Sports briefs 10/29/04

Baseball

• Longtime Chicago Cubs analyst Steve Stone announced Thursday he was leaving WGN-TV, less than one month after coming under fire for on-air comments he made criticizing the team's performance.

Stone announced his decision on WGN-AM radio.

"I regret I won't be calling another Cubs game on WGN-TV for the greatest fans in baseball, the fans of the Chicago Cubs," said Stone, a Cubs broadcaster for 20 years.

Stone's partner Chip Caray also recently left WGN-TV to take a job calling games for the Atlanta Braves, joining his father in the booth there.

• The season's not over yet for three St. Louis Cardinals pitchers. Jason Marquis and relievers Ray King and Kiko Calero will be part of major league baseball's tour of Japan early next month.

Two other Cardinals, Albert Pujols and Edgar Renteria, had been approached to participate in the eight-game trip from Nov. 5-14, but both declined.

The tour is the second in three years for the major leagues to Japan and includes games in Tokyo, Fukuoka, Osaka, Sapporo and Nagoya against an All-Star team from the Japanese leagues.

Colleges

• Anaheim Angels star Darin Erstad and his wife, Jessica, are donating $1 million for Nebraska's Memorial Stadium Improvement Project.

Erstad was an All-America baseball player for the Cornhuskers in 1995 and the punter on the school's 1994 national championship football team. He was the first player picked in the 1995 Major League Baseball draft.

Football

• Chicago Bears rookie defensive tackle Tommie Harris was fined $5,000 for knocking Tampa Bay Buccaneers quarterback Brian Griese to the ground Sunday during a dead ball situation.

Harris said Thursday that he plans to appeal the fine, his second of the season.

"I don't understand how the NFL gives me a 15-yard penalty and then fines me $5,000 for that," Harris said.

Harris was offsides on the play and officials whistled action dead when he came in unabated toward Griese. Harris pushed Griese to the ground and drew a 15-yard penalty for unnecessary roughness, a penalty which helped lead to a Bucs field goal.

Golf

• Jeff Sluman shot a course-record 62 for a two-shot lead in the Chrysler Championship on Thursday.

Jonathan Kaye made a hole-in-one with a 3-iron from 222 yards on 17, then followed that with a birdie for a 7-under 64. He was tied with Kirk Triplett and Kent Jones. Vijay Singh made five birdies in a seven-hole stretch on the back nine for a 65.

The Chrysler Championship is the final full-field tournament of the year, the last chance for players to get into the Tour Championship (top 30 on the money list), the Masters (top 40) or keep their PGA Tour cards for next year (top 125).

• Sergio Garcia shot a 4-under-par 67 in the wind to share the first-round lead at the Volvo Masters with fellow Spaniard Jose Manuel Lara, who was stung by a bee early in his round.

Garcia, who won in Mallorca two weeks ago, survived a tough day on the Valderrama course where the Ryder Cup was played seven years ago. Lara was bothered for a while after the bee sting on the fifth hole. But he regrouped and birdied five of the last 10 holes.

Brian Davis and Alastair Forsyth were at 68, with Luke Donald, Peter O'Malley, Christian Cevaer and Jonathan Lomas at 69.

Tennis

n Andre Agassi had little trouble reaching the Stockholm Open quarterfinals, beating Jonas Bjorkman 6-3, 6-4 Thursday.

Agassi's next opponent is eighth-seeded Fernando Verdasco, a 6-4, 6-2 winner over Raemon Sluiter.

Also reaching the quarterfinals were second-seeded Joachim Johansson, No. 4 Tommy Haas, and 19-year-old Swedish wild card Michael Ryderstedt.

-- From wire reports