LOCAL

LOCAL
Boxing
YOUNGSTOWN -- The three Salinas brothers -- Juan, Alejandro and Julian -- are representing the Youngstown Southside Boxing Club at the Ohio Silver Gloves Tournament at the Bethlehem Community Center in Toledo today and Saturday.
The tournament is for Junior Olympic boxers ages of 8 to 15.
Jack Loew has trained them since they started boxing.
"If all my fighters trained like these three guys, I would never have a worry in the world about anybody's conditioning," said Loew.
Juan, 13, has a 15-9 record and will fight in the 106-pound weight class. He was the 2004 National Silver Gloves runner-up at Olathe, Kan. Alejandra, 11, who is known as "Popo" will take a 7-2 record into the 70-pound weight class. Nine-year-old Julian, called Nano, will fight in the 65-pound weight class with a 2-0 mark.
Winners advance to the Region 2 championships at Defiance, Ohio. Those winners advance to the national meet in Lenexa, Kan.
REGION
Pirates moves
PITTSBURGH -- Right-hander Brandon Duckworth, who spent time early last season in the Houston Astros' rotation, agreed to a minor league contract with the Pittsburgh Pirates.
Marty McLeary and Nerio Rodriguez, two other right-handers with major league experience, also agreed to minor league deals with the Pirates.
Duckworth was 0-1 with an 11.20 ERA in seven games with Houston last season and is 16-21 with a 5.34 ERA in 91 career games with the Phillies and Astros. Right-handed reliever Scott Strickland, who also spent time with Houston last season, previously signed a minor league contract with Pittsburgh.
McLeary pitched in three games with the San Diego Padres in 2004 before going 5-8 with a 4.75 ERA in 41 games with Class Triple-A Portland last season.
Cavs waive Hamilton
CLEVELAND -- Backup center Zendon Hamilton was waived Thursday by the Cleveland Cavaliers hours before the club would have had to pay his full $719,000 salary for the season.
Hamilton averaged 2.3 points and 4.2 minutes in 11 games for the Cavs, who signed him to a non-guaranteed contract before the season. Cavs coach Mike Brown said there was a possibility Hamilton could re-join the club on a 10-day contract.
Blue Jackets moves
COLUMBUS -- Columbus Blue Jackets on Thursday activated defenseman Bryan Berard from injured reserve.
Berard has missed seven games with a lower back injury. He has six goals and 13 assists in 32 games this season with five-power play goals and one game-winner for the Blue Jackets.
The Blue Jackets signed Berard to a two-year contract in August.
NATION
Rose Bowl ratings
NEW YORK -- Texas' last-minute victory over Southern California in the Rose Bowl drew the highest rating for a college football game in 19 years.
ABC Sports' broadcast of Texas' 41-38 victory Wednesday night got a 21.7 rating, a 59 percent increase from the 13.7 for USC's win over Oklahoma in the Orange Bowl in last year's Bowl Championship Series national title game.
The Rose Bowl drew the highest rating since the 25.1 for Penn State's victory over Miami in the Fiesta Bowl on Jan. 2, 1987.
The rating is the percentage watching a program among the all television households, and each point for over-the-air networks represents 1,096,000 homes. The share is the percentage tuned in among those homes with TVs in use at the time.
Bills hire Levy
ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Hall of Fame coach Marv Levy was hired as the Buffalo Bills' vice president of football operations, returning to the team he led to an unprecedented four straight Super Bowl appearances in the 1990s.
In becoming the NFL's oldest active front office executive, Levy -- who referred to himself as "an 80-year-old rookie" -- takes over a struggling team that's coming off a 5-11 season and missed the playoffs for the sixth straight year.
The move comes a day after the Bills fired president and general manager Tom Donahoe.
NASCAR HOF
CHARLOTTE, N.C. -- NASCAR has narrowed the possible sites for its first official Hall of Fame to Atlanta, Charlotte or Daytona Beach, Fla., and expects to pick a winning city by the end of March.
"Based upon the proposals that we have reviewed internally for the past several months, we believe these three cities provide us with the best opportunity to build and develop a world-class NASCAR Hall of Fame for our millions of loyal fans," Mark Dyer, NASCAR's vice president for licensing, said Thursday in a statement.
The decision eliminates Richmond, Va., and Kansas City., Kan. from consideration.
Vindicator staff/wire reports