Rockies’ DiPoto Could Be Out for Season

Jerry Dipoto, the front-runner to be Colorado’s closer, will be out at least four weeks and could be out for the season after being diagnosed with a bulging disk below his neck.

Dipoto, a right-hander, had been pitching with pain in his left shoulder, and Rocky General Manager Dan O’Dowd sent him to have an MRI test to determine the cause. The results showed a C-6 bulging disc just below Dipoto’s neck.

“I feel terrible for Jerry. I really do,” O’Dowd said. “No one represents the fabric of this club as much as Jerry.”

Dipoto, 31, had 19 saves in 1998 before losing the closer job near the end of the season. He spent last year in middle relief but was the leading candidate to be Colorado’s stopper in 2000 after Dave Veres was traded to St. Louis in November.

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With two weeks left in spring training, San Francisco Giant pitcher Shawn Estes is still bothered by a sore shoulder, and Manager Dusty Baker said there’s a chance he might not be ready for the start of the season. Mark Gardner is the most likely candidate to step into Estes’ rotation spot. . . . Deion Sanders’ ankle is bothering him, reducing his already small chance of making the Cincinnati Reds’ opening day roster. Sanders’ right ankle has swelled up and will force him to take several days off. “It would be very, very difficult at this point to envision him being ready by opening day, for physical reasons,” Red General Manager Jim Bowden said. . . . The New York Yankees acquired left-handed pitcher Ted Lilly from the Montreal Expos, the first of two players to be named for Hideki Irabu from a December trade. Lilly, 24, made his major league debut in 1999, going 0-1 with a 7.61 ERA in nine games with the Expos. He was 8-5 with a 3.84 ERA at triple-A Ottawa.