ESPN college basketball analyst LEN ELMORE was “treated by paramedics after collapsing” yesterday during a meeting of the Knight Commission on Intercollegiate Athletics. Elmore is a “member of the blue-ribbon reform panel of education, sports and business leaders." He "collapsed" around 11:30am ET "but was seen on his feet about 15 minutes later.” Commission co-Chair and SMU President GERALD TURNER said that Elmore “had said he’d experienced similar episodes that are related to an ongoing health issue that Turner did not specify” (USA TODAY, 10/10).
GETTING POLITICAL: The Olympic Council of Ireland has made golfer RORY MCILROY “an offer it hopes he can't refuse.” OCI President PAT HICKEY said, "I will say to Rory that if he declares for Ireland, then he will automatically put himself in pole position to carry the Irish tricolor into the Olympic Stadium in Rio.” McIlroy as a native of Northern Ireland is “eligible to play for both Ireland and Great Britain in 2016, when golf is re-introduced to the Olympics for the first time since 1904” (GOLFCHANNEL.com, 10/9)....CBS college basketball analyst GREG ANTHONY appears in a MITT ROMNEY ad “saying he voted for PRESIDENT OBAMA but has ‘lost faith’ in him and likes Romney as a ‘no-excuses kind of guy.’” CBS Sports VP/Communications JEN SABATELLE said the net “declines to comment” (USA TODAY, 10/10).
DUTY CALLS: USA TODAY’s Mike Snider reports Nationals P STEPHEN STRASBURG and several members of the team including P DREW STOREN, LF MICHAEL MORSE and C JESUS FLORES “played ‘Call of Duty: Black Ops’ during the offseason as a way to keep in touch.” Strasburg is “so into ‘Call of Duty’ that he visited the game’s developer Treyarch in late April when the team was in Los Angeles to play the Dodgers to get a sneak peek at ‘Black Ops II,’ due out Nov. 13” (USA TODAY, 10/10).
STRONG CONTRIBUTION: ESPN.com’s Michael Rothstein reported Univ. of Michigan football coach BRADY HOKE “purchased more than 40 #chuckstrong T-shirts for his staff to wear on Saturday when the Wolverines play Illinois.” Michigan Associate Dir/Public & Media Relations for Football JUSTIN DICKENS said that the shirts will be “worn by Hoke and the staff during the day leading up to the game but not during the game itself.” Dickens added that Hoke “paid for the shirts, valued at $20 each on the Colts website, himself” (ESPN.com, 10/9).
NAMES: Late Blue Jays radio announcer TOM CHEEK and longtime Expos and current Blue Jays French-speaking radio announcer JACQUES DOUCET “are among 10 finalists for the Ford C. Frick Award.” The finalists “were announced Tuesday and the award will be presented at the baseball winter meetings on Dec. 4” (CP, 10/9)....The Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation has “reconstructed four city rinks and given kids a place to play hockey” with a $6.5M contribution to “match a grant from the Commonwealth’s Redevelopment Assistance Capital Program” (PHILLY.com, 10/9)….Panthers RB JONATHAN STEWART will “contribute $250,000 toward the construction of the state-of-the-art Casanova Center expansion project, which will house the athletics department’s entire football operations.” Stewart’s donation to the Univ. of Oregon will be "specifically earmarked for endowment of the Running Backs’ Squad Room, which will be located in the teaching wing of the 135,000 square-foot facility” (OREGONLIVE.com, 10/9)....Houghton MifflinHarcourt has moved up the publishing date of “Francona: The Red Sox Years.” The book by new Indians Manager TERRY FRANCONA and Boston Globe columnist DAN SHAUGHNESSY was “previously scheduled to hit shelves in May, but will now go on sale Feb. 5” (BOSTON GLOBE, 10/10)….Athletes First has commissioned sports & entertainment publicity firm CMPR for areas of exclusive representation in publicity, events, branding as well as social and digital media (CMPR).
IN MEMORY: Former Chicago Daily News and Chicago Sun-Times sports editor JOE REIN passed away yesterday at the age of 99. Rein “worked his way up from a part-time copy boy at the Daily News to its sports editor when the newspaper closed in 1977.” He then “served as the sports editor of the Sun-Times.” Rein’s sports career “spanned 49 years” (CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 10/10).
