Veterans Committee

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. -- Somebody said a long time ago that if you were in this business long enough, you'd eventually make every possible mistake.I've now officially been in this business long enough. And if Leon Day thinks I've been in it too long, he's got a legitimate reason.It seems that while culling information about Earl Weaver's possible nomination to the Hall of Fame and the nominees under consideration by the veterans committee, there was a serious case of miscommunication. It was mentioned that one problem the veterans committee has is the difficulty of nominating candidates while they are alive -- and that most of Weaver's competition would come from among the deceased.

Hal "Skinny" Brown, who provided stability during the formative years, is the latest addition to the Orioles' Hall of Fame.A righthander, Brown compiled a 62-48 record with the Orioles from 1955-1962. He is 10th on the club's all-time list with 1,312 innings pitched.Brown was the Orioles' most dependable pitcher during the years when Paul Richards was developing his "Kiddie Korps" in the late 1950s and early 1960s.After going 0-4 in his first season in Baltimore, Brown had a winning record in seven of the next eight seasons.

Ida May Bolden saw her younger brother play baseball on the sandlots of Mount Winans in Southwest Baltimore every Sunday when he was a boy. She saw him strike out 18 batters at Baltimore's Bugle Field and pitch a no-hitter at Newark's Ruppert Stadium when he was the star pitcher for the Negro National League's Newark Eagles.Her brother is Leon Day. He is 78, suffers from gout, diabetes and a bad heart and has spent most of last week in a bed at St. Agnes Hospital. Tuesday he is up for election to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Late Ravens owner Art Modell might face an easier path to the Pro Football Hall of Fame if the museum follows through on tentative discussions of putting "contributors" in a different voting pool than players. Modell, who brought pro football back to Baltimore, made a list of 15 finalists for the 2013 class, the first time he had gotten that far in the voting since 2001. Modell's death last September at age 87 seemed to spur a reconsideration of his candidacy, which has always been divisive because he moved his franchise from Cleveland.

Thomas Robert Winebrener, owner of the Union Bridge Hardware Store and a former member of the Town Council, died of a stroke Saturday at Carroll County General Hospital. He was 86. A longtime resident of Main Street in Union Bridge, he had owned the former Buckey's Hardware Store since 1952. Until his death, Mr. Winebrener remained active in the business, which will continue to be operated by his wife and son. Mr. Winebrener was born and raised on Fort Avenue in Baltimore, where his family owned a Locust Point bakery.

TEMPE, Ariz. -- It was a momentous occasion for Joe Gibbs, as the soft-spoken Southern gentleman was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame yesterday for his coaching deeds with the Washington Redskins -- including the unprecedented feat of winning three Super Bowls with three different quarterbacks.Gibbs led the way in the election to the sport's highest honor. Four former players will join him in the class of 1996: tackle Dan Dierdorf of the St. Louis Cardinals; wide receiver Charlie Joiner, who played with the Houston Oilers, Cincinnati Bengals and San Diego Chargers; defensive back Mel Renfro of the Dallas Cowboys; and offensive tackle Lou Creekmur of the Detroit Lions of the 1950s.

Gillespie V. "Sonny" Montgomery, 85, who during his 30 years representing east-central Mississippi in Congress pushed through a modernized GI Bill that boosted recruiting for the all-volunteer force, died Friday at a hospital in Meridian, Miss. He had undergone surgery to correct a bowel obstruction in December. A conservative Democrat, Mr. Montgomery served in the House of Representatives from 1967 to 1997, and for 13 years chaired the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Frank Boos, 70, the bow-tied appraiser on the PBS program Antiques Roadshow, died of complications from vascular disease Tuesday at his home in Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

Though it didn't garner giant headlines in Baltimore, the news last week that the late Walter O'Malley will be inducted into baseball's Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., in July couldn't help but make me wonder anew when they'll get around to enshrining Art Modell in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Certainly not soon, since he actually lost ground in football's strange selection process this year. It's not hard to see some similarities between O'Malley and Modell, even if they represent different sports and there is no similarity between the processes that determine who gets in and who is frozen out of each sport's Hall of Fame.

Looking back, but mostly ahead:All things considered, 1993 was a good year for baseball. It brought expansion, along with the expected higher batting averages and ERAs, and avoided a strike or lockout.And it concluded with one of the most exciting finishes in World Series history, with apologies to Mitch Williams, the ringmaster of excitement.But, of all the memorable happenings, the one that stands out for this observer didn't take place on the field. Instead, it happened in the dugout after the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Atlanta Braves to win the National League pennant.

WASHINGTON -- Maryland Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski joined the chairman of the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee yesterday to try and close a loophole that allowed the killer of a Hagerstown couple to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery. Mikulski, a Democrat, and Sen. Larry E. Craig, an Idaho Republican, are pushing an amendment to a defense bill being debated in the Senate this week to prevent any veteran convicted of a capital crime - in either state or federal court - from being buried in a military cemetery, or from receiving military honors at a private cemetery.