Barry Bonds facing fewer felony charges

Federal prosecutors have reduced the number of felony charges Barry Bonds faces from 11 to five.

Major League Baseball’s career home run leader still faces the same punishment he always has, but the paring of the charges underscores the troubles prosecutors have encountered since indicting him for the first time in 2007 for allegedly lying to a grand jury about his steroid use. Bonds has pleaded not guilty. The indictment unsealed Thursday in San Francisco was the fourth version of the charges against Bonds. The document reflects the hit the government’s case took when the slugger’s personal trainer, Greg Anderson, made clear his willingness to go to jail on contempt of court charges instead of testifying against his former client.

Prosecutors removed from the indictment perjury charges that relied on dates found on so-called doping calendars found in Anderson’s apartment that prosecutors allege show Bonds’ drug regimen. U.S. District Judge Susan Illston ruled those documents inadmissible at trial because of Anderson’s refusal to authenticate them on the witness stand.

In the new indictment, prosecutors reduced from nine to three the number of charges alleging Bonds lied under oath when he testified that he never knowingly took performance-enhancing drugs.

ETC.

NFL labor talks break down

Negotiations to prevent an NFL lockout took a grim turn Thursday with the cancellation of the second day of a planned two-day bargaining session.

The current collective bargaining agreement expires March 3. The NFL confirmed that Commissioner Roger Goodell has canceled a meeting of owners scheduled for Tuesday in Philadelphia, where labor was expected to be a topic.

Neither the league nor the union would comment on why Thursday’s session was called off.

The NCAA’s new TV deal for the men’s basketball tournament will allow for staggered starts of games in addition to televising all of the games live nationally for the first time. The contract with CBS and Turner Sports was signed in April and includes prime-time games on TBS, TNT and truTV on the first Sunday of the tournament. Under the new schedule, games will start at least 30 minutes apart.

A few days after posting on his Twitter account that he was cancer-free, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said his comment was a “misstatement.” “You’re never really cancer-free, and I should have known that,” he said. “My cancer right now is at an absolute minimum.” Abdul-Jabbar, 63, was diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia in 2008.

Apprentice jockey Abel Cedillo was briefly hospitalized and a 5-year-old mare broke a leg during a first-race spill at Santa Anita. Cedillo’s mount, Saint’s Crown, was on the rail in second place in the first turn of the mile-long race when she clipped the heels of the leader, Sky Brite Miss, unseating the jockey. Lucy Got Lucky tried to hurdle the fallen Saint’s Crown but ran into the horse, sustaining an open fracture. The horse was euthanized on the track. Jockey Victor Espinoza, who rode Lucy Got Lucky, also was unseated. He was treated at the track’s first aid station for a bruise to his forehead. Cedillo was conscious when he was taken to Arcadia Methodist Hospital by ambulance. His horse was “walking sound” after the spill, according to track steward Tom Ward. Rogelio Olguin, Cedillo’s agent, said the jockey has a hairline fracture in his back.

— Kevin Baxter

Six girls’ basketball players from Southern California were selected for the McDonald’s All-American game March 30 in Chicago. Playing for the West will be Justine Hartman from Brea, Reshanda Gray from Los Angeles Washington, Ariya Crook-Williams from Long Beach Poly, Kaleena Mosqueda-Lewis and Alexyz Vaioletama from Santa Ana Mater Dei and Bonnie Samuelson from Huntington Beach Edison.

There were no players from California selected for the boys’ game for the second year in a row.

— Eric Sondheimer