Pair of 51s headed to Beijing

Two members of the 51s -- third baseman Terry Tiffee and right-handed pitcher Mike Koplove -- were among 23 players announced Wednesday to the U.S. baseball team that will participate in the Beijing Olympics.

San Diego State pitcher Stephen Strasburg, whose 23-strikeout performance on April 11 brought him national attention, was the lone college player selected.

Outfielder Matt LaPorta, traded by Milwaukee to Cleveland this month in the CC Sabathia deal, also is on manager Davey Johnson's squad of mostly minor leaguers. Team USA still has one player to be selected to round out the 24-man roster.

The team's first game is against Korea on Aug. 13. Team USA, which won gold in Sydney in 2000, is back in the Olympics after missing out on a bid in 2004.

Tiffee leads the Pacific Coast League at the All-Star break with a .393 average. He also has eight home runs and 59 RBIs. He played in Wednesday's Triple-A All-Star Game in Louisville, Ky., going 0-for-4 with two strikeouts.

Koplove is 1-1 with a 3.40 ERA in 47 2/3 innings and 35 games for Las Vegas.

In addition to the Dodgers, seven other major league organizations landed two players on the Olympic roster: Oakland pitchers Brett Anderson and Trevor Cahill; St. Louis outfielder Colby Rasmus and infielder Brian Barden; Angels infielder Matthew Brown and pitcher Kevin Jepsen; Philadelphia infielder Jason Donald and catcher Louis Marson; Colorado outfielder Dexter Fowler and pitcher Casey Weathers; Detroit infielder Mike Hessman and pitcher Blaine Neal; and LaPorta and pitcher Jeff Stevens of the Indians.

The U.S. team features 14 Triple-A players, seven Double-A players and Baltimore pitcher Jake Arrieta as the lone Single-A representative.

Players who weren't on 25-man major league rosters as of June 26 were eligible for selection to the U.S. team. The American roster must be set by July 22.

• NBC ROSTER -- Bob Costas will be back in Beijing for his seventh Olympics as prime-time host of NBC's coverage, but this time, he'll be getting out a little more.

NBC announced its roster of announcers and commentators for the Beijing Games, which will begin Aug. 6. NBC's 106 on-air announcers have won 42 Olympic medals among them, including 25 gold medals.

Costas will be leaving the studio to appear more at Olympic venues, an approach tested out this summer when he was at U.S. Olympics Trials for swimming and gymnastics, said NBC Sports spokesman Brian Walker.

NBC's roster includes a mix of old and new. Jim Lampley, who will anchor NBC's afternoon telecasts, is working his 14th Olympic Games. 2000 Olympics gold medalist Rulon Gardner is among NBC's additions, working as a commentator for the wrestling competition with play-by-play announcer Matt Devlin.

Famed gymnastics coach Bela Karolyi is also joining NBC's team as a commentator in his sport.

Cris Collinsworth will join the Olympics crew as a roving correspondent. Mary Carillo, who will host NBC's late-night coverage, is doing segments introducing U.S. residents to Chinese culture. Essayist Jimmy Roberts will be back to fill a similar role.

Former ESPN voice Bill Patrick will make his debut as Olympic host, working on the MSNBC telecasts.

• BOXING -- USA Boxing reinstated Luis Yanez to the Olympic team, more than two weeks after the light flyweight was kicked off the Beijing roster for missing several weeks of workouts.

Yanez was dropped from the team after he was absent for most of June from the Olympic team's residency training program in Colorado Springs, Colo. Coach Dan Campbell and USA Boxing CEO Jim Millman said they didn't hear from Yanez, who was home in Duncanville, Texas, until shortly before they sent a formal letter setting a final deadline for his return.

Yanez agreed to pay a fine, undergo sports counseling and make a public apology. He also will personally apologize to his teammates and keep from making public remarks on the case.

Yanez reached his deal for reinstatement just two days after USA Boxing's judicial committee upheld the organization's decision to ban him. Yanez was scheduled to put his case before an independent arbitrator this week.

• TRACK AND FIELD -- Double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius fell short in Lucerne, Switzerland, of the 400-meter qualifying time he needed to make the Olympics, though the personal best he ran could still get him to Beijing in the 4x400 relay.

The 21-year-old South African shrugged off a pre-race distraction of threatened legal action against the IAAF and finished third in his heat in 46.25 seconds.

Though still outside the Olympic individual qualifying standard of 45.55, it was 11 hundredths of a second faster than his previous best.

South Africa selectors will choose their team for the Aug. 8 to 24 Beijing Games by the weekend and can invite him to join the six-man roster for the relay.

Pistorius won an appeal at the Court of Arbitration for Sport in May to overturn an IAAF ban that prevented him from competing against able-bodied runners.

• GYMNASTICS -- Morgan Hamm's spot on the U.S. Olympic team is secure.

USA Gymnastics said that a warning Hamm received this month for getting a prescribed anti-inflammatory shot without proper clearance from anti-doping authorities did not affect his qualification to the team.

Hamm's results from the second day of the national championships were wiped out as part of his punishment. Results from that day, as well as the first day of nationals and two days of Olympic Trials, were used to help determine the U.S. team for Beijing.

The men's selection committee reran the numbers, taking Hamm's punishment into account, and the result was the same, said Steve Penny, president of USA Gymnastics.

• GOLF -- Golf's major governing bodies stepped up their campaign to get the sport added to the Olympic program in 2016, naming former LPGA commissioner Ty Votaw to lead the effort.

Votaw, now an executive vice president of the PGA Tour, will be loaned out from that post in the next 15 months to represent seven of the bigger hitters in the game: both the American and European tours, Royal & Ancient, LPGA, U.S. Golf Association, PGA of America and Augusta National Golf Club, home of the Masters.

The IOC will decide in October 2009 on possible changes in the Olympic program at the same meeting where it picks the host city for the 2016 Summer Games.

Golf hasn't been an Olympic sport since 1904.