League Baseball Players

Kevin Zonn had seen it before, but he couldn't get enough.So there he was yesterday at Tate Dodge in Glen Burnie, standing outside during a rainstorm watching a guy from Rawlings make a baseball bat by hand.The short, sandy-haired Millersville man was awe-struck. He marveled as Roy Conrad of Rawlings began chipping away at a && bat as it twirled on a lathe. It wasn't just any bat, but one for San Francisco Giants first baseman Will Clark.Chips flew onto Mr. Conrad's red shirt as he explained that bats for major league baseball players are made by hand.

BOSTON -- Suddenly you understand why Kevin Kennedy told the media two weeks ago how much he wanted to manage the Boston Red Sox in 1995.It is because the Red Sox could be putting themselves into a position where they will go from doormats to the prime contender in the American League East when the the baseball strike finally ends.Barring unforeseen circumstances, the Red Sox will wind up with Kansas City Royals right-hander Kevin Appier, Montreal Expos closer John Wetteland and Chicago Cubs right fielder Sammy Sosa, the Boston Globe reported yesterday, citing anonymous sources.

MAJOR LEAGUE Baseball players will report to spring training camps in Florida and Arizona in just five weeks, and clubhouse managers across the show are apt to be busy finding smaller jerseys for not a few pros. Even with baseball's toothless stab at drug testing last season, some ball players showed up with noticeably deflated physiques, the apparent result of having forsaken the juice of steroids. This season, with baseball now having been shamed into the tougher testing protocol announced last week, look for the games to be played on a much more human scale.

One of the women who served as the inspiration for the film "A League of Their Own" will be the featured speaker at a Dec. 7 breakfast sponsored by the Greater Severna Park Chamber of Commerce.The breakfast is set for 8 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. at the Severna Park Library on McKinsey Road.The guest speaker will be Dr. Florence Blanck of the Severna Park Chiropractic Center, who played in the All American Girls Baseball League, which was featured in the movie. The league was formed during World War II, when many major league baseball players were in the armed forces.

Did you ever wonder what a few days in the big leagues is worth? Well, here's the scoop:The Orioles have used three players this year, Richie Lewis, Tommy Shields and Jack Voigt, who had never performed in the big leagues. Lewis totaled 10 days in his two stays, Shields and Voigt had half that time.The salary for 10 days in the big leagues (prorated from the $109,000 minimum) is $5,989. A player's cut of the licensing money (from baseball properties) for the same period is $3,846. A full cut of the licensing money this year is estimated to be just under $70,000 -- or 64 percent of the minimum salary.

The Chicago Cubs fired pitching coach Dick Pole yesterday after their 12th loss in 13 games, a 14-6 rout by the St. Louis Cardinals in which Cubs pitchers allowed 21 hits.He was replaced by Billy Connors, who was Chicago's pitching coach from 1982-86. Pole, 40, was in his fourth season with the Cubs, and his departure comes a little more than five weeks after manager Don Zimmer was fired."Sometimes, a fresh look helps," manager Jim Essian said.* EXPANSION: Major-league owners will meet by conference call Friday to vote on final approval of Denver and Miami as the National League's expansion cities.

C Major League Baseball Players Association director Donald Fehr huddled with acting baseball commissioner Bud Selig in Washington yesterday, apparently searching for a reason to restart stalled negotiations.The talks must resume soon if there is to be any hope of starting the 1995 season with major-league players, but both sides have spent the past two weeks steering clear of the bargaining table.Whenever and wherever the talks resume, there has to be a dramatic bid to bridge the wide economic gap that stands between ownership's highly restrictive payroll tax system and a union proposal that would affect only one free-spending team.

NEW YORK -- Major League Baseball Players Association director Donald Fehr and management negotiator Randy Levine announced last night that a deal has been struck to end baseball's protracted labor dispute, but interim baseball commissioner Bud Selig so far has refused to acknowledge or endorse it.Fehr and Levine hammered out the final compromises on Thursday, but the owners must ratify it by a 75 percent vote. That likely will happen in the next few days, but Selig isn't willing to say the four-year labor dispute is over until it's over.

Although a strike might soon stop the major-league baseball season, there are different ways to keep the action going. Kids can continue to watch their favorite players hit, catch and throw through video games.Baseball video games continue to add features and improve their three-dimensional graphics.Some games let you see diving catches in the outfield. Others let you match wits with the help of 1993 statistics.For Super Nintendo, the favorite baseball game among kids appears to be Super Bases Loaded 2. It features top 3-D graphics and different camera angles for following the ball.

The sign at Legends Field said everything you need to know about the New York Yankees, a team so used to having its way in the economically imbalanced world of Major League Baseball that owner George Steinbrenner (or one of his lackeys) was simply not capable of hiding the franchise's Big Apple-sized sense of entitlement. Of course, I'm talking about the sign that was visible Saturday on the main concourse of the Yankees' fancy spring training site in Tampa, Fla., which apologized to fans for the absence of several of the club's biggest stars during the World Baseball Classic.