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Sports log

Pete Rose still hopes to gain reinstatement

December 16, 2015, 2:35 a.m.

Pete Rose said Tuesday he is a changed person even if he still likes to bet on an occasional Major League Baseball game. ‘‘All I look forward to being some day is a friend of baseball,’’ Rose said at a news conference fronting his restaurant on the Las Vegas Strip, his first comments since MLB commissioner Rob Manfred rejected Rose’s bid to get back into baseball. “I want baseball and Pete Rose to be friends. I want to say I’m not an outsider looking in. I have grandkids, and they want their grandpa to be associated with baseball.’’ Rose, baseball’s career hits leader. said he was disappointed at Manfred’s decision not to end a ban that has stretched more than a quarter-century. But he held out hope he could still one day be inducted into the Hall of Fame, joining teammates such as Johnny Bench and Joe Morgan from the Big Red Machine of the 1970s. ‘‘It would be nice to have the opportunity to go to the Hall of Fame,’’ said Rose, now 74. ‘‘My whole life has been a Hall of Fame life just by the association with the teammates I had.’’ Rose said his meeting with Manfred earlier this year — where he first denied still betting on baseball and then admitted he did — could have gone better. ‘‘I’m a good guy, to be honest with you,’’ Rose said. ‘‘I tried to be as honest as I could with the commissioner, but I made some mistakes and I clarified them. Some of his questions, though, I kind of panicked.’’ The ban prevents Rose from working for any major league team or minor league affiliate, but he is allowed to make ceremonial appearances with the commissioner’s permission and may work for third parties such as Fox, which hired Rose this year as a baseball analyst.

‘‘I’m in control of my life now,’’ Rose said. ‘‘I watch baseball, talk on Fox and talk baseball to anyone who wants to talk about it. I’m a baseball player. I’m a baseball person. That’s never going to change.’’

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Heyward finalizes big deal The Chicago Cubs finalized their $184 million, eight-year contract with outfielder Jason Heyward, adding a three-time Gold Glove winner in their ongoing makeover to build a World Series contender. Heyward can opt out of the deal after three seasons and become a free agent again at age 29, having earned $78 million under the deal with the Cubs. He also has a conditional opt out if he has 550 plate appearances after the 2019 season . . . The Orioles and All-Star reliever Darren O’Day completed a $31 million, four-year contract. The 33-year-old submarining righthander will make $6 million next year, $7 million in 2017, and $9 million the following two seasons. There will be $1 million deferred each year.

Colleges

Ryan retires immediately

Wisconsin basketball coach Bo Ryan, who turns 68 on Sunday, announced in June he would be retiring at the end of the 2015-16 season, but he opted to retire immediately following Tuesday night’s 64-49 nonconference victory over Texas A&M-Corpus Christi. Greg Gard, Ryan’s longtime assistant, will take over as interim coach. Ryan, who compiled 364 wins and four Big Ten regular-season titles in 15 seasons in Madison, Wis., guided the Badgers to consecutive Final Four appearances, including their first national championship game in 74 years last season . . . Je'lon Hornbeak scored 18 points, going 15 of 16 from the line, and Monmouth (7-3) upset Georgetown, 83-68, in Washington for the program’s first win over a Big East opponent . . . Former Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky, 71, convicted in 2012 of 45 counts of child sexual abuse, will collect a $4,900-a-month pension after the expiration of a 30-day window for an appeal by the Pennsylvania State Employees’ Retirement System of a Nov. 13 court order restoring Sandusky’s pension benefit. The court order said the system was wrong to classify Sandusky, now serving 30 to 60 years in Greene State Prison, as a university employee at the time of the child sex abuse crimes that were the basis of his pension forfeiture. No money has yet been paid to Sandusky and his wife Dottie, who are owed back benefits plus interest, going back to October 2012 . . . Mississippi defensive lineman Robert Nkemdiche apologized after being charged with possession of marijuana following a 15-foot fall at an Atlanta hotel over the weekend. Nkemdiche said in a statement he “made a mistake and put myself in an environment that does not reflect who I am as a person.’’ Nkemdiche was hospitalized and had stitches in his back and leg, according to Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze, who has yet to decide on Nkemdiche’s status against Oklahoma State in the Jan. 1 Sugar Bowl . . . Harvard tight end Ben Braunecker and offensive lineman Cole Turner were first-team selections to the STATS FCS All-America team. Harvard freshman wide receiver/return specialist Justice Shelton-Mosley and New Hampshire junior defensive back Casey DeAndrade, of East Bridgewater, Mass., were named to the third team.

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Miscellany Smith to miss two months

Arizona Coyotes goalie Mike Smith is expected to miss at least two months after undergoing abdominal surgery. Anders Lindback will take over as Arizona’s No. 1 goalie . . . US Olympic ski champion Mikaela Shiffrin offered no timetable on her return from a torn right knee ligament and bone bruise suffered in a wipeout during a practice giant slalom run last weekend in Are, Sweden. “It’s tough to make any sort of predictions,’’ she said. But there is some promising news: She won’t need surgery. Just rest and rehab . . . George Macomber, a member of the 1948 and 1952 US Olympic Ski teams, a 1949 US Ski champion, and a 1973 inductee to the US National Ski Hall of Fame, died Monday at 88.

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