Spurs guard Ginobili out 10-14 days with injury

(Reuters) - San Antonio Spurs guard Manu Ginobili is expected to miss 10-14 days due to a strained left hamstring, the National Basketball Association team said on Monday.
The third-leading scorer on the Southwest division-leading Spurs was injured in the final minute of the first half of San Antonio's 106-88 victory over Minnesota on Sunday.
Ginobili, 35, who has already dealt with back spasms, a left quadriceps bruise and a thigh bruise this season, is second on the Spurs with an average of 4.6 assists per game.
(Reporting by Larry Fine in New York; Editing by Frank Pingue)

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Golden era for QBs, with great stories around NFL

NEW YORK (AP) — The two kids from Northern California burst from NFL afterthought to championship contender in eerily similar fashion a decade apart.
Tom Brady and Colin Kaepernick, each playing in a conference title game this weekend, are bookends to a fortuitous moment in quarterback history. On one side are the likes of Brady, Peyton Manning and Drew Brees, still scintillating in their mid-30s.
On the other are Kaepernick, a second-year player, and the brilliant class of rookies with Andrew Luck, Robert Griffin III and Russell Wilson leading their teams to the playoffs.
Young, old and in between, the current crop of NFL quarterbacks is not only deep but dynamic and diverse.
"We're in a little bit of a boom right now. We're flowing a little bit, especially young players," Hall of Famer Steve Young said last week. "If those guys continue to develop, we'll have a period of time here, kind of a Camelot of quarterbacking."
The depth of the position shows in the other two guys joining the Patriots' Brady and the 49ers' Kaepernick in the conference championship games. Atlanta's Matt Ryan and Baltimore's Joe Flacco were first-round draft picks in 2008, and for all their successes, they're probably low on the list when fans think of the most dominant NFL quarterbacks.
Yet here they are a win away from the Super Bowl after leading stirring comebacks that answered many doubts about each.
Quarterback has long been the glamour position of all of sports, but it seems even a bit more glamorous right now. Rule changes favor a wide-open passing game, which makes a superior quarterback more valuable. Colleges and high schools run more sophisticated offenses, and the best athletes gravitate to quarterback then develop into polished passers who happen to be able to scramble.
"I can't remember — even though this is a quarterback-driven league — as many remarkable and compelling stories on the quarterback side as you're seeing this year," CBS Sports chairman Sean McManus said.
There was that brief stretch less than 15 years ago when Trent Dilfer and Brad Johnson won Super Bowls, and it seemed perhaps championship teams didn't need a star at the position. Since then, here's the roll call of victorious quarterbacks: Brady, Ben Roethlisberger, both Manning brothers, Brees and Aaron Rodgers.
Twenty-five of the 46 Super Bowl MVPs have been quarterbacks, but now it's five of the last six. In the half-dozen years before that, four were non-QBs, including two defensive players.
"It ebbs and flows, no question. There's some dark times where you have two or three guys that can truly do it," said Young, Kaepernick's forerunner as a dual-threat San Francisco QB and now an ESPN analyst.
Jimmy Johnson, who won two Super Bowls with future Hall of Famer Troy Aikman as his quarterback for the Dallas Cowboys, was talking to Bill Belichick last summer about the recent shift. Belichick has won three championships with Brady, but even as of a few years ago, both coaches believed a title was possible behind a strong defense and running game.
Not anymore, they agreed.
"Now, the only thing that matters is if you get a great quarterback," said Johnson, now a Fox commentator.
Of this year's playoff teams, the only one without great stability at quarterback was Minnesota. And the Vikings had a guy named Adrian Peterson.
The bottom of the standings is full of clubs with uncertainty at the position: from the Chiefs and Jaguars to the Eagles, Cardinals and Jets.
This year, 20 quarterbacks started every regular-season game, nearly two-thirds of the league. That's by far the most since the NFL went to a 16-game season in 1978, according to STATS, four more than the previous high.
That record partly reflects a lack of injuries, in which all those rules protecting the QB may be a factor — along with, of course, sheer luck. But it also reflects how few teams benched their quarterbacks. Most clubs are quite happy with their current situation.
For all the quarterback intrigue in the playoffs, consider the big names who didn't qualify for the postseason: Brees, Eli Manning, Roethlisberger, Tony Romo, Cam Newton. And then there's Tim Tebow, who may never start again as an NFL QB but is still one of the most recognizable and polarizing athletes in all of sports.
This quarterback Camelot is about more than the deep field of effective starters. The playoffs oozed with stars popular not just for their performances but their personalities and pizazz.
"I marvel at how prepared these guys are — not only on the field, but the exposure they get off it," said Aikman, who will call the NFC title game for Fox. "Whether it's through social networks or different platforms, they are given the opportunity to talk to the press and are much more well-rounded and prepared for all that comes with the scrutiny of the position than ever before.
"If you're on Park Avenue in New York (at league headquarters), you're pretty happy with the new representatives that will be the ambassadors for the league for the years to come."
The quarterbacks in the postseason undoubtedly fascinate fans, but they do so in different ways.
"All with incredibly different kinds of stories, all with incredibly different ways of getting to the playoffs," said McManus, whose network airs next month's Super Bowl.
Nielsen/E-Poll calculates an "N-Score" to measure the endorsement potential of athletes. Peyton Manning has the top score of current QBs, but other players come out ahead in specific categories in the surveys.
In this high school yearbook of NFL quarterbacks, Brees is voted most appealing. Rodgers is the most confident, Newton the most dynamic, Griffin the most talented. Luck is considered the most intelligent and Brady the most attractive.
Their back stories sizzle. This season saw Manning return from neck surgery to lead the Broncos to the AFC's top seed and earn All-Pro honors. Brees was dealing with the fallout of the Saints' bounty scandal.
Unlike past rookie quarterbacks who reached the playoffs, Luck and Griffin were anything but caretakers riding a strong defense; both were vibrant leaders turning around franchises. And Wilson advanced deeper into the postseason than either of them.
Kaepernick is for the moment the best story of them all. The 2011 second-round draft pick opened the season as a backup to Alex Smith, who led the 49ers to the NFC championship game last year. Kaepernick played so well after Smith was injured that coach Jim Harbaugh took the gamble to stick with him — just as Belichick did with Brady 11 years earlier.
Now Brady is the grizzled veteran, though fans won't get that expected matchup with his longtime rival, Manning, after Baltimore stunned Denver.
"They're not going to last forever," Young said of the old guard, "but you've got a feeling that there's some guys around that we're in pretty good shape in the next generation. Right now, as we speak, there's compelling stories all over the playoffs at the quarterback spot, which is kind of fun.

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Chiefs player legally drunk when he killed girlfriend: autopsy

KANSAS CITY, Missouri (Reuters) - Kansas City Chiefs linebacker Jovan Belcher was legally drunk when he killed his girlfriend Kasandra Perkins and then took his own life last month, according to an autopsy released on Monday.
The report showed Belcher had a blood alcohol content of .17 - more than double the .08 level that by Missouri law makes a driver drunk.
Belcher, 25, killed Perkins, 22, in the bedroom of their home during an argument on the morning of December 1. He then drove to Arrowhead stadium, where the Chiefs play, and shot himself in the head.
The autopsy by the Jackson County Medical Examiner found that Belcher shot Perkins nine times, inflicting wounds to her neck, chest, stomach, legs and hands. She had negligible blood alcohol content, the autopsy showed.
Head coach Romeo Crennell and General Manager Scott Piolo, who have since left the Chiefs, tried to talk Belcher out of shooting himself. But he put a handgun to his temple and pulled the trigger. He was pronounced dead shortly after reaching the hospital.
Belcher and Perkins, parents of a three-month-old girl, had a stormy relationship, according to a recent police report.
Belcher had been visiting another girlfriend the night before the shooting, witnesses told police.
Police questioned Belcher about five hours before the shooting when he was spotted sleeping in his Bentley automobile on a street near the second girlfriend's apartment.
A video shows officers questioning Belcher outside his car. But he showed no outward sign of being drunk and was not given a blood alcohol test.
Belcher assured officers he was not getting back in the car and instead went into the apartment building after calling one of its occupants, according to police records.
He asked to be awakened at 6:45 a.m. so he could go to a team practice, police reports said.

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Israel PM vows to proceed with disputed settlement

RAMALLAH, West Bank (AP) — Israel's prime minister pledged Sunday to move ahead with construction of a new Jewish settlement in a strategic part of the West Bank, speaking just hours after Israeli forces dragged dozens of Palestinian activists from the area.
The activists pitched more than two dozen tents at the site on Friday, laying claim to the land and drawing attention to Israel's internationally condemned settlement policy.
Before dawn Sunday, hundreds of Israeli police and paramilitary border troops evicted the protesters. Despite the eviction, Mustafa Barghouti, one of the protest leaders, claimed success, saying the overall strategy is to "make (Israel's) occupation costly."
The planned settlement, known as E-1, would deepen east Jerusalem's separation from the West Bank, war-won areas the Palestinians want for their state. The project had been on hold for years, in part because of U.S. objections.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revived the E-1 plans late last year in response to the Palestinians' successful bid for U.N. recognition of a state of Palestine in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem.
Jewish settlements are at the heart of the current four-year impasse in Mideast peace efforts. The Palestinians have refused to negotiate while Israel continues to build settlements on the lands they seek for their state. Netanyahu says peace talks should start without any preconditions. He also rejects any division of Jerusalem.
Israel expanded the boundaries of east Jerusalem after the 1967 war and then annexed the area — a move not recognized by the international community. Since then, it has built a ring of Jewish settlements in the enlarged eastern sector to cement its control over the city.
E-1 would be built in the West Bank just east of Jerusalem, and would close one of the last options for Palestinians to create territorial continuity between Arab neighborhoods of east Jerusalem, their hoped-for capital, and the West Bank. According to building plans, E-1 would have more than 3,000 apartments.
The Palestinians say they turned to the U.N. last November out of frustration with the deadlock in peace talks. They believe the international endorsement of the 1967 lines will bolster their position in negotiations. Israel has accused the Palestinians of trying to bypass the negotiating process and impose a solution.
Netanyahu told Israel Army Radio on Sunday that it would take time to build E-1, citing planning procedures. Still, he said, "we will complete the planning, and there will be construction."
Asked why the protesters were removed, Netanyahu said, "They have no reason to be there. I asked immediately to close the area so people would not gather there needlessly and generate friction and disrupt public order."
Palestinian protest leaders hoped the tent camp would be the first of a new type of well planned, nonviolent protests against Israeli policies in the Palestinian territories.
In recent years, Palestinians have staged weekly rallies in some areas of the West Bank, demanding to get back land they lost to Israel's separation barrier. Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has held up such tactics as worthy of emulation. The protests have remained relatively small, and media coverage has dropped off over the years.
The tent camp was set up after a month of planning by grass-roots groups using Facebook, Google Earth and other tools to find the right spot and stay in touch, said organizer Abdullah Abu Rahma.
The Palestinian Authority, the self-rule government in parts of the West Bank, provided legal assistance.
The activists said they pitched the tents on private Palestinian land and immediately obtained an Israeli court injunction preventing the removal of the tents for several days.
At the next court hearing, Israel will have to explain why it wants to take down the tents, said Mohammed Nazzal, a Palestinian Authority official whose department is involved in the legal proceedings. Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said he believes one of the issues in the hearing will be the status of the land where the tents were pitched.
Barghouti, meanwhile, said troops beat some of the protesters, a claim Rosenfeld denied. Rosenfeld said the protesters were carried away without injuries, put onto buses and dropped off at a West Bank checkpoint.
About half a million Israelis live in the dozens of settlements that dot the West Bank and east Jerusalem. Over the past 15 years, Jewish settlers have also set up dozens of rogue settlement outposts without formal approval, and critics say the government has done little to remove them.

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Syrian warplanes bomb rebellious Damascus suburbs

BEIRUT (AP) — Syrian fighter jets on Sunday bombed Damascus suburbs in a government offensive to dislodge rebels from strategic areas around the capital, activists said, as clashes raged around army bases and airfields in the country's north.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said warplanes were hitting towns and villages around the capital, while regime forces targeted other neighborhoods with artillery and mortars. At least nine people were killed when a shell hit eastern Ghouta district, the group said.
Also Sunday, Turkish state media said Assad's fighter jets bombed the Syrian town of Azaz near the Turkish border.
At least 34 Syrians wounded in the airstrikes were brought across the border to the Turkish province of Kilis for treatment, the state-run Anadolu agency said. Seven died of the injuries, the report said.
The Observatory said troops were battling rebels in the suburb of Daraya a day after government officials claimed the army had taken much of the strategic area, which lies on the edge of a major military air base southwest of the capital.
In northern Syria, government forces were fighting rebels over an air base and the international airport of the city of Aleppo. The airport includes a military base.
Syrian troops have been pushing since November to regain Daraya, which had a population of about 200,000 before the fighting. Thousands have fled the relentless violence, among more than 2 million Syrians who have been internally displaced during the civil war. At least half a million Syrians have fled to neighboring countries like Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.
Because of its strategic location, rebel control of the Daraya poses a particularly grave threat to the capital.
The suburb is flanked by the key districts of Mazzeh, home to a military air base, and Kfar Sousseh, where the government headquarters, the General Security intelligence agency head office and the Interior Ministry are located.
While Assad's loyalists appear to have an upper hand on the Damascus front due to the regime's air power, the rebels dealt the government a major blow in the north by capturing a sprawling air base in Idlib province on Friday.
Rebels retained control of the Taftanaz base Sunday and intensified their assault on the Mannagh air base and the international airport in Aleppo, Syria's largest city, activists said.
Among the rebels taking part in the battle are fighters from Jabhat al-Nustra, an Islamist group that the U.S. has branded a terrorist organization. Washington said the group, among the most organized and effective rebel forces on the ground, is affiliated with al-Qaida.
Syrian official statements regularly play up the role of Islamist militants in the civil war and refer to the rebels as terrorists.
More than 60,000 people have been killed since the revolt started almost two years ago.
Heavy fighting was reported Sunday in the northern province of Deir el-Zour, involving attacks by warplanes, activists said.
Last month an international aid group, Doctors Without Borders, said tens of thousands of Syrians, many of them wounded, are trapped in Deir el-Zour.
In Aleppo, where rebels fought troops to a stalemate last year, the two sides clashed near the air force intelligence building in the Zahra neighborhood.
The state-run SANA news agency said an army unit killed "a number of terrorists and destroyed a convoy of cars that was transporting weapons, ammunition and terrorists" in Deir el-Zour.
Prime Minister Wael al-Halqi formed a ministerial committee to conduct dialogue with opposition groups, SANA reported. The dialogue is part of efforts to implement a peace plan Assad outlined in a speech a week ago.
In his first address to the nation in six months, Assad rejected international calls to step down and offered to oversee a national reconciliation conference, while rejecting any talks with the armed opposition and vowing to continue fighting them.
The speech was condemned by the U.S. and its Western and Gulf Arab allies, while Assad's backers in Russia and Iran said his proposal should be considered.
In a rare demonstration in Damascus, dozens of protesters staged a sit-in at the Justice Ministry on Sunday, demanding the minister move against merchants who activists claim are trying to profit from the crisis by raising prices of cooking gas, flour and bread.
Food prices have soared in the past year in Syria, as the value of the local currency plummeted because of the conflict and an international ban on oil exports.

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Palestinian premier urges Arabs to pay pledged aid

CAIRO (AP) — The Palestinian prime minister warned Sunday that his government could fail to meet its obligations to its people because of a cash crunch, and urged Arab countries to deliver on promised aid.
Salam Fayyad met with Arab League members to discuss ways to raise the $100 million they pledged earlier to his Palestinian Authority. Arab League chief Nabil Elaraby said seven countries have responded favorably, but he did not name them.
League foreign ministers meeting in Cairo decided to dispatch a delegation to the region to raise the funds the Palestinian government needs to make ends meet. The group would include the Elaraby, Fayyad, and the foreign ministers of Iraq and Lebanon.
Fayyad told The Associated Press last week that the authority's cash crunch has gradually worsened in recent years, reaching a point where the government is unable to pay the salaries of about 150,000 government employees. On Sunday, he told reporters that the situation may push more than 1.5 million of 4 million Palestinians into poverty.
He warned that the financial crisis could lead to the disintegration of the Palestinian Authority.
"The absence of these funds threatens the Palestinian Authority's ability to carry out its obligations to the Palestinian people, including helping them stay in the territory," he said.
Fayyad said the Palestinian's successful bid in November to gain U.N. recognition for a state of Palestine has so far led only to Israeli punitive measures, including a halt to monthly transfers of about $100 million in tax funds the Jewish state collects on behalf of the Palestinians.
In a statement, the Arab League urged Israel to release those funds, and called on the international community to press Israel to do so.
Fayyad said those tax rebates amount to about one-third of the monthly operating costs of the Palestinian Authority. Fayyad said he now only takes in about $50 million a month in revenues.
Israel has said it used the withheld money to settle Palestinian Authority debt to Israeli companies, and it's not clear whether the transfers will resume.
The Palestinian Authority employs some 150,000 people, including civil servants and members of the security forces. About 60,000 live in Gaza and served under Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas before the Islamic militant Hamas group took over the strip in 2007, but continue to draw salaries even though they've since been replaced by Hamas loyalists.
In recent months, the government has paid salaries in installments. The Palestinian Authority relies heavily on foreign aid, and is already heavily indebted to local banks and private businesses.

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