Illinois

Tank Johnson's defense attorney Lorna Propes thought she had an upper hand when she and her client entered a Cook County court room on Thursday. Already armed with Lovie Smith testifying on the behalf of her client, Propes already figured the judge would be too star-struck to decide against her client. When she bumped into Brian Urlacher at the courthouse, Propes thought she had an open and shut case.

Although only playing in a "B" game, White Sox outfielder Scott Podsednik had quite the day Wednesday. Recovering from a sports hernia, the speedy leadoff hitter went 3 for 4 and stole a base against the Rockies. Topping off Podsednik's great day was the fact he got to go home to his wife Lisa Dergan, Playboy's Miss July 1998.

For Sixers coach Maurice Cheeks, something didn't seem right at the Wachovia Center Wednesday night.

When Ben Gordon tossed an alley-oop to rookie Tyrus Thomas and he slammed it down for a reverse dunk in a lane of traffic, a sold out United Center crowd was certain they were in the wrong p

After a scoring frenzy in their last game Saturday, the Blackhawks returned to form Tuesday night getting run out of the building 7-1. Martin Lapointe scored the lone Hawk goal at the end of the third period to at least make sure they weren't shut out in extremely embarrassing fashion.

Despite another awful outing this weekend in Cactus League play, Mark Prior locked up a starting spot with Class A Daytona Cubs. Prior gave up four runs on four hits--including a home run--against the lowly Royals, punching his one-way ticket to the minors, where he will start Thursday.

After filming two commercials playing up the Sox-Cubs rivalry, McDonald's abruptly announced that it would release A.J. Pierzynski from his promotional contract with the corporation.