SPORTS UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Thursday, April 28, 1994
11
Baseball still has a special place in Budig's heart
Playing softball is a family matter
After serving for nearly 14 years as chancellor of the University, Gene Budig could be facing an interesting dilemma.
The New York Times reported Tuesday that a search committee had reelected
ident of the American League in Major League Baseball. Budig, who spent most of yesterday at the KU Medical Center, released a statement but was unavailable for comment.
"My love for baseball is well known, and to be considered for this position is a high honor," Budig's statement read.
The 55-year-old Budig, who grew up in McCook, Neb., always has been an avid baseball fan. As a member of the Kansas City Royals board of directors, Budig has heavily involved himself with one of his favorite teams. His tenure and dedication to the University might further affect his decision on what or how to accept the job offer
Woody Howe, a friend of Budig's since the 1960s and current editor-in-chief of the Omaha World-Herald, said that Budig's love for the game
that Budig's passion for baseball wouldn't necessarily mean that he would resign from being chancellor at U.
I think that he would find a job in baseball very exciting, but I also think he's very satisfied serving as chancellor of a fine institution such as Kansas, "Howe said yesterday in a telephone interview. "I wouldn't know how he's going to choose, but either way it would be a major dilemma."
Howe met Budig when they worked for the Lincoln Star as reporters in the early 1960s.
William Alix / KANSAN
Howe said that he remembered going to a baseball game with Budig during the mid-1970s. At the time, Budig was the president of Illinois State University. From Howe's account, Budig already had made some contacts in baseball.
"He took me to a Chicago White Sox game," Howe said. "He introduced me to the general manager of White Sox. He knew a lot of the people, and I assumed he did that with other teams. Certainly when he got to Kansas City, he got very interested in the Royals." Budig played baseball in high school and sometimes talked about the game with Howe.
After breaking her left thumb during the first week of spring practice, sophomore shortstop Katie Morgan is on back in the field for the Kansas softball team.
"He was kind of a would-be player in high school," Howe said. His interest goes way back to his childhood. He has followed baseball for a long time.
An article in the Oct. 30, 1991, issue The University Daily Kansan aronicked Budig's love for the game and listed the chancellor's picks for all-time all-star team.
director of info research and that Bodig was a lifelong student in the game.
But it was Morgan's mom, Lynne, who helped Katie attract the college scouts. Morgan was not a well-known player because she didn't play summer ball. She chose to work instead. Summer ball is a prime opportunity for a player to make a name for themselves and attract offers. Lynne knew that Morgan had the talent to play Division I softball and decided to take matters into her own hands.
I've sat with him at a number ofansas baseball games," Frederickid. "At home, he has a tremendousstorgh collection."
"I own a professional video store," Lynne said. "I made tapes of Katie playing and sent them out to some Division I schools. I took pictures of the team anyway. I'm just thrilled that Katie is playing for a school like Kansas."
I had dreams of being a profession- baseball player," Budig said in the article. "That was not to be, but that doesn't diminish the attractiveness of me game to me."
For his American League team, undig picked Mickey Mantle, Joe Maggio and Ted Williams as his outliders. He had George Brett at first, and Carew at second, Lou Boudreau shortstop, George Kell at third and
Perry, Nolan Ryan, Rolle Fingers,
Bob Feller rounded out the list.
His National League team included Frank Robinson, Willie Mays, Hankaron and Sandy Koufax.
the "tremendous autograph collection" that Frederick mentioned includes Budig's all-time players. Budig once said that the one signed DiMaggio meant the most.
"I don't have one of the strongest arms," Morgan said. "Because I don't have a strong arm I think about accuracy. I have a first basemen who complements me, and I complement her. When I throw it down in the dirt she always scoops it up. We're not like the best All-American defensive players, but we complement each other."
To help her overcome the injury her dad bought her an exercise machine to strengthen her arm, and Haack has helped her throw with more leg strength. The two people most directly responsible for her playing are sometimes the subject of a comical debate.
Probably because I knew him very ally, Badig said. "We would play golf gather or five or five times a year, and we would talk about baseball."
When Budig was president of West
Virginia University in the late 1970s,
Maggio donated $100,000 to the
diversity for medical research.
"Last year it was like 'please God don't hit the ball to me.'"
"Haack is always asking her who is the better coach, me or your dad," Lynne said. "She always has to say you."
The improvement she makes will have to come with a right shoulder impingement, which Morgan said she had been playing with for the past year. A shortstop often has to make the longest throws of any infielder and the impingement has hurt Morgan in that respect.
Haack saw a tape that Morgan's mom had sent and liked what he saw. Although Morgan was elated about playing for a Division I school, she was nervous about starting at shortstop.
"Freshmen year I was scared," Morgan said. "I had so much control over the infield. All the plays somehow revolved around me. I thought everybody looked at me when I made a mistake. Last year it was like 'Please God, don't hit the ball to me.'"
"He is so knowledgeable about the game," Morgan said. "About mechanics he knows everything. He comes to every one of my games and always wants me to succeed."
"I think I'm just an athlete," she said. "I don't look at myself and say, 'Oh, I'm a great player.' There is a lot of learning for me to do. There are still a lot of things I need to work on. But I think I improve everyday."
But Morgan worked at her game and gradually gained confidence. This season she wants to make the big play. But because of the injury it has been another struggle for her. She said she expected to excel when she came back. Morgan said that when she was rusty and wasn't doing as well as she wanted she would get upset. It took time, but Morgan has found herself again.
Morgan has had her share of support during her softball career. Her dad, Gordon, who was a former professional baseball player for the St. Louis Cardinals and Chicago White Sox, coached Morgan for two years at Bishop Kelley High School in Tulsa, Okla. She said he was the person who helped her develop the skills necessary to play at the collegiate level.
Katie Morgan
sophomore shortstop
Budig's potential appointment don't happen until the owners meet June 8.
KU baseball coach Dave Bingham did that he did not know Budig well enough to speculate on whether or not Budig would accept the possible offer, but he said that Budig had been supportive of Kansas baseball.
arrive of us when times have been tough. He always encourages us."
Shortstop's first coach an old pro
The last play during the first week of spring softball practice would define sophomore shortstop Katie Morgan's season.
By Matt Siegel
Kansan sportswriter
Kansas coach Kalum Haack hit what appeared to be a routine line drive to the right of Morgan. As she dove for the ball, Morgan landed on her glove hand.
"It felt like I broke my left thumb," she said. "It felt like someone took a knife and cut my thumb off, and that is all I remember."
"Coach talked to me about supporting the players, because when Ihealed I was going to go in," Morgan said. "I never knew this until I was injured, but it's really a tough situation. It really hurt me a lot. I wanted to do something for the team. It's a terrible feeling. Haack just told me to support my team members."
Morgan did not break her thumb, but she needed to have a tendon reattached. The surgery forced her to miss three months of playing ball. As is the case with many athletes, the waiting was understandably the hardest part. It got to be so bad that Morgan said she had to have a talk with Haack.
"We started warming him up the last time, and then he couldn't go back out. After about 40 minutes, he was shot. We were in a world of trouble (last night) if he would have had to go back out and couldn't."
Appier wants rain, losing to disappear
The Associated Press
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Kansas City starter Kevin Applier spent a rainy afternoon playing meteorologist.
"We couldn't warm our guy up," McKaa said. "Losing either starter and losing them early would have hurt. We went to our pen early last night.
"I did a little of everything." Appier said last night after the Detroit-Kansas City game was postponed following a 42-minute rain delay at the start. "I went out and checked the tarp. I was checking the weather reports all the time. I knew everything that was going on. I knew we weren't going to play."
Appier had reason for concern. Before his April 9 start against Cleveland, Appier warmed up in the rain and went out and made 15 pitches — all for nothing. The game was delayed and he was unable to go into the game when play resumed.
In this next start, Appier lasted just three innings, giving up three homers and a career-high nine runs in a 22-11 loss to Boston.
In his last start, Appier, who has had trouble controlling his slider and curve, gave up five hits and seven runs in five innings at Milwaukee.
"It's better this time," Appier said. "The last time we were in a delay, I had to do what they told me to do."
Appier (1-2) would have taken a 9.00 ERA into the Detroit game after leading the American League last year with a 2.56 ERA.
Royals manager Hal Mcare has a worn-out bullpen and was not going to make the same mistake this time with Appier.
"I've had a lot of success (in games) after getting blown out." he said.
NBA approves Vancouver team
The Associated Press
NEW YORK — The NBA has opened a western front in its Canadian campaign.
The league's owners unanimously approved a Vancouver franchise yesterday, six months after admitting Toronto. Both teams will begin playing in the 1995-96 season.
"Vancouver is a beautiful, fast-growing city," NBA commissioner David Stern said. "It's got a great seaport, great restaurants and great fans."
The addition of Toronto and Vancouver will give the NBA 29 teams. The franchises must pay an entry fee of $125 million, nearly four times the $32.5 million paid by the four expansion teams in the late 1980s.
But Vancouver owner Arthur Griffith thinks it's a good investment. He said 7,000 people already have agreed to buy season tickets to watch the team play in a 20,000-seat arena that is now under construction.
"We've been overwhelmed by the response," said Griffiths, who owns the new arena and also the NHL Vancouver Canucks. "We are confident the NBA will be a big success here."
While hockey remains the top sport in Canada, Griffiths said basketball was growing in popularity, especially in Vancouver.
"We have more high school and college teams than anyplace else in Canada," he said. "When I drive around my neighborhood, I see kids playing basketball all the time. I see them wearing Chicago Bulls' jerseys and Phoenix Suns' shirts. Now they'll be wearing Vancouver paraphernalia."
The team was going to be called the Mounties, but that name has been scrapped because of licensing problems with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
"We're going to do some test marketing and come up with another name." Griffiths said.
Griffiths said he planned to hire a general manager by the end of the summer.
Expansion teams usually struggle in their first few years, but Griffiths promised his team will play an exciting brand of basketball.
"We want someone with credibility, respect and a strong track record," he said. "We want somebody who knows how to build a franchise from the bottom up."
An expansion draft will be held in the summer of 1995 to stock the two Canadian teams, which will take unprotected players from existing clubs. Each expansion team also will get a pick in the first round of the 1995 college draft. One team will pick sixth and the other seventh.
"The NBA is in the entertainment business, and we plan to give our fans their money's worth," he said.
Stern, who has marketed the NBA on a global basis, said he doesn't anticipate any more expansion before the end of the century. However, he did mention Mexico City as a future frontier.
"We see ourselves as a North American league," Stern said. "But through television, exhibitions and club tournaments we can maintain a presence all over the world."
Vancouver and Toronto will be the first Canadian teams in the NBA since the Toronto Huskies in 1946-47, the league's inaugural season.
Vancouver will play in the Midwest Division of the Western Conference. Toronto will be in the Eastern Conference, but the division has yet to be determined.
The Associated Press
To gain admission to the league, the Canadian clubs had to get NBA betting removed from their provincial lotteries. The NBA said it wouldn't award franchises to those cities unless the betting was banned.
Raiders may move to Orlando by fall
LOS ANGELES — The Los Angeles Raiders are engaged in serious talks with Orlando, Fla., officials about the prospect of moving there as early as this fall, the Daily News of Los Angeles reported yesterday.
Raiders owner Al Davis raised that prospect while in Orlando for NFL owners' meetings late last month. At the time, he talked of a "dark cloud" over Los Angeles as a result of damage done to the 71-year-old Los Angeles Coliseum by the Jan. 17 earthquake.
"There have been a lot of telephone negotiations, for several days — this week, even," said Wayne Weinberg, special assistant to Orlando Mayor Glenda E. Hood. "My understanding is that the Raiders would like to move to play in the fall somewhere else."
Davis said then that his primary alternatives, if $3.47 million in repairs were not completed in time, were temporary occupancy of Dodger Stadium or the Oakland Coliseum.
But Davis also toured the 72,000-seat Citrus Bowl with Orlando officials during his stay, and Weinberg told the newspaper that telephone discussions have since been conducted on the prospects of the Raiders making a permanent move there.
"We will present him with a proposal (for 94)," Weinberg said. "Obviously, we've got to do it pretty quick—not for our sake, for his. He's got tickets to sell, a schedule to get ready for."
Raiders representative Al LoCasale declined comment and referred inquiries to Amy Trask of the team's legal affairs department. She did not return phone calls.
The Raiders, who are on a year-to-year tenancy with the Coliseum, were granted an extension for 1994 after the January earthquake severely damaged the Coliseum. They have not signed yet a lease for this season.
Nor have they sent out season-ticket renewal notices, which usually are issued in early February. A club official said the notices are to be malled by the end of the week.
Coliseum repairs are on target to have at least 50,000 seats ready for the University of Southern California's football opener against Washington on Sept. 3.
The NFL will release its schedule within the next several days, and the Raiders' earliest possible home date would be the following day, Sept. 4.
Orlando officials are expressing confidence that the Raiders could be accommodated on short notice.
Southern Cal has not made contingency arrangements in case the repairs are not completed by Sept. 3.
"What we're discussing now is incentives and renovations," Weinberg said of the Citrus Bowl, which doesn't have revenue-rich luxury boxes.
While in Orlando, Davis said he hoped long-promised luxury boxes would be part of the construction project—the they are not currently — while also expressing concern about the Coliseum's forbidding environs.
The Associated Press
Tennis star getting back into game
It may sound nice to Monica Seles to play only for fun, but that is not enough to bring the kind of success she once had. Tennis at the top isn't so much fun as it is very difficult work. It requires incredible sacrifice in all aspects of life, a travel schedule that only the most dedicated can endure, constant practice and competition.
Right now, she is at once more cautious about tennis and more daring off the court. She's reluctant to venture back onto the tour until she is completely ready — physically, mentally, emotionally — but more eager to try things she once shunned out of fear of injury.
If Seles feels unable to make that commitment, if she is unable to have fun and be No.1, there may be no point in her returning.
"She just wants to be her best when she comes back," said an aide to her agent, Stephanie Tolleson, at the International Management Group. "It's perfectly understandable. You can't go from No. 1 and then lose to Joe Blow. She wants to be 100 percent. And she's obviously not ready to feel that way. I think she's almost there, but things happen to her, and she gets sidetracked and does other things. It's just a matter of getting it all together."
Seles acknowledges the conflicts tugging at her, viewing them almost with a sense of amusement.
"One of the big changes in me is that I'm not that cautious anymore," she said. "I guess that's ironic, because I heard all the rumors about how I as in a mental institution, how I was an emotional wreck. But the opposite is true. I don't spend any time looking over my shoulder."
Nor does she worry about the rumors that have swirled about her for so long. An example of the tabloid "reports" was that she was pregnant when she skipped Wimbedon in 1991.