| Three weeks until it begins anew
Seems hard to believe, but it's just three weeks until we relocate to Dark Star for six weeks of painful wakeup calls, blissful breezes and copious quantities of coffee. Edwin Pope, the venerable Miami Herald scribe with whom I had the pleasure of working in the same pressbox with on numerous occasions, once wrote: "It is true that spring baseball makes millions more promises than it keeps. But baseball is unlike love. In baseball, making promises means vastly more than keeping them." With that in mind, three teams can enter spring training realistically counting themselves as contenders for the NL East title. (And some members of the Nationals and Marlins might also try to convince themselves their squads have a shot.) The Braves, like the Mets and Phillies, can make a legitimate claim that if things go well — not if things go perfectly, but just if they go well — they can reclaim the NL East title that New York took from them in 2006 and which is presently held by Philly after the Mets' Great September Collapse of '07.
Down $77b and falling
Australian shares plunged a massive 6 per cent this afternoon as panic selling set in among investors over an expected slowdown in global growth.
The benchmark S&P/ASX 200 Share Index had shed more than 6 per cent, down 335.4 points to 5245 points - its lowest since November 2006 - placing the market on course for a record 12th day of declines.
The plunge equated to a $77 billion loss of market value. The latest plunge means the sharemarket has now lost more than 23 per cent of its value since hitting a record high in November and is now officially in a bear market.
The broader All Ordinaries Index was down 294.4 points, or 5.23 per cent, to 5336.5 before noon.
Asian bourses were also softer, with Japan's benchmark Nikkei Share Average Index down 4.8 per cent and the boarder TOPIX index down 4.6 per cent.
Lady Raiders split in volleyball
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Styris retires, Vettori injured
Vettori, who rolled an ankle during training last week, said the injury was improving but he would not participate in the Twenty20 games in Auckland on Tuesday and Christchurch on Thursday. He was also in doubt for the opening one-day international against England next Sunday but would undergo a medical assessment later in the week. Experienced middle-order batsman Scott Styris announced his retirement from Test matches, saying he wanted to focus on the limited over versions of the game with the 2011 World Cup in India as his end goal. "The rigours of international cricket have become increasingly demanding and I would like to extend my career by focusing on shorter versions of the game," the 32-year-old said. "I have found the niggles and injuries associated with the longer form of the game were making it difficult for me to get on to the park." In his 29-Test career, Styris scored 1,586 runs at an average of 36.04 and also proved a handy medium pacer taking 20 wickets at 51.15.
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