Internet

New way for Wells to offer opinions

The New York Yankees might have some more fines to hand out.

David Wells, who made headlines and earned a $100,000 fine with his irreverent biography this month, signed an agreement Thursday with Tampa's Studio 419, which will produce the veteran pitcher's official Internet site at boomer33.com.

"As we've come to know, his opinions are something people enjoy reading, unless they're about you," Studio 419 president Pete Larios said. "We expect David to be very involved with his Web site, and he should have a lot of things to say."

Larios said Wells' site should combine the attitude of Warren Sapp's qbkilla.com with the articulate reviews offered by Simeon Rice at simeonrice97.com. Wells, whose site should be up late next week, will share his insights on everything from restaurants to music to, yes, Yankees baseball.

Studio 419 has also reached an agreement with Martin Gramatica and brother Bill on a new site, kick7.com, which will serve as the official home to both NFL kickers. They previously had a site produced by Raymond James at gramaticabrothers.com -- shared with brother Santiago, who kicks for USF. Having a college athlete on that site kept the Gramaticas from selling merchandise to fans, but that won't be an issue on the new site, which has a preview page but will have a full launch next month.

ICE MELTING: Larios' company also hosts the official sites for two Lightning stars at vincentlecavalier.com and bradrichards19.com, but both sites have been stuck in single-page "Coming Soon" mode since before the NHL season started. Both are in the final stages of development and should be launched in time for the Lightning's playoff opener.

Another great player site, khabibulin.com, is busy enough that fans visiting the site are redirected to a page that explains that the site is unavailable because it "exceeded its monthly traffic quota." As they say, there's no such thing as a free site.

BRACKET UPDATE: How intact was your bracket entering Thursday's NCAA men's basketball games? The leader in ESPN.com's Tournament Challenge got 29 of 32 games correct and missed one of the Sweet 16 teams, picking Louisville instead of Butler.

ESPN's contest drew nearly 1-million participants, enough that more than 2,400 brackets predicted Vermont to upset top-seeded Arizona. The leading bracket calls for an Oklahoma-Arizona final, with the Sooners winning 69-65.

WHERE'S LADYBUGS? SI.com goes to the movies this week, riffing on the greatest sports movies, scenes and more. Among the best water-cooler discussions is a list of the five actors who were least convincing as athletes, impressive if only because Michael J. Fox's basketball turn in Teen Wolf only ranks third.

The feature also offers the five greatest sports movie quotes, including a full transcript of Bill Murray's Dalai Lama speech from Caddyshack. It's nice, after all these years, to get an authoritative spelling on "gunga-galunga."

TID-BYTES: The Lightning is bumping up advertising for its return to the playoffs, and ads are in the strangest places. One hawking playoff tickets is in the rotation on the "Transactions" page at SI.com, part of an agreement with AOL Time Warner. ... From the Hope Springs Eternal Dept., a poll at devilrays.com and other AL East team pages asked fans which reliever would lead the division in saves. Tampa Bay's Jesus Colome drew 2 percent of the vote. ... Search engine Lycos.com reports that searches related to the war in Iraq were the second-most popular topic last week. Drawing 1 percent more searches was the NCAA Tournament.

-- If you have a question or comment about the Internet or a site to suggest, e-mail staff writer Greg Auman at auman@sptimes.com .

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