Who Loves a Parade? Thieves in an Atlanta Mall, Apparently

While Atlantans cheered the World Series champion Braves in a parade, as many as 200 teen-agers stormed Underground Atlanta for orchestrated shoplifting.

Merchants at the downtown shopping and entertainment complex, still smarting the day after the stampede, said Tuesday they’re fed up with being a magnet for unruly crowds during celebrations. They wonder how authorities will handle the crush of Olympic visitors next summer.

Merchants described whooping mobs that shouted out the names of stores, followed by a charge to the targeted shop.

“They got some chant going, like ‘Hee Yie, Hee Yie!’ Then one of them would holler out ‘Foot Locker,’ and they’d all run in there knocking everybody down,” said Al Warren, who sells sports memorabilia from a push cart.

Although some vendors said the crowd wasn’t as unruly as some in past disturbances, they questioned whether Underground can contain the masses next summer.

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“I was a baseball player. I’m still a baseball player. And I’ll always be that,” Ryne Sandberg, 36, said after ending his 16 1/2-month retirement by signing a one-year contract worth a reported $2 million with the Chicago Cubs.

“I did the retirement thing. I did the summer activities and all that. It just got to the point where now it was time to go back and play baseball.”

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Left-handed pitcher Jim Abbott, third baseman Tony Phillips, infielder Rene Gonzales and reliever John Habyan were the first of 13 eligible Angels to file for free agency.

Nine others, among them left-hander Chuck Finley and catcher Greg Myers, are also eligible to file by the Nov. 12 deadline.

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Star pitchers Jack McDowell, Andy Benes, Tim Belcher and Kenny Rogers were among 19 players who filed for free agency, raising the total to 30.

Meanwhile, the Boston Red Sox declined to exercise a $4-million option for 1996 on reliever Rick Aguilera and decided instead to pay a $300,000 buyout. Aguilera then filed for free agency.

The Seattle Mariners exercised their $3.5-million option on AL batting champion Edgar Martinez rather than pay a $200,000 buyout.

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Jim Campbell, the former Detroit Tiger general manager who orchestrated the club’s world champion seasons of 1968 and 1984, died Tuesday night in a Florida hospital. Campbell, 71, had been with the Tigers for 43 years when he was fired in 1992.

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World Series ratings increased 13% this year over 1993, the first time they’ve gone up in four years.

Atlanta’s six-game victory over Cleveland averaged a 19.5 rating and 33 share, Nielsen Media Research said. The rating was well above the 17.3 rating and 30 share for Toronto’s six-game victory over Philadelphia two years ago but 3% below the 20.2 for the Blue Jays’ six-game victory over the Braves in 1991.

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A bronze bust commemorating Mickey Mantle’s 500th home run was recovered after a former New York Yankee security guard tried to sell it on the Internet after the slugger died. The bust had been missing for nearly 20 years.

Mantle died Aug. 13 of cancer.

Robert Pagani, 43, of Greenbelt, Md., tried to sell the bust for $25,000, according to a statement by FBI Agent Jack Campanella.

Basketball

The NCAA Committee on Infractions will announce today whether California will be penalized for its recruiting of basketball star Shareef Abdur-Rahim.

The NCAA alleged that the school lacked institutional control because it did not stop Hashim Ali Alauddeen, a Cal alumnus and a graduate student, from helping Abdur-Rahim during the recruiting process.

The school says Alauddeen acted on his own in helping Abdur-Rahim, a fellow Muslim, and not as a representative of the school. Cal defended its position Sept. 29 in a hearing before the committee.

American University junior center Chris Ganz will undergo surgery next month for a torn knee ligament sustained while showing off his dunking ability at a Midnight Madness practice Oct. 15. He will sit out the season.

Jurisprudence

A handwriting expert testified that a boxer’s signature on two copies of a contract with promoter Don King were identical, supporting a government theory that King faked a contract to collect insurance.

The testimony came as prosecutors in federal court in Manhattan considered whether to rest after a month of testimony meant to prove King collected $350,000 illegally from Lloyd’s of London. The trial will resume Thursday.

King is charged with nine counts of mail fraud in an indictment that alleged he faked a contract with Julio Cesar Chavez in 1991 so he could collect training fees that he had never paid to the boxer. If convicted, King could face up to five years in prison on each count.

Miscellany

Third-seeded Boris Becker and No. 4 Michael Chang survived first-set lapses at the Paris Open. Becker defeated Alexander Volkov of Russia, 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, and Chang rallied to defeat Byron Black of Zimbabwe, 4-6, 6-3, 6-3. . . . Zina Garrison Jackson struggled to victory over 21-year-old Venezuelan Maria Vento, 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, in the first round of the Bank of the West Classic in Oakland.

Grand Prix discus champion Dmitry Shevchenko of Russia has been banned for four years after testing positive for a steroid.