Sports briefs 2/9/05

Baseball

* Baseball commissioner Bud Selig will be in San Francisco on Wednesday to announce that the Giants will host the 2007 All-Star game.

It was widely reported during the World Series in October that the Giants would get the game, but Selig will now make it official.

This will be the city's first time staging baseball's midsummer classic since 1984.

* Detroit Tigers catcher Ivan Rodriguez denied accusations by Jose Canseco that he used steroids while playing for the Texas Rangers.

Canseco says in his upcoming book he introduced Rodriguez, Rafael Palmeiro and Juan Gonzalez to steroids after being traded to Texas in 1992, the Daily News of New York reported Sunday.

"I'm in shock," Rodriguez told local El Nuevo Dia newspaper for Tuesday's editions. "He is saying things that aren't true, and it hurts me a lot that he would say things like that because I've always had a lot of respect for him, and I've even helped him many times when things weren't going well for him." Gonzalez and Palmeiro also have denied using steroids.

Advertisement Canseco's book, "Juiced: Wild Times, Rampant 'Roids, Smash Hits, and How Baseball Got Big," is scheduled for release by Regan Books on Feb. 14.

Basketball

* The WNBA awarded an expansion team to Chicago on Tuesday, returning women's professional basketball to the home of the Chicago Hustle.

The Chicago team -- its nickname will be announced later -- is owned by Michael Alter, and will begin play in 2006. It will be the league's 14th team and first new franchise since 2002. San Antonio and Connecticut began play in 2003, but each moved from a previous location.

The WNBA hopes to add another team for the 2007 season. The league started with eight teams in 1997 and expanded to 16 in 2002, but three franchises folded: Cleveland, Miami and Portland.

* Miami's Dwyane Wade and San Antonio's Manu Ginobili were among six players picked as NBA All-Stars for the first time when reserves were announced Tuesday.

Gilbert Arenas and Antawn Jamison of the Washington Wizards, Amare Stoudemire of the Phoenix Suns, and Rashard Lewis of the Seattle SuperSonics also gained their first All-Star selections in balloting by the NBA's 30 head coaches.

Cleveland's LeBron James, chosen as an Eastern Conference starter last week, is a first-time All-Star, too. The seven first-timers fell short of the record of 10 in 2002 and 1994.

The East's other reserves for the Feb. 20 game in Denver are centers Zydrunas Ilgauskas of Cleveland and Ben Wallace of Detroit, forward Jermaine O'Neal of Indiana, and guard Paul Pierce of Boston.

Guards Steve Nash of Phoenix and Ray Allen of Seattle, and forwards Dirk Nowitzki of Dallas and Shawn Marion of Phoenix were selected for the Western Conference team.

Colleges

* A high school football coach who accepted $150,000 from an Alabama booster to steer his standout football player to the Crimson Tide was sentenced Tuesday to two years' supervised probation and 500 hours of community service.

Lynn Lang was also fined $2,500 after pleading guilty to conspiring to get defensive lineman Albert Means to sign with the Crimson Tide in 2000. He could have faced 30-37 months in federal prison and fines up to $60,000.

Lang, former head coach at Trezevant High in Memphis, said he took the money from wealthy businessman Logan Young to make sure Means went to Alabama.

Football

* Jets quarterback Chad Pennington had surgery Tuesday to repair a tear in his right rotator cuff, and his doctors are cautiously optimistic he will be ready for the start of training camp in July.

Dr. James Andrews performed the arthroscopic surgery in Birmingham, Ala. Pennington needs three to four weeks of full rest with his arm in a sling and then three to four months of range-of-motion physical therapy.

Pennington played the final seven games of last season with a tear in the muscle of the rotator cuff, which the Jets initially said was a strain.

Miscellaneous

* Michael Vick wears No. 7 on the football field, but he's tops in the hearts of kids.

The Atlanta Falcons quarterback was voted the most popular athlete among children, according to SI for Kids. In an open-ended poll of 1,000 children, Vick received 8 percent of the vote.

New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter finished second, followed by NBA star LeBron James, and quarterbacks Peyton Manning and Donovan McNabb.

Vick is the first NFL player to top the annual poll. Past winners include Michael Jordan -- who took home the honor a record seven times -- Tracy McGrady, Allen Iverson and Shaquille O'Neal.