Union Looms as Designated DH Protector

Who’s running major league baseball, anyhow?

Tom Schieffer, president of the Texas Rangers, told the Houston Chronicle that 21 of 28 clubs oppose the designated-hitter rule, but it remains the main hitch to major league baseball’s realignment. Why? Because the players’ union, which can block realignment, wants to keep it, protecting jobs.

John Moores, San Diego Padre president, says, “The DH ought to be done away with. It strikes me as nothing more than a mechanism to keep guys around who can’t cut it anymore.”

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Trivia time: Who caught no-hitters by Sandy Koufax with the Dodgers and Nolan Ryan with the Angels?

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Lakers, take note: North Korea’s supreme leader, Kim Jong Il, has mapped out a strategy to bring his nation world supremacy in basketball.

The key is making shots from a longer distance, Kim has instructed. The state-run newspaper, Democratic Korea, which published Kim’s “precious instructions,” added that young people throughout the country should heed Kim’s call and “steel themselves” to help raise the level of basketball in a short time.

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Soft society: Ray Meyer, former DePaul basketball coach, blames society for complaining athletes.

“There is a difference in our society,” Meyer, 83, said. “We are softer. Athletes don’t play hurt. Instead, they say, ‘I got a headache. I stubbed my toe.’

“The big money makes them lose their incentive. How are you going to motivate an athlete making $5 million when you’re not even making half of that as a coach?”

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Getting an education: Young Winston Cup driver Jeremy Mayfield, on what it means to race against NASCAR old-timers such as Bill Elliott, Dale Earnhardt and Mark Martin:

“While I’m racing them, I want to take advantage of the free education they are offering me. It’s as good as a basketball player getting a University of Kentucky scholarship, and I’m sure not going to turn this ‘grant-in-aid’ down.”

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Get the hint? How bad does Rhode Island want the New England Patriots?

At a recent gathering of Rhode Island politicians, State Senator John Celona gave Patriot vice president Jonathan Kraft a blue satin jacket with these words on the back: “Rhode Island: Future Home of the New England Patriots.”

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Trivia answer: Jeff Torborg.

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And finally: Sportservice Corp., the official food provider for tennis’ U.S. Open, has ordered nearly 190,000 bottles of water, 200,000 beers and upward of 400,000 sodas for the two-week tournament.

That’s to wash down 150,000 hot dogs, 90,000 orders of fries, 120,000 pretzels and more than 100,000 hamburgers and Tuscany sandwiches.

The food was more exotic for the Australian Open, where fans consumed more than 10,000 oysters, 1,300 pounds of smoked salmon and an undisclosed number of kangaroo burgers and grilled emu sandwiches. Emu? It’s an ostrich-like bird.