Smith, a Former King, Dies After Shooting

Brian Smith, a former King player who had become a popular television sportscaster in Ottawa, died Wednesday, a day after being shot in the head outside his station by a man police say harbored an unexplained grudge against the media.

Smith, 54, was walking to his car in the CJOH-TV parking lot Tuesday night when a man armed with a .22-caliber rifle fired two shots in front of several witnesses.

Police said a 38-year-old man surrendered Wednesday at the main courthouse in Ottawa and was expected to be charged with the killing.

“He was angry at members of the media and wished to cause harm to a media personality,” Police Supt. Garry Rae said at a news conference. “Mr. Smith was the first personality that he saw.”

Smith died at Ottawa Civic Hospital, where he underwent 90 minutes of surgery late Tuesday.

Smith played for the Kings and the Minnesota North Stars in the late 1960s.

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Kevin Stevens, a high-scoring left wing for Pittsburgh, returned to the city where he grew up and played college hockey, going to the Boston Bruins in a four-player trade. In exchange for Stevens, 30, a two-time 50-goal scorer, and center Shawn McEachern, the Penguins will get center Bryan Smolinski and right wing Glen Murray.

Baseball

Unless former New York Yankee Mickey Mantle has further cancer surgery, he probably has less than a year to live, a research doctor said in Dallas.

“If they do not [operate to remove the lung tumors], the prognosis is not very extended; it would be a year--maybe,” said Dr. Isaac Djerassi, a research oncologist at Mercy Catholic Medical Center in Philadelphia.

Djerassi said the drugs needed to keep Mantle’s body from rejecting his new liver would also mean he cannot reject the new tumors and fight the cancer. Djerassi suggested removing the tumors and giving Mantle “aggressive” chemotherapy and radiation treatments.

Dr. Goran Klintmalm, director of the Baylor transplant program, said “we do not believe there is a place for surgery” in Mantle’s case.

Basketball

Former Kentucky swingman Roderick Rhodes has committed to attend USC, according to family sources. Rhodes, who averaged 18.4 points a game last season and backed out of an attempt to join the NBA early, will have to sit out a season before joining the Trojans as a senior.

The leadership of the NBA players’ union said if it can’t reach a new labor agreement with the league by Tuesday, it will drop its attempt, allowing dissident players to pursue their antitrust suits in court.

The union announced its position after a meeting of its officials and three prominent dissident players--Michael Jordan, Patrick Ewing and Alonzo Mourning.

But the dissenters appeared unmoved. Sixteen players faxed a message to the membership urging that it reject any deal reached by union Executive Director Simon Gourdine and President Buck Williams.

Football

Florida defensive end Johnie Church, safety Teako Brown and defensive lineman Ernie Badeaux received one-game suspensions for what Coach Steve Spurrier described as “conduct detrimental to the university” and will sit out the season opener against Houston on Sept. 2.

Church was suspended over a battery charge involving his wife, and Brown was penalized over an aggravated battery charge involving his girlfriend. Badeaux was suspended for undisclosed reasons.

Former NFL quarterback Joe Ferguson, 45, signed with the San Antonio Texans of the Canadian Football League. Ferguson, the league’s oldest player, was the Buffalo Bills’ quarterback during O.J. Simpson’s 2,000-yard season and also played for Tampa Bay and Indianapolis.

Miscellany

After a report that he would skip the World Series of Golf, John Daly received a solution to the conflict created by his victory in the British Open through some creative scheduling.

Daly was set to play in a tournament in Vancouver opposite the World Series, Aug. 24-27.

PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem said a solution was reached when the Vancouver event was changed to a 54-hole format, played Aug. 21-23.

Paul Henderson, president of the International Yacht Racing Union, says the floating marina for the 1996 Olympic yachting competition in Savannah, Ga., is too small and needs to be tripled in size before next summer.