June 08, 1998 | Volume 88, Issue 23

So I was walking home from that new Robert Redford movie when I heard somebody in the alley go, "Hey, buddy."

June 19, 1978

If Jordan wants to leave because of problems with management, then shame on the front office for not repaying him for all he has done for that franchise.—Rob Del Muro, Greenlawn, N.Y.

Letters to SPORTS ILLUSTRATED should include the name, address and home telephone number of the writer. They may be mailed to The Editor, SPORTS ILLUSTRATED, Time & Life Building, New York,...

He Ain't So Heavy

•That Zen master Phil Jackson recapture his inner peace and quit whining about the refs.•That the U.S. soccer team fare better in France than U.S. men tennis players did.•That beanball pitchers...

Departments

SPORTS ILLUSTRATED and CNN team up on the Internet to offer up-to-the-minute sports news. Follow the NBA Finals with our real-time scoreboards and analysis from SI's Phil Taylor and Marty Bums....

250Fine, in dollars, threatened by Royals manager Tony Muser—who had instructed his team to use sunblock—against any Kansas City player to suffer a sunburn during a day off between games against...

HOME RUNSIn each of the last three seasons in which they played 100 games, Mark McGwire and Ken Griffey Jr. have been zeroing in on 61 dingers. RBIs? Please. No one's come within 30 of Hack...

On the seventh day they rested...and on the eighth, ninth and 10th. The way the Utah Jazz talked last week, the team's most fearsome opponent on the road to the Finals wasn't a Western Conference...

Designer Ralph Lauren's company, Polo, is suing to force the 23-year-old official magazine of the U.S. Polo Association to give up the name Polo.

MATTHEW BARNABYBuffalo Sabres right wing, on his team's response to Washington Capitals coach Ron Wilson's attempt to goad the Sabres by calling them "chicken": "I don't think anyone is smart...

Saturday 6/6French Open Women's Final

Steve Martin said it best: "Some people have a way with words and others...not have way." Even if tú no hablas español, you can appreciate the panache that play-by-play man Andrés Cantor brings to...

Chris Martinez, Simi Valley, Calif.BaseballChris, a senior second baseman at Chaminade High, hit 20 home runs this season, the most ever by a California schoolboy. He also batted .406 for the...

UnwaveringAn unidentified water-skier, practicing for a competition in Liverpool, Australia, performs barefoot, backward and upside down.

Red Wings goaltender Chris Osgood has allowed some soft goals in the playoffs, but he's determined to dispel Motown's doubts about whether he's Cup-worthy

Quick, who has scored more goals in the last four years than any other player in the league? It's the Capitals' Peter Bondra, hockey's best-kept secret

BASEBALL

The Phillies spent a year wrangling with überagent Scott Boras over J.D. Drew, the second pick in the 1997 June draft. After failing to sign Drew, all the team had to show for its efforts was a...

Shuttling its best players from city to city is nothing new for baseball

Class Dismissed

Goooooaaal-less!

Alan Rothenberg, Who Will conclude his eight-year tenure as president of the U.S. Soccer Federation in August, recently announced Project 2010, a $50 million development plan that includes a...

Clay Pigeons

A Crowd Pleaser

Led by nine-time Olympic gold medalist Carl Lewis (who bowed out last fall), one of the most decorated generations of U.S. track and field athletes is moving toward retirement. Below, a look at...

, NBC's combative and widely reviled NBA pundit, couldn't be more different from his big brother, , the contemplative and widely respected columnist.

For monster power, nothing beats a Jason Zuback drive

"Miss the green in Calcutta, and you might step on a cobra. That will make you hit the ball straight," says Steve Flesch, a 31-year-old lefty from Kentucky who played the Asian tour from 1993 to...

I don't buy the idea that golf is too expensive. You may say it's outrageous to pay $300 to play Pebble Beach, but I say it's cheap. Where else can you get a piece of heaven for a price like that?

Mattiace's Burden: Len Mattiace, a fan favorite since he fell short at the Players Championship after hitting two balls into the water at 17 with his family on hand, finished 31st at the Memorial...

TouringStyx 'n' Stones 'n' Flounders

What do these players have in common?

Nonchalantly adding to a monster year, Fred Couples made winning the Memorial look easy

Check the followers, not the leaders, for the lowdown on low scores

19Age of NCAA players of the year Bryce Molder of Georgia Tech and Grace Park of Arizona State, both of whom were playing high school golf a year ago.

PGA

Loose talk by the new USGA president has an entire industry on edge

Making up for recent disasters in the NCAAs, UNLV went all the way last week