Morning State Sports Briefs: Driver ready to return for another season with Packers
Wisconsin Sports-- The Green Bay Packers’ all-time leading receiver will apparently return for his 14th season. Donald Driver’s agent tells WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee that the two sides have agreed to terms on a restructured contract – and the deal will be finalized today.
GREEN BAY - The Green Bay Packers’ all-time leading receiver will apparently return for his 14th season. Donald Driver’s agent tells WTMJ-TV in Milwaukee that the two sides have agreed to terms on a restructured contract – and the deal will be finalized today.
Also, the 37-year-old Driver tweeted “It is now true – Packer for life.” No contract details have come out so far. The day after the Packers’ playoff loss in January, Driver said he wanted to keep playing, either with Green Bay or somebody else. As time went on, Driver said he wanted to stay with the Packers – and he would take a pay cut to do it. Driver is due to get a one-and-a-half million dollar roster bonus on the first day of training camp, and his base salary for this fall is two-point-six million dollars. Meanwhile, four other receivers are returning – and the Packers are trying to find room for prospects Diondre Borel and Tori Gurley. Last year, both players were given pay raises when other teams tried to claim them off Green Bay’s practice squad.
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The NBA Draft Lottery takes place tonight. And for the second year in a row, the Milwaukee Bucks will get a chance to move up from their current Number-12 spot in the June draft. The odds are not good. Milwaukee only has a two-and-a-half percent chance of getting one of the top-three picks in the draft. And the odds of nailing the top pick are just seven-tenths-of-one-percent – similar to the Bucks’ odds in 2005 when they landed Andrew Bogut as the Number-One pick. This year, Bucks’ general manager John Hammond says his team should get a quality player in the first round, no matter what happens. He says it will be a deep draft, and he hopes the player the Bucks select can make an immediate contribution. Ohio State center Jared Sullinger, North Carolina center Tyler Zeller, and Kentucky forward Terrence Jones could all be available at the 12th spot. Kentucky freshman power forward Anthony Davis is expected to be the Number-One pick.
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The Northwoods League will open its 19th season of baseball tonight. It gives college players a chance to see what a minor league schedule and travel regiment are like. They’ll play for 16 teams in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, and Ontario. Their season will have two halves, with an All-Star Game in July and playoffs in August. Brainerd bowed out of the Northwoods League this year. A new team partially owned by Milwaukee Brewers’ Hall-of-Famer Robin Yount will debut in a new stadium in Mequon. The Lakeshore Chinooks have already gotten some nice publicity, thanks to TV ads during Brewers’ games which feature Yount, Brewers’ GM Doug Melvin, and several others. The Chinooks are the seventh Northwoods League team in Wisconsin. The others are in La Crosse, Wausau, Madison, Eau Claire, Wisconsin Rapids, and Green Bay. Also, the Saint Cloud team has new ownership – and they’ve changed their name from the River Bats to the Rox. Battle Creek of Michigan won the Northwoods title a year ago. And for the first time, the league attracted a total of over 900,000 fans to its games – a record for a summer collegiate league with almost 1,700 per game.
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Racine native Donald Johnson, a former CEO of Chicago’s Western Golf Association, has died at age 77. Johnson led the group from 1988 until he retired in 2009. It runs several tournaments in the Chicago area, including the BMW Championship which is part of the PGA’s Fed-Ex Cup playoffs. The group also sponsors the Evans Scholars’ Foundation, which sponsors college scholarships.
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SCORES
In the Midwest League…
Peoria 4, Wisconsin 3 in 14 innings
Beloit 5, Kane County 4 in 11 innings
Burlington 7, Clinton 2
Quad Cities 3, Cedar Rapids 1
Lansing 10, Lake County 9
Great Lakes 6, South Bend 5 in 10 innings
Bowling Green 8, Fort Wayne 2
West Michigan 8, Dayton 0
Tags: wisconsin sports, proam, sports, packers, bucks
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