SPORTS DIGEST || Byrd out for season after failed PED test

Byrd out for season after failed PED test

Cleveland

Marlon Byrd’s second strike with performance-enhancing drugs cost him a full season — and his career. The Indians veteran outfielder was suspended 162 games without pay by Major League Baseball on Wednesday after testing positive for Ipamorelin, a growth hormone releasing peptide.

It’s Byrd’s second violation of Major League Baseball’s Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program. Shortly after he was released in 2012 by Boston, Byrd served a 50-game suspension for testing positive for Tamoxifen, a medication used by body builders but also to treat breast cancer.

In 2014, MLB increased its penalty for a second offense from 100 games to a full season.

Phantom Fireworks, Cavs announce contest

YOUNGSTOWN

The Phantom Fireworks and Cleveland Cavaliers have teamed up for a contest to give away two tickets for a NBA Finals game.

One winner will be chosen. The date of the game is to be determined. To sign up and find out more details regarding the contest, please visit www.fireworks.com

Big XII wants expansion settled soon

irving, texas

Big 12 Commissioner Bob Bowlsby wants conference leaders to make decisions one way or the other on the lingering topics of expansion, a football championship game and a league network by the end of the summer.

Athletic directors spent about 90 minutes during the Big 12 spring meetings Wednesday in what were termed “philosophical discussions” about those issues that will ultimately be decided by the league’s board of directors comprised of school presidents and chancellors.

The 10 directors, which include interim leaders at Baylor, Kansas State and Texas Tech, will join the conference meetings Thursday and Friday. They will have a significant amount of data to discuss this week and consider into the summer when returning to their campuses.

Baylor commits seeking release

waco, texas

Seven members of Baylor’s incoming football recruiting class are requesting to be released from their letters of intent.

The class was ranked 17th in the nation, the best in Baylor history, but after the school fired head coach Art Briles, the players want to look elsewhere.

The school now has 30 days to decide whether they will release each player from their letters of intent.

Briles was fired from his position on May 26 following a review of how the university handled several accusations of sexual misconduct by football players.

Mickelson disappointed

DUBLIN

Phil Mickelson said he was disappointed to get caught up in a federal investigation that linked him to an insider trader scheme and that he needed to be more responsible for the company he keeps off the golf course.

“I feel excited to start playing golf again,” he said Wednesday. “I feel excited to have that part behind me and move forward.”

It was his first public appearance since Mickelson was named in a federal complaint that accused Las Vegas gambler Billy Walters and Thomas Davis, a former corporate board member of Dean Foods Co., of making tens of millions of dollars in illicit stock trades.

Mickelson was spared criminal charges. The Securities and Exchange Commissioner alleges he benefited only from the misdeeds of others. Mickelson agreed to repay the $931,000 (plus interest) he made in a single trade of Dean Foods in the summer of 2012.

It was the second time in two years that Mickelson met the media at the Memorial to talk about stock deals instead of his short game. FBI agents met him after his first round of the 2014 Memorial to ask him about Walters during an insider trading investigation. Mickelson said that week he had done nothing wrong.

Staff/wire report