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AL notebook

By MARC TOPKIN, Times wires

© St. Petersburg Times, published October 6, 2000

Tired A's arrive two hours late

NEW YORK -- Playing the games might be the easy part for the A's. Certainly easier than getting to New York.

The A's arrived about two hours late Thursday night after a bizarre journey that saw them make a one-hour stopover in Salina, Kan., then be diverted from LaGuardia airport to Newark and then back to LaGuardia when the plane nearly ran out of fuel.

"We're miserable and grumpy," third baseman Eric Chavez said after arriving at the team hotel around 9 p.m.

The A's left the bay area around 10:30 a.m. Pacific time expecting their chartered plane to fly non-stop to New York. But with severe weather on the east coast, they were forced to stop in Salina to be re-fueled. A planned 25-minute stopover led to an hour delay as they were told they would lose their landing slot at LaGuardia because President Clinton was supposedly going to be at the airport about the time the A's would be.

They then took off re-routed to Newark, with travel director Mickey Morabito scrambling to have the two team buses and equipment truck relocated, but were delayed by bad weather and put in a holding pattern.

After they circled Newark for about 40 minutes, Morabito said the pilot told him, "We're going to run out of gas; we've got to land somewhere."

By then, LaGuardia had opened up, and they were diverted back there and landed safely, with the buses and equipment truck making it back just as the plane touched down.

A's manager Art Howe said the delay wasn't a big deal and shouldn't affect his team's play tonight. Asked if the whole team was indeed grumpy, Howe said: "I hope so."

Starting pitcher Tim Hudson, who spent time in the cockpit during the Salina delay, wearily insisted he was ready to go. "I'm weathered," he said.

BUNNY EARS: Yankees manager Joe Torre has an idea how to prevent further embarrassing incidents like Luis Sojo tripping over his shoelace in Wednesday's game. "I think we have to start using Velcro like my (4-year-old) daughter instead of shoelaces," Torre said.

EL DUQUE BUENO: The Yankees will start Orlando "El Duque" Hernandez, who is 5-0 with a 1.02 ERA in six post-season games. The secret to his success? "I've been lucky," Hernandez said through an interpreter.

MISSING IN ACTION: Hudson won 20 (and lost six) this season, but none against the Yankees. What did Torre think about not seeing him all season? "I thought we were very fortunate," Torre cracked.

"Watching him pitch on TV, he pitched for me in the All-Star Game, he has that look in his eye. He has that look of confidence: "Yeah, I know I'm young, but I can get you out.' He certainly is a throwback type of guy. He doesn't give in." LOW RATINGS: The season debut of NBC's Emmy-winning White House drama West Wing pulled in more than three times as many TVs as Fox's coverage of Game 2 of the division series between the Yankees and Athletics.

New York's 4-0 victory Wednesday night got a 5.3 Nielsen rating, the worst prime-time baseball playoff number for Fox since it started showing post-season games in 1996.

The two hours of West Wing drew a 16.3 rating and 25 share.

"We're not surprised with the rating; we were going up against season premieres," Fox Sports spokesman Dan Bell said.

NBC's telecast Tuesday of the playoff opener between Oakland and New York registered a 3.7 with a 6 share, the lowest-rated division series game ever on a network.

That game went up against the first presidential election debate between Al Gore and George W. Bush, which drew a combined 31.7 rating on wide airing.

A rating point represents just over 1-million television households. Share is the percentage of in-use TVs tuned to a program.

MARINERS: Outfielder Rickey Henderson jammed his left index finger sliding into third, but expects to play today.

ORIOLES: Outfielder Trenidad Hubbard was released. He played little after being acquired from Atlanta in July.

WHITE SOX: Sore-armed James Baldwin is scheduled to start today. Manager Jerry Manuel said he would pull Baldwin in the first inning if he wasn't effective and might replace him with Sean Lowe, scheduled to start Game 4.

ANGELS: Outfielder Tim Salmon had surgery on his right foot and is expected to be fully recovered for spring training.

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