BASEBALL

POLL: BONDS QUEST DRAWS LITTLE SUPPORT FROM FANS

Only about four in 10 baseball fans are rooting for Barry Bonds to break the career home run record and most think he knowingly took steroids, according to a poll show ing stark racial divisions in how the San Francisco Giants‘ slugger is viewed.

Still, most fans think Bonds should end up in the Hall of Fame He has 10 homers this season and 744 lifetime — 11 shy of Hank Aaron’s record, one of the most revered in sports.

In the poll by ABC News and ESPN, 37% said they are rooting for Bonds to break Aaron’s record while 52% said they hope he falls short and 11% had no opinion Twenty-eight percent of whites and nearly 75% of blacks said they were hoping Bonds succeeds.

Associated Press

METS, ARAMARK SUED BY LAWYER HURT BY DRUNKEN FAN

The Mets and Aramark Corp. which runs concessions at 13 Major League Baseball stadiums were sued by a lawyer who said a drunken fan fell on her during last month’s home opener and broke one of her vertebrae.

Ellen Massey, who is in private practice in Manhattan, said she was injured April 9 while sitting in the upper deck above right field at Shea Stadium. An unidentified male spectator seated about four rows behind her, who Massey said was “visibly intoxicated,” first spilled beer on her and then tumbled on top of her, she said in a law suit filed in New York Supreme Court on May 3.

The man, who Massey and her lawyers said hasn’t been identified, stumbled away and vanished into the crowd. Massey described him as “acting in a rowdy, boisterous and dangerous manner” from drinking beer sold by the Aramark vendor.

Bloomberg News

TENNIS

U.S. OPEN, CBS REDO RIGHTS DEAL

The U.S. Open and CBS have agreed to a new six-year deal worth about $145 million for broadcasting the Grand Slam tennis tournament.

They tore up the last three years of an agreement that was to run through 2008; the new deal was agreed to last year and runs through 2011, the USTA said yesterday.

It also gives CBS the rights to events in the U.S. Open Series, the circuit of hard-court warmup tournaments leading up to the season’s last major.

FEDERER, NADAL RENEW THEIR RIVALRY IN DOUBLES

Roger Federer and Rafael Nadal have met on clay, grass, and hard courts, and even in a half-grass, half-clay court exhibition last week.

Yesterday, the top two players tried another version of the game — doubles.

Nadal teamed with Carlos Moya to beat Federer and his Davis Cup teammate Stanislas Wawrinka 6–4, 7–6 (5) in the first round of the Rome Masters.

“I’m getting to know him pretty well,” Federer said. “It was fun.”

Associated Press

BASKETBALL

NBA SAYS DON NELSON CAN’T TAKE BEER INTO INTERVIEWS

The National Basketball Association told Golden State Warriors coach Don Nelson that he can’t bring beer into the postgame interview room.

“We talked to the team,” NBA spokesman Tim Frank said in an e-mail. “It won’t happen anymore.”

Nelson, 66, brought a can of Bud Light into the interview room on more than one occasion during his team’s opening-round upset of the top-seeded Dallas Mavericks.

Bloomberg News