Cowboy Insider Campo Becomes Fifth Coach

Dave Campo was hired Wednesday as coach of the Dallas Cowboys, putting a low-profile guy into one of the highest-profile jobs in pro sports.

Campo, defensive coordinator since 1995, has been with the Cowboys since Jerry Jones bought the team in 1989. Campo is among the group of assistant coaches Jimmy Johnson brought with him from the University of Miami.

“I feel like I’m family in this organization,” Campo said in Irving, Texas.

He is only the fifth coach in Cowboy history and, like the other four, he is a first-time NFL head coach. His predecessor, Chan Gailey, is the only one who didn’t win a Super Bowl and was 8-8 before his firing earlier this month.

“I could quote a lot of statistics here, but let me give you just one: The Tennessee Titans were 8-8 last year and they’re playing in the Super Bowl,” Campo said.

Campo, 52, received a five-year contract worth $800,000 to $1 million a season.

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Bill Belichick dropped his antitrust lawsuit against the NFL, a day after a judge refused to free him from the New York Jets to negotiate to coach other teams. . . . Kansas City Chief linebacker Derrick Thomas, paralyzed from the chest down after a car crash Sunday in Liberty, Mo., might be moved out of intensive care today at Miami’s Jackson Memorial Hospital. He remained in serious but stable condition. . . . The New England Patriots interviewed Jacksonville defensive coordinator Dom Capers for their vacant coaching position.

Baseball

St. Thomas of St. Paul, Minn., beat the University of Havana, 7-0, in a game at Cuba’s Latinoamericano Stadium that was as much about breaking political barriers as it was about sport.

It was the first time a U.S. college baseball team played in Cuba since a 1986 visit by Johns Hopkins.

The teams will play again Friday.

While hunting in Mexico last weekend, former teammate Ryan Klesko tried to impress on Atlanta Brave reliever John Rocker that he’s going to be standing in the line of fire this season.

“He’s got a tough year ahead of him,” Klesko said of his friend, condemned by many for his disparaging remarks about immigrants, minorities and gays in Sports Illustrated last month. “He’s going to have to pay for it for a while.”

Klesko met with the San Diego media for the first time since he and Bret Boone were traded from the Braves to the Padres on Dec. 22.

“I don’t agree with what he said at all,” said Klesko, who added that Rocker “has too much redneck in him, I guess.”

Meanwhile, New York Yankee shortstop Derek Jeter weighed in on Rocker, saying, “I wouldn’t sit in the same room with him.”

Pitcher Steve Avery, coming off August shoulder surgery, worked out for the Detroit Tigers. Avery went 6-7 with a 5.16 earned-run average last year with the Cincinnati Reds, walking 78 in 96 innings. . . . Tommy Harper, 59, the former Boston player and coach who filed a wrongful termination suit that was settled after his firing months after he complained about a whites-only outing in 1985, was hired for a second stint on the Red Sox coaching staff. . . . The Kansas City Royals signed free-agent first baseman Paul Sorrento, 34, to a minor league contract. . . . The New York Mets invited infielder Kurt Abbott to spring training as a non-roster player. . . . St. Louis Cardinal right-hander Matt Morris, who missed last season because of an elbow ligament injury, avoided salary arbitration when he agreed to a one-year, $550,000 contract. . . . Pitcher Jason Grimsley avoided salary arbitration with the Yankees, agreeing to a $750,000, one-year contract. He earned $350,000 last season.

College Football

The Louisiana Superdome, already home to the Sugar Bowl, would host the New Orleans Bowl during the third week in December matching the Sun Belt Conference champion against an at-large team in 2001 under a plan unveiled by the Greater New Orleans Sports Foundation. . . . The Mountain West Conference is considering pursuing a third bowl commitment in 2000. The conference has guaranteed contracts with the Liberty and Las Vegas bowls.

Olympics

When Frank Joklik was chairman of the Salt Lake City Olympic bid committee, he apparently wrote Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch about obtaining financial aid for the son of expelled IOC member Lamine Keita of Mali, the Salt Lake Tribune reported.

Salt Lake Olympics boosters paid more than $97,000 for Moriba Keita to get his bachelor’s degree in finance from Howard University in Washington.

Hatch did not recall receiving a letter from Joklik, but said he would have offered assistance as long as it was legal and proper.

Miscellany

Lake Merced in Daly City, Calif., was selected as the site of the 2003 U.S. Women’s Open and Pumpkin Ridge in North Plains, Ore., got the 2004 tournament, the U.S. Golf Assn. said. . . . Next month’s women’s World Cup speed ski races on the mountain in Salt Lake City where the Winter Olympics are to be held in two years were canceled for lack of snow. . . . Ireland approved plans to build an 80,000-seat national stadium in suburban west Dublin that could form the hub for a future Olympic bid. . . . The Russian wrestling team will face a U.S. team of Olympic hopefuls Feb. 8 at Edinboro University in Pennsylvania.

Names in the News

An arrest warrant was issued for former major league outfielder Kal Daniels, indicted in Cincinnati on a charge of failing to pay $54,800 in child support for his 8-year-old son by a former girlfriend. Daniels, 36, could be sentenced to up to one year in jail if convicted of the felony charge. . . . Andrea Lashawn Anderson, a former member of the UCLA track team, pleaded no contest to giving a false statement to get a handicapped parking placard. She was sentenced to a year’s probation and ordered her to pay about $500 in fines. . . . World Boxing Council super-featherweight champion Floyd Mayweather Jr., inactive since September, reportedly is ready to sign a six-fight contract extension with HBO similar to the $12.5-million deal he rejected last fall and called a “slave contract.” . . . John S. Stonebraker, who played on the USC football team from 1936-40, died Tuesday at Pomona Valley Hospital Medical Center. He was 81. Services will be held at 2 p.m. today at the La Verne Heights Presbyterian Church.