr. Belvedere,” an ABC sitcom that aired over 100 episodes from 1985-90.
But he’s most revered in Wisconsin for the thousands upon thousands of Brewers games he’s brought to people’s homes. Those fans are savoring the opportunity to finally hear Uecker again, even if it’s 3½ months later than expected.
“Anytime people get to listen to him,” Brewers outfielder/first baseman Ryan Braun said, “he will bring a sense of normalcy back to what otherwise will be a completely abnormal season in every imaginable way.”
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Pac-12 follows Big Ten's lead, will only play conference games this fall
(AP) The Pac-12 has become the second major conference to shift to a conference-only fall schedule amid growing concerns over the coronavirus pandemic.
The announcement came after a meeting of the Pac-12 CEO Group on Friday and a day after the Big Ten opted to eliminate nonconference games for all fall sports.
“The health and safety of our student-athletes and all those connected to Pac-12 sports continues to be our No. 1 priority,” Pac-12 Commissioner Larry Scott said in a statement. “Our decisions have and will be guided by science and data, and based upon the trends and indicators over the past days, it has become clear that we need to provide ourselves with maximum flexibility to schedule, and to delay any movement to the next phase of return-to-play activities.”
Two hours later, the Pac-12 announced that Scott had tested positive for COVID-19 and was under self-quarantine.
The Atlantic Coast, Big 12 and Southeastern conferences are still weighing options for fall sports. On Wednesday, the Ivy League became the first Division I conference to suspend all fall sports until at least January, leaving open the possibility of moving some sports to the spring if the pandemic is under better control.
The Pac-12′s decision covers football, men’s and women’s soccer and women’s volleyball. Conference-only schedules will be announced no later than July 31.
The conference is also delaying the start of mandatory athletic activities until a series of health and safety indicators become more positive. Athletes who choose not to participate in the next academic year due to COVID-19 concerns will continue to have their scholarships honored and will remain in good standing with their teams.
The college sports world has been put on hold since the coronavirus pandemic wiped out the lucrative NCAA basketball tournaments and all spring sports. Athletes recently began returning to campuses for voluntary workouts, but many schools have scaled back as more than a dozen schools have reported positive COVID-19 tests among athletes in the past month.
Schools also have faced massive budget shortfalls in the wake of the pandemic.
The NCAA shorted its member schools $375 million in scheduled payouts due to the cancellation of the NCAA Tournament and schools across the country have been hit with massive budget shortfalls as college sports remain on hold.
Stanford eliminated 11 of its 36 varsity sports this week and at least 171 four-year schools have eliminated sports during the pandemic.
“Arizona State University and Sun Devil athletics support the Pac-12’s announcement of a strictly conference schedule for the 2020 football and fall sports seasons,” Arizona State athletic director Ray Anderson said in a statement. “We will continue to seek the guidance and input from medical and infectious disease experts, as well as our local and campus health officials and doctors as we evaluate this ever-changing landscape.”
A shift to conference-only schedules will likely have a ripple across the college sports landscape.
Smaller schools that rely on revenue from guarantee football games against Power Five schools could be shorted millions of dollars.
Non-Power Five schools receive hundreds of thousands of dollars to more than $1 million from guarantee games to fund their athletic departments. Guarantee-game revenue can account for more than 5% of a school’s overall athletic budget.
