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Published: August 26, 2008
9-year-old pitcher too good for league
Nine-year-old Jericho Scott is a good baseball player -- too good, it turns out.
Scott has a fastball that tops out at about 40 mph. He throws so hard that the Youth Baseball League of New Haven, Conn., told his coach that the boy could not pitch any more. When Jericho took the mound anyway last week, the opposing team forfeited the game, packed its gear and left, his coach said.
Officials for the three-year-old league, which has eight teams and about 100 players, said they will disband Jericho's team, redistributing its players among other squads, and offered to refund $50 sign-up fees to anyone who asks for it. They say Jericho's coach, Wilfred Vidro, has resigned.
But Vidro says he didn't quit and the team refuses to disband. Players and parents held a protest at the league's field on Saturday urging the league to let Jericho pitch.
"He's never hurt any one," Vidro said. "He's on target all the time. How can you punish a kid for being too good?"
The controversy bothers Jericho, who says he misses pitching.
"I feel sad," he said. "I feel like it's all my fault nobody could play."
Jericho's coach and parents say the boy is being unfairly targeted because he turned down an invitation to join the defending league champion, which is sponsored by an employer of one of the league's administrators.
Jericho instead joined a team sponsored by Will Power Fitness. The team was 8-0 and on its way to the playoffs when Jericho was banned from pitching.
"I think it's discouraging when you're telling a 9-year-old you're too good at something," said his mother, Nicole Scott. "The whole objective in life is to find something you're good at and stick with it. I'd rather he spend all his time on the baseball field than idolizing someone standing on the street corner."
Basketball
■ Robert Brickey has joined the women's basketball staff at Duke as the assistant director of basketball operations, Coach Joanne McCallie announced yesterday.
Brickey, a former Duke player, spent the last three seasons as the men's coach at Shaw and also has been an assistant at James Madison (2004-05), Southern Methodist (2002-04) and Army (2000-02). As a player, Brickey was part of three Final Four teams and started in the national championship game in 1990.
■ Brandon Evans has transferred from East Carolina to UNC Greensboro, Coach Mike Dement of UNCG announced yesterday. A 6-2 guard, Evans played in 50 games in two seasons at ECU, averaging 3.2 points. He will be eligible to practice at UNCG this coming season and will be eligible to play started with the 2009-10 season.
■ The Dallas Mavericks re-signed forward Devean George yesterday, nearly six months after he blocked a trade to the New Jersey Nets. George played his first seven seasons for the Los Angeles Lakers before signing with the Mavericks in 2006. Terms of the deal were not immediately available.
George averaged 3.7 points and 2.6 rebounds last season and has career averages of 5.8 points and 3.3 rebounds.
■ Elena Delle Donne has enrolled at Delaware and has joined its volleyball team as a non-scholarship player. She was released from her basketball scholarship at Connecticut less than a week ago, and she said at a news conference yesterday that she has no intention of playing basketball at Delaware anytime soon.
The 6-5 Delle Donne was chosen as the nation's top girls basketball player this spring, winning the Naismith National High School Player of the Year award based on her career at Ursuline (Del.) Academy. She scored 2,818 career points and played on four state-championship teams in five years.
Delle Donne attended summer school at Connecticut for several days in June before deciding to return home.
■ A northwestern Pennsylvania woman who claims Michael Jordan fathered her son is out of jail after agreeing not to bother Jordan.
A Crawford County judge released 35-year-old Lisa Miceli, of Meadville, Pa., on Friday. She was jailed Aug. 13 for violating an order in a civil suit Jordan filed against her in January.
The order enforces a 2005 agreement stopping her from contacting him or those close to him after two DNA tests showed he wasn't the boy's father.
A judge found Miceli sent messages to Jordan's lawyer after the order was issued.
■ Sun Yue, a second-round pick in the 2007 NBA draft, signed a multiyear contract with the Western Conference champion Los Angeles Lakers.
Terms of the deal were not announced.
The 23-year-old Sun, a 6-9 guard taken with the 40th overall selection by the Lakers in last year's draft, averaged 6.8 points, 1.7 rebounds, 2.5 assists and 1.33 steals in six games for China in the Olympic Games in Beijing.
Sun played for the Beijing Aoshen Olympians of the American Basketball Association for the past three seasons, and was a first-team All-ABA selection each of the last two years.
Miscellaneous
■ Mariana Hollman, the tennis coach at Salem College, has been selected by the U.S. Tennis Association to compete in the Margaret Court Cup competition. The competition, for women 45 and older, will be Oct. 12-18 in Antalya, Turkey, and will feature 374 teams.
Hollman, selected to the Margaret Court Cup team for the first time, played on gold-medal winning Young Cup teams (40-over) for the U.S. in 2003, 2005 and 2006. She also finished 2007 as the top player in the nation in 45-over singles.
■ Tom Kite, the winner of last weekend's Boeing Classic in Snoqualmie, Wash., has committed to compete in this year's Greater Hickory Classic at Rock Barn Sept. 8-14 in Conover.
■ The Southeastern Conference has signed a 15-year deal with ESPN reported to be worth more than $2 billion to televise its sporting events. The agreement, announced yesterday, is the longest ESPN has ever signed and matches the length of the SEC's deal with CBS earlier in August. The deal will start with the 2009-10 school year and will end the SEC's look into starting its own network.
ESPN will have rights to every SEC home football game not on the network package, and all league games will be shown on some outlet, including at least 20 a year on ESPN or ESPN2. The new deal also will add a second and third night of SEC basketball coverage on ESPN and ESPN2 each week.
■ Bryan Berard, a veteran NHL defenseman, will attempt to make an NHL club on a tryout contract, after being invited to training camp with the Philadelphia Flyers.
The 31-year-old Berard was the No. 1 overall draft pick of the Ottawa Senators in 1995, but refused to sign and was traded to the New York Islanders.
In 619 career games covering 12 years with the Islanders, Toronto, New York Rangers, Boston, Chicago and Columbus, Berard has 76 goals and 247 assists. Last season with the Islanders, he had five goals and 17 assists in 54 games.
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