Lockout Costs NBA More Than 100 Employees

The NBA has lost more than 100 employees during the lockout and its work force is expected to shrink even more.

Commissioner David Stern said some of the remaining employees could face layoffs if the season is canceled.

“We’re still hoping to make a deal, so we haven’t contemplated that yet. But obviously that would affect the situation dramatically,” Stern said. “Right now, we’re 125 positions reduced from where we were in June through attrition and the elimination of part-time work and the like. We’re achieving very successful cutbacks without mandating layoffs.”

The league has had a hiring freeze and payroll freeze since July 1, and Stern has not been drawing his salary.

League spokesman Brian McIntyre said those who left their jobs worked in a variety of positions. All, he added, left voluntarily.

The number of league employees is down to about 750. The NBA office draws its budget from a 6% share of gate receipts.

Meanwhile, the NBA instituted another lockout of sorts, closing its official store in New York to the public for almost four hours so it could hold its annual Christmas party.

A constant throng of holiday shoppers stopped outside the new NBA Store on Fifth Avenue, but they were turned away by a pair of league employees standing guard at the door.

Soccer

Former national team coach Steve Sampson will become technical director of the Fullerton-based California Youth Soccer Assn.-South on May 1.

Sampson, who resigned as coach of the U.S. team 5 1/2 months ago after they lost all three of their World Cup matches, pledged to place a “special emphasis” on increasing the amount of inner-city and Latino players in its Olympic development program.

“There will be great interest on my part to work hands-on with those inner-city and Hispanic kids because I truly believe that we are missing a great number of athletes that could represent our country, especially in Southern California,” Sampson said at the First Soccer Symposium in Beverly Hills, convened to discuss a variety of issues facing the sport.

The California Youth Soccer Assn.-South oversees competition for about 90,000 players between ages 5 and 19 from San Luis Obispo County to the Mexican border.

Motor Sports

A second NASCAR Winston Cup race could be in Las Vegas if speedway magnate Bruton Smith gets his way.

Smith confirmed he is trying to bring another Winston Cup race to the Las Vegas Motor Speedway, which he bought last week for $215 million.

Smith said one of his first moves would be adding 20,000 temporary seats to the 107,000-seat facility in time for the Las Vegas 400 on March 7.

Olympics

Dick Schultz, secretary-general of the U.S. Olympic Committee said at the International Olympic Committee meetings in Lausanne, Switzerland, that he is confident of the NHL’s participation in the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City.

“I can’t see where you have games in the United States and the NHL does not participate,” he said.

The issue has been a thorny one since the Nagano Olympics in February, where American NHL players made an early quarterfinal exit and subsequently trashed their hotel rooms. The NHL is expected to decide on its participation in February.

Creatine is a food and won’t be included on the IOC’s list of banned drugs, Prince Alexandre de Merode, the chairman of the IOC’s medical commission and the committee’s top doping expert, said in Lausanne.

Creatine, an amino acid protein that is produced naturally in humans, is marketed as a legal alternative to anabolic steroids.

Miscellany

Norway’s Finn Christian Jagge, racing at night under floodlights at Sestriere, Italy, edged Austrian Thomas Stangassinger by 0.06 seconds to win the third World Cup slalom of the season.

Jagge, 32, an Olympic slalom champion in 1992, had a combined time of 1:51.92 on the icy track.

The French Cycling Federation has handed down bans of 4 1/2 months to three cyclists from the Festina team that was expelled from the scandal-rocked Tour de France, French television reported. Laurent Brochard, Christophe Moreau and Didier Roux, who all have admitted to taking banned drugs, will be prevented from competing until April 30.

U.S. Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, who played baseball for Tufts University from 1968-70, will be the 33rd recipient of the NCAA’s Theodore Roosevelt Award, the organization’s highest individual honor, Jan. 10 in San Antonio.

Kansas State’s Bill Snyder, who coached the Wildcats to an 11-1 season, was voted the Associated Press’ first college coach of the year.

A jockey and a top Australian horse were killed when lightning struck during a workout at Perth, Australia.

Damion Beckett was working Brave Buck, a Perth Cup contender, when a lightning bolt struck during a storm, said Bernie Ryan, president of the Western Australia Jockey’s Association.

Another jockey went to Beckett’s aid but found rider and horse dead.