Sports shorts Bates-Diop named Big Ten Player of the Year

Ohio State junior forward Keita Bates-Diop is the 2018 Big Ten men’s basketball Player of the Year.

The honor was announced on Monday. It is voted on by the league coaches and select media members.

Bates-Diop is the first Buckeye to earn the honor since Evan Turner in 2010 and the sixth overall, joining Tuner, Terence Dials, Scoonie Penn, Jim Jackson and Dennis Hopson.

Additionally, the Normal, Ill. native was named to the All-Big Ten first team, becoming the first to achieve the feat since D’Angelo Russell in 2015.

For the season, BatesDiop is averaging 19.2 points per game (second in the Big Ten), 8.9 rebounds (second) and 1.7 blocks (sixth).

Baseball free agents will play two exhibition games this week against a Japanese amateur team.

The Major League Baseball Players Association says the games against JR East will take place at the IMG Academy in Bradenton, Florida. The games will be open to media and scouts but not the public.

More than four dozen players remain unsigned among the 166 who exercised their right to become free agents last November. The players’ association opened a training camp for free agents at the IMG Academy two weeks ago.

JR East is sponsored by Japan Railway, and players are considered amateurs who are paid as company employees.

The players’ association announced the games Monday.

The Davis Cup is set to be transformed into a one-week, 18-nation World Cup of Tennis in a major overhaul of the international team event in the men’s game.

The International Tennis Federation says it has unanimously endorsed a proposal to create a new season-ending event in November starting in 2019.

The World Cup of Tennis would be played over seven days in the traditional week of the David Cup final, and comprise a round-robin format followed by a quarterfinal knockout stage. Each match would consist of two singles and a doubles.

Sixteen teams would automatically qualify for the finals and two more would be selected.

The event has been devised in conjunction with investment group Kosmos in a partnership worth $3 billion over 25 years.

ITF President David Haggerty said Monday it is “a complete game-changer for the ITF and for tennis.”

The Davis Cup was established in 1900.