ScoreTouchDowns

Nolan to start opener; Jerry to build new stadium: What is today?


Hicks to buy Cats

Outgoing Texas Rangers owner Tom Hicks has agreed to purchase the Fort Worth Cats. Cats owner Carl Bell, who brought the Cats back to Fort Worth in 2001 after an almost four-decade absence, has been attempting to sell the team for almost a year.

Hicks has agreed to sell the Texas Rangers, and while technically still the team's owner, he said he had already started to miss owning a baseball team during the sale process.

Ryan gets Opening Day nod

Nolan Ryan will throw out the first pitch for the Texas Rangers' home opener Monday.

Not the ceremonial first pitch -- the game's first pitch.

The 63-year-old Ryan, who last pitched in 1993, will be the Rangers' Opening Day starter in a surprise announcement from the team.

Although the ownership transfer of the Rangers from Tom Hicks to a group headed by Chuck Greenberg and Ryan appears a few weeks from taking place, the decision reflects the incoming owners' pledge to listen to Rangers fans and give them the baseball experience they want.

"I don't know who wouldn't want to see Nolan Ryan pitch again," Rangers manager Ron Washington said. "I'm just not sure if I'm going to be able to walk out to the mound to pull my boss from the game."

General manager Jon Daniels said everyone in the organization was in agreement to give the starting nod to Ryan.

"Nolan gives us that veteran presence every team wants to see on the mound to start a new season," Daniels said. "This is not a gimmick. Nolan can still bring it."

TMS to host Super Bowl in 2014

The Super Bowl appears to be returning to North Texas sooner than expected.

Although the NFL will not announce the host site for its next available Super Bowl -- in 2014 -- until next year's Super Bowl in Arlington, multiple sources say that it is all but a done deal that Super Bowl XLVIII will be played at Texas Motor Speedway.

"You know I rarely decline to comment on things," TMS president Eddie Gossage said in a statement, "but this is one report I cannot comment on."

"However, I have said many times that hosting one NASCAR race is like hosting several Super Bowls in one day. And you could fit four Cowboys Stadiums inside Texas Motor Speedway, so I know that the Great American Speedway certainly is capable of hosting a Super Bowl."

Jerry ready to build new, updated stadium

The question of which NFL team would attempt to build a stadium bigger and better than Cowboys Stadium has been answered: the Dallas Cowboys.

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones said he plans to build a new Cowboys stadium at a site to be determined to replace the $1.25 billion Cowboys Stadium that opened last year in Arlington.

"In Cowboys Stadium's short and successful history," Jones said, "we have been able to attract every type of sporting event we could ever hope to host. Those who know me know that I am not one to become content and rest on laurels.

"For that reason, I believe now is the time to begin the process of building a new stadium so that we can bring to our fans the first-time, bigger-and-better events that they have enjoyed over the past year and deserve to experience again."

Jones declined to say what type of budget he expects to have for the new project or in which city he anticipates the stadium will be built, but said it definitely would improve upon the current facility.

"We are only in the preliminary stages at this point," Jones said, "so any speculation in those regards would be premature."

Jones did say, however, his list of events he would like to bring to the new stadium will look familiar to area fans: Super Bowl, NCAA Final Four, NBA All-Star Game, Professional Bull Riding, college basketball and football games, international soccer matches and concerts, plus either a Winter or Summer Olympics.

"We raised the bar with Cowboys Stadium," Jones said. "Now we're going to raise it again."

The 2009 TCU Horned Frogs did, in fact, complete the program's first undefeated football season since 1938, but the news comes too late to boost the team's claims to a national championship.

Boise State has been ordered to forfeit its 17-10 Fiesta Bowl victory over TCU because of an ineligible player.



Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/03/31/2081667/nolan-to-pitch-opener-jerry-to.html#ixzz0jpUS4I5Y