Stars

BOWIE -- Orioles manager Ray Miller arrived at Prince George's Stadium yesterday relaxed in knowing he had plenty of reserves on hand from the club's minor-league system to spell his regulars for last night's exhibition game.Then came the tension.Miller discovered that some newcomers weren't available for various reasons, leading to a bit of roster shuffling before the Orioles' 7-4 loss to their minor-league all-stars.Single-A catcher Tim DeCinces, the son of former Orioles third baseman Doug DeCinces, was promoted to Triple-A Rochester because of a thumb injury to Melvin Rosario and accompanied the Red Wings to Syracuse.

Though the Metro all-stars put up a fight, the Maryland Scholastic Association all-stars delivered the knockout punch in a 12-7 victory in the 10th annual Lacrosse for Leukemia all-star game last night at Johns Hopkins University's Homewood Field.The MSA, which has won the game every year since its inception, scored five goals in the second quarter to take control.

KINGSTON, R.I. - The Soccer Club of Baltimore Stars under-19 boys advanced to the semifinals of the U.S. Youth Soccer Region I Championships yesterday by winning its last game of round-robin play on a late goal. Randy Tolson, who plays for Towson University, flicked in a bouncing ball in the 42nd minute to lead the Stars over the BPFC Dynamo from New York West, 2-1. The Stars today will face FC Delco of Eastern Pennsylvania, last year's champion. George Wakefield of UMBC put the Stars ahead in the 50th minute.

Three players from the City All-Stars posted double-digit point totals to help the team outlast the Suburban All-Stars, 80-73, in the first game of the second Charm City Challenge at the Towson Center last night. Trailing by as many as nine points in the fourth quarter, the Suburban All-Stars trimmed the lead to three with 33.5 seconds left after Dwayne Birden of Calvert Hall sank two free throws. Anthony Fitzgerald of Poly compiled team highs in points with 12 and rebounds with 16 to power the City All-Stars.

Have you ever wondered how a star is born? Or imagined seeing one explode into a supernova or disintegrate into a black hole. What if you could get close enough to the sun to see what's at its core?Contemplators of the world beyond can experience all this and more at "Bizarre Stars," the media show that opens today at the Davis Planetarium in the Maryland Science Center.Well, you can't actually see these things happen, but you can see them simulated on the planetarium's 50-foot-wide domed ceiling that will be transformed into a sky full of stars with the flick of a switch.

This year's Capital Classic already had a strong local flavor with three area players on the Capital team, and now it has even more of a taste of Baltimore: Loyola's Jerry Savage will coach the U.S. All-Stars."

When did it become so all-fired important that big-name movie stars provide the voices for animated features? Trailers for the coming Open Season, the story of a domesticated bear who suddenly finds himself living in the wild, proudly proclaim that it stars Martin Lawrence, Ashton Kutcher, Debra Messing, Billy Connolly and Gary Sinise. But does it really? Doesn't it really star the talents of the film's animators, the men and women who designed the characters, anthropomorphized them and mapped out their actions?

MORNINGSTAR has announced that it will completely overhaul its ubiquitous star-ratings system, beginning in July. Hundreds of mutual funds will gain or lose valuable stars without any change in investment performance. It's a confusing development that, in the end, will not only improve the system but also benefit those who rely on the star system without understanding it fully. That group includes most fund investors. According to Financial Research Corp. in Boston, funds with four- and five-star ratings from Morningstar gathered $119 billion in assets last year, while funds with lower ratings shrank by $79 billion in net redemptions.

When the red carpet rolls out tonight for the 64th annual Golden Globe Awards, millions of star-gazers will be tuned in. But it's a fair guess that many of them won't be nearly as interested in whether Babel or Bobby takes the top honors as they will be in what's hugging Beyonce's curves. Or whether Meryl Streep will indeed wear Prada. On TV The 64th Annual Golden Globe Awards will air live tonight on NBC (Channel 11) from 8 to 11.

Washington. -- The government of Singapore has banned the new double album by the American hard-rock band, Guns N'Roses, called ''Use Your Illusion I and II.'' I've never been to Singapore, but it appears they know something there that we in the United States have forgotten. They know obscenity when they see it and are not afraid to try to stem its flow.David Geffen, president of the label that records Guns N'Roses, said of the advance sale of more than 4 million copies, ''When you give the people what they want, they'll show up in droves.