Sports briefs 1/24/05

Baseball

* John Franco agreed to a $700,000, one-year contract with the Houston Astros on Sunday. Franco, 44, is the major league's all-time leader in saves by a left-hander.

He was 2-7 with a 5.28 ERA with the New York Mets last season, his 14th year with the team. The Mets cut ties with Franco in December after declining to offer him arbitration.

Franco's 424 saves rank only behind Lee Smith's 478 on the career list.

Basketball

* Shaquille O'Neal didn't have any trouble choosing a wedding gift for Donald Trump and Melania Knauss.

"Phantom Rolls-Royce, a white one," O'Neal said, referring to the massive luxury car that starts around $325,000. "It'll be parked at my house when he wants to use it."

O'Neal and his wife Shaunie were among the estimated 400 guests attending the Trump wedding Saturday night, the third for the real estate mogul and reality television star. Other guests included Billy Joel, television personalities Barbara Walters, Matt Lauer and Regis Philbin and former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

Guests at Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate and club in Palm Beach dined on steamed shrimp salad, beef tenderloin and individual Grand Marnier chocolate truffle cakes that mirrored the towering 50-pound, seven-tier wedding cake topped with 3,000 white-icing roses.

"It was fun," O'Neal said Sunday before his Miami Heat played the New Orleans Hornets. "There was a lot of people there ... I shook a lot of hands and got a lot of endorsement deals done yesterday."

O'Neal said he and Trump have known each other for more than a decade; Trump and Knauss attended a Heat home game as O'Neal's guests earlier this season.

Golf

* Dana Quigley made a 3-foot par putt on the third playoff hole and beat a faltering Tom Watson to win the season-opening MasterCard Championship for the second time in three years.

Watson, who led after the first two rounds, made a bogey after he hit into the lava behind the 17th green at Hualalai Golf Club.

The 57-year-old Quigley, a nine-time winner on the 50-and-over tour, closed with a 6-under 66 to match Watson (70) at 18-under 198. Watson, 1-7 in playoffs on the Champions Tour, could have won in regulation, but missed a 9-foot birdie putt.

Hockey

n An ardent hockey fan who died this week in Ottawa used his obituary to denounce the NHL lockout.

Archie Bennitz, 84, instructed his son to criticize NHL commissioner Gary Bettman and union leader Bob Goodenow in his death notice.

Bennitz called Bettman and Goodenow "skunks for denying him the pleasure of watching the NHL on TV this year," the obituary in the Ottawa Citizen read. Bennitz also urged Bettman to step aside in favor of Wayne Gretzky.

David Bennitz said his father had become increasingly angry during his last month in the hospital as the lockout dragged on. Hockey was the only thing he watched on TV.

Skating

* American Jennifer Rodriguez claimed the women's World Sprint Speedskating Championship on Sunday, becoming the first U.S. skater in nine years to win the event.

Rodriguez set her second straight personal best in the 500 meters Sunday and was the fastest skater in the 1,000 meters to finish with 150.015 points and the first world sprint title by an American since Chris Witty won in 1996.