Off the wire

BASEBALL

Rangers extend manager

After a busy offseason in which they added Prince Fielder and Shin-Soo Choo to their lineup, and more than a week into spring training, the Texas Rangers on Monday added a year to Manager Ron Washington’s contract through the 2015 season. Washington is the team’s winningest manager with 611 wins over seven seasons, and led Texas to its only two World Series appearances in 2010 and 2011. The Rangers have averaged more than 91 victories over the last five seasons. Texas won 91 games last season, but missed the playoffs for the first time in four years after losing the AL wild-card tiebreaker game at home to Tampa Bay. The Rangers had last extended Washington’s contract in January 2012, when two years were added through 2014. Only three managers have been with their current teams longer - Mike Scioscia of the Los Angeles Angels, Minnesota’s Ron Gardenhire and Tampa Bay’s Joe Maddon.

Outfielder Nelson Cruz and the Baltimore Orioles have finalized an $8 million, one-year contract, a deal that puts him on track to become the team’s regular designated hitter. Cruz, 33, who served a 50-game suspension last year for violating baseball’s drug agreement, can earn an additional $750,000 in bonuses based on days on the active 25-man roster: $150,000 each for 60, 90, 120, 150 and 180. He turned down a $14.1 million qualifying offer from the Texas Rangers in November. Because of the qualifying offer, Baltimore forfeits its second-round selection in June’s amateur draft, the 55th pick overall. Cruz hit .266 last season with 27 home runs and 76 RBI in 109 games. The suspension cost him $2,732,240 of his $10 million salary. As part of his new deal, he would earn $50,000 bonuses for making the All-Star team, winning a Gold Glove and being selected MVP of the league championship series or World Series. By March 15, he can submit a list of eight teams he can’t be traded to without his consent. To clear a roster spot, Baltimore designated left-hander Chris Jones for assignment.

Texas Rangers left-hander Matt Harrison is expected to resume throwing this week after an additional MRI and examination on his back showed no issues. Assistant general manager Thad Levine said Monday that the report was about as good as the team could have gotten. Harrison was scratched from two throwing sessions last week after experiencing stiffness in his neck and back. He then returned to Texas to visit the doctor who last year did two operations for a herniated disk in his lower back. The plan is for Harrison to resume cardio and conditioning Wednesday, and play catch the following day. Levine says it’s not clear how far behind Harrison is, but acknowledged it’s unlikely he’ll be ready for the start of the regular season in five weeks.

BASKETBALL

Knicks waive World Peace

Metta World Peace’s dream homecoming lasted less than a season, with the New York Knicks waiving the veteran forward and Beno Udrih on Monday after buying out their contracts. World Peace finally got his wish to play for the Knicks when he signed last summer, but he never gained a place in Mike Woodson’s rotation and appeared in just 29 games before asking for his release. The moves were announced Monday before the Knicks hosted the Dallas Mavericks. By getting waived this week, both veterans will be able to sign with another team and be eligible for the playoffs. World Peace, who grew up in Queensbridge and starred at St. John’s when he was still Ron Artest, missed nearly all of January due to a procedure on his left knee. He played seven minutes Friday in a loss at Orlando, and then wrote on his Twitter page on Saturday that his agent was working on a buyout. Udrih, who also signed last summer, had 12 starts among his 31 appearances. Woodson said he and Mills would talk today about adding players. Woodson said he thought the Knicks needed a guard to defend on the perimeter, and another big man with Andrea Bargnani and Kenyon Martin injured.

HOCKEY Hejduk retires

Milan Hejduk announced his retirement Monday. The announcement put an official end to his stellar 14-year NHL career with the Quebec/Colorado franchise that included the 2001 Stanley Cup. He played another six seasons in his native Czech Republic. Hejduk, 38, hadn’t played this season after being limited by injuries to a career-low 29 games during the league’s truncated season a year ago. Hejduk said he actually thought about calling it quits before last season but was nine games shy of 1,000 NHL games, so he returned in 2013 and finished his career with 375 goals in 1,020 games. Only two Czech-born players have registered more points in NHL history: Jaromir Jagr and Patrik Elias.

BASEBALL MLB collision rule leaves open exceptions

Rather than ban home plate collisions outright, Major League Baseball and its players adopted a rule limiting them this season.

In what both sides said was a one-year experiment, the rule allows collisions if the catcher has the ball and is blocking the runner’s direct path to home plate, and if the catcher goes into the basepath to field a throw to the plate.

“It’s good, I think it takes away the malicious intent behind the play at the plate,” Texas Rangers catcher J.P. Arencibia said. “Obviously the runner doesn’t always have to slide, and the catcher still has the ability to block the plate once he has the ball in hand.”

The new rule, 7.13, states “a runner attempting to score may not deviate from his direct pathway to the plate in order to initiate contact with the catcher (or other player covering home plate).” A runner violating the rule shall be declared out, even if the fielder drops the ball.

Along with the rule, the sides agreed to a pair of comments umpires use to interpret the rule. The first comment says “the failure by the runner to make an effort to touch the plate, the runner’s lowering of the shoulder, or the runner’s pushing through with his hands, elbows or arms, would support a determination that the runner deviated from the pathway in order to initiate contact with the catcher in violation.” The comment says players who slide appropriately are not in violation of the rule.

The second comment says that “unless the catcher is in possession of the ball, the catcher cannot block the pathway of the runner as he is attempting to score.” The runner shall be declared safe if the catcher violates that provision. In addition, it is not a violation “if the catcher blocks the pathway of the runner in order to field a throw, and the umpire determines that the catcher could not have fielded the ball without blocking the pathway of the runner and that contact with the runner was unavoidable.”

“There are some things that often times can make the water a little muddy,” union head Tony Clark said. “Over the course of the offseason, the concern was protecting players, but trying to draw up something that not only made sense on paper, but also was going to make sense to the players that were playing on the field.”

The umpire crew chief can use the new video-review system to determine whether the rule was violated.

Debate over plate collisions has intensified since May 2011, when San Francisco’s Buster Posey was injured as the Marlins’ Scott Cousins crashed into him at the plate. Posey, an All-Star catcher, sustained a broken bone in his lower left leg and three torn ligaments in his ankle, an injury that ended his season.

In Game 5 of last year’s AL Championship Series, Detroit backstop Alex Avila was pulled a couple of innings after being run over at the plate by Boston’s David Ross, a fellow catcher.