Red Sox Hope Sprague Fills Hole at Third

The Boston Red Sox, filling a hole at third base, obtained Ed Sprague in a trade with the San Diego Padres on Friday.

The Red Sox also signed outfielder Bernard Gilkey for the remainder of the season, according to Gilkey’s agent, but the team would not confirm the signing.

The Red Sox sent minor league infielder Cesar Saba and right-handed pitcher Dennis Tankersley to the Padres for the 32-year-old Sprague.

Sprague, who has 10 homers, is expected to take over for Wilton Veras, a promising prospect who is in an eight-for-63 slump and has struggled in the field.

Gilkey, 33, was with Arizona until June 24, when the team designated him for assignment. In 38 games, Gilkey hit a career-low .110 with two home runs and six runs batted in.

Gilkey’s agent, Jim Bronner, said he will receive the league-minimum $200,000 from Boston because Arizona is still obligated to pay him until the end of the season. Gilkey was making $5.25 million under the agreement with Arizona.

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John Rocker’s first visit to New York since he made disparaging remarks about the city produced cable channel TBS’s highest ratings for an Atlanta Braves’ game since 1994.

The Time Warner Inc. unit, which broadcasts Braves’ games to a potential audience of about 79.4 million U.S. homes, drew a cable rating of 2.8, about 2.32 million households, for Atlanta’s 6-4 victory Thursday against the Mets.

On News Corp.’s Fox Sports New York, the game generated its third-highest baseball audience since the local cable channel began airing Mets’ games in 1976 as SportsChannel.

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Brave third baseman Chipper Jones missed Friday night’s game against the Mets and returned to Atlanta, where doctors were to induce labor in his wife, Sharon.

To replace him, former Met Bobby Bonilla made his first start of the season at third base.

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New York Met right-hander Rick Reed was put on the 15-day disabled list because of a broken wrist and the Mets recalled right-hander Jim Mann from Norfolk of the International League.

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Major League Baseball’s most experienced umpires want to make $325,000 a year in their next contract, a 44% raise that would make them the highest-paid professional sports officials, John Hirschbeck, president of the World Umpires Assn. said.

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Costa Mesa-based Tickets.com will become major league baseball’s online ticket vendor beginning in the 2001 season.

Tickets.com will handle ticket sales at each of the Web sites run by baseball’s 30 teams.