Powell leaps to the fore...Ueberroth balks at politics...Baseball loses an elder statsman

Landed
The prestigious Sullivan Award, in the arms of record-setting long jumper Mike Powell. The AAU has bestowed the trophy since 1931 to the previous year's outstanding American amateur athlete. Powell leaped 29'4½" at the world championships in Tokyo last August, beating Bob Beamon's 23-year-old world mark by two inches and snapping a 10-year, 65-meet winning streak by Carl Lewis. Said Powell, 28, who finished second to Lewis at the 1988 Seoul Olympics, "The next step is a gold medal."

Fired
Doug Risebrough, as coach of the feckless Calgary Flames, by general manager Doug Risebrough. With six minutes left in Calgary's fourth straight Flame-out, a 6-3 loss to Pittsburgh that he watched from the press box, Risebrough announced the change. Assistant Guy Charron will coach the fifth-place team for the rest of the season. "This is a responsible general manager making the right decision at the right time," said Risebrough, a former Flame captain who led Calgary to a second-place finish in 1990-91, his first season as coach. He took on the added duties of general manager last May, when Cliff Fletcher defected to Toronto.

Suspended
For violating baseball's drug policy, volatile righthander Pascual Perez. After arriving five days late—and 12 pounds underweight—at the New York Yankees' training camp in Fort Lauderdale, Perez tested positive for cocaine use. He was banned for a year, per an agreement he signed in 1989 to win reinstatement after he first tested positive. Perez, 34, forfeits his 1992 salary of $1.9 million. He signed a three-year, $5.7 million deal with the Yanks in November '89, but injuries limited him to 88 innings in two seasons. Perez said he is considering filing a lawsuit to challenge the accuracy of the drug test. "I'm not the bad guy," he said. "The procedure was bad. I did nothing wrong."

Flirted
Peter Ueberroth, the former baseball czar and 1984 Summer Olympics organizer, with a run for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Alan Cranston (D., Calif.). An attorney representing Ueberroth paid a $2,500 filing fee to election officials in conservative Orange County. That would have enabled Ueberroth to battle for the Republican nomination against, among others, Palm Springs mayor Sonny Bono. In classic Ubiespeak, he said the payment would "facilitate a decision either way." Two days later Ueberroth decided not to file the paperwork that would have made his bid official.

Died
Allan Roth, 74, believed to be the first full-time statistician employed by a major league baseball team; on March 3; in Los Angeles. After sharpening his pencil as an NHL stat man, Roth was hired in 1947 by Branch Rickey to chart Brooklyn Dodger games in a revolutionary way. For example, Roth tracked players' batting averages against individual pitchers, how often they pulled the ball and how they hit with runners in scoring position. "Walter Alston doesn't make a move without consulting Roth," a source close to the Dodger manager told SI in 1960. Roth left the Dodgers in '64 to become NBC's baseball statistician and later filled the same role for ABC.

PHOTO

MIKE POWELL/ALLSPORT

In Tokyo, Powell's smile was electric.