| Business News |
Wall Street tumbles, led by financials
(Reuters)
 Reuters - Stocks tumbled more than 2 percent on
Thursday after a report showing yet another drop in U.S. home
sales prompted investors to take profits in financial shares,
which had rallied over the past week.
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Microsoft CEO backs Web spending, "done" with Yahoo
(Reuters)
 Reuters - Chief Executive Steve
Ballmer on Thursday defended Microsoft Corp's need to
make heavy investments in its Internet businesses but said the
company was "done," for now, with pursuing Yahoo Inc .
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Wachovia CFO Wurtz to leave
(Reuters)
Reuters - Wachovia Corp , which posted a
record $8.86 billion second-quarter loss Tuesday, said Chief
Financial Officer Thomas Wurtz will resign from the
fourth-largest U.S. bank after a successor is named.
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Home sales at 10-year low, jobless claims jump
(Reuters)
 Reuters - Jobless claims jumped and the pace
of existing home sales tumbled to a 10-year low as slowing
growth hit hiring and a glut of unsold houses weighed on real
estate, data released on Thursday showed.
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Morgan Stanley aggressively recruiting brokers
(Reuters)
 Reuters - Morgan Stanley said on Thursday
it is poaching brokers from Merrill Lynch and other
rivals, accelerating the expansion of its global wealth
management business during a period of turbulence on Wall
Street.
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Jobless claims jump as housing market gets weaker
(AP)
 AP - Two cornerstones of the economy — jobs and housing — sank to new depths Thursday, with unemployment claims bolting higher and home prices recording one of their steepest drops on record.
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| Young NY filmmakers peek inside Japanese baseball - 13, May 2008 |
By Daniel Trotta
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Bobby Valentine hit only 12 home runs during 10 seasons as a player in Major League Baseball, so he knows something about tough pitches.
Now managing the Chiba Lotte Marines in Japan, Valentine received a relentless pitch from three young filmmakers who wanted to document an entire season of his in Japan. The New York University film students sought to record his life -- from shaving in the morning to agonizing over defeats at night -- over eight months in 2007.
After initially resisting, Valentine gave in, and the result is "The Zen of Bobby V," which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival last month and makes its television debut on the U.S. all-sports channel ESPN 2 on Tuesday May 13.
Valentine was a successful manager in the United States, taking the New York Mets to the 2000 World Series. He was also known for outspokenness and defying convention, making for occasional tumult.
Valentine became a huge celebrity in Japan as the first foreign manager to lead his team to the Japan Series title, in 2005. As the title implies, the film is about more than baseball. It examines how Valentine lives spontaneously, has embraced Japanese culture and how the Japanese in turn have embraced an outsider.
"Some of the bad news is that foreigners aren't accepted and haven't been for a long time. Part of the good news of the story is that I have been, and it wasn't an easy chore. It took a lot of cultural acceptance and change on my part," Valentine said in a telephone interview from Osaka, Japan.
U.S. and Japanese baseball have grown closer in recent years. Major League Baseball has opened its season in Japan three times since 2000. When pitcher Hideo Nomo came to America in 1995, he was the only Japanese player in the "big leagues." This year there are 16, and many of them are stars.
Andrew Jenks, Jonah Quickmire Pettigrew and Andrew Muscato -- all 21 years old at the time -- collaborated on all aspects of the film, turning 500 hours of raw video into a 93-minute documentary that must make them the envy of NYU film school.
(c) 2008 Reuters
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| Other news from Sport category: |
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CHICAGO (Reuters) - Tribune Co on Wednesday narrowed the potential list of bidders for the storied Chicago Cubs baseball team to 3-5 groups bidding $1 billion or more, according to sources briefed on the matter.
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BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq have been banned from next month's Beijing Games because of a government decision to disband the country's National Olympic Committee (NOC), a senior official said on Thursday.
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NAKHABINO, Russia (Reuters) - Twice major winner John Daly is defying doctors' advice and risking serious injury to play in the Russian Open this week.
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NEW YORK (Reuters) - The New York Mets scored two runs in the eighth inning to beat the Philadelphia Phillies 3-1 on Thursday and grab sole possession of first place in the National League East for the first time since April 19.
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TORONTO (Reuters) - A racket-smashing Andy Roddick was shocked 6-4 4-6 6-4 by 19-year-old Croat Marin Cilic in the third round of the Toronto Masters on Thursday.
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SINGAPORE (Reuters) - The agent of U.S. Olympic swimmer Jessica Hardy leapt to her defense on Thursday after media reports said she had tested positive for a banned substance.
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LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Top seed Jelena Jankovic overcame some early jitters before battling to a 7-5 6-2 victory over Vania King at the Los Angeles Classic on Wednesday, the Serb advancing to the third round on a day of several upsets.
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LONDON (Reuters) - Paul Hamm discovered the true meaning of the saying 'all that glitters is not gold' at the Athens Olympics.
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LONDON (Reuters) - A few weeks before the 1988 Seoul Olympic Games, Ben Johnson's race against Carl Lewis over 100 meters in Zurich was one of the most eagerly awaited sporting events of the year.
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TORONTO (Reuters) - The end of Roger Federer's long reign as world number one moved closer when he suffered a shock second-round defeat by Frenchman Gilles Simon at the Toronto Masters on Wednesday.
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