The Atlanta Constitution from Atlanta, Georgia • C4

PAGELABELTAG custom3strtag: C4 CREDIBLE. COMPELLING. COMPLETE. THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 2016 SPORTS GOLF For fans, foes, Spieth is on center stage Former Negro League star James "Red" Moore, inducted into cheers during a Hall anniversary celebration at the Buckhead the Atlanta Sports Hall of Fame in 2006, acknowledges Theatre in February 2014. hyosub shin hshinajc.com World's No.

1 player trying to adjust to being in spotlight. By Doug Ferguson Associated Press PEBBLE BEACH, CALIF. -Jordan Spieth had to work his way through about 100 people who blocked his path to the first tee at Pebble Beach. They held out tournament tickets, caps, glossy photos and Masters flags for him to sign, and some asked him to stop for pictures. Unusual about this day is what happened after he finally reached the tee and drilled a 3-iron down the middle.

The crowd followed along for the next four hours. The golf course that Robert Louis Stevenson described as "the most felicitous meeting of land and sea" is magnificent under warm sunshine and a blue sky, so it was not a waste of anyone's time, even for a practice round. They wanted to see Spieth, the No. 1 player who is still trying to get used to the attention. A year ago, he was No.

9 in the world and still had only one PGA Tour victory on his ledger. Now he's the Masters and U.S. Open champion who last year made the most spirited run at the Grand Slam since Jack Nicklaus in 1972. He is the 22-year-old who earned $22 million last year, including his bonus for winning the FedEx Cup. He is the first American since Tiger Woods to reach the top of the world ranking.

And he has his own bobblehead, which corporate partner is giving away to the first 8,000 fans Saturday. Fans tried to follow him onto the fairways and were waiting for him as he walked off the green. Spieth finally asked if the seines could wait until after he was done. "Honestly, it's something I have not gotten used to," Spieth said. "Who knows how long it will take? It makes you appreciate some of these other guys who have gone before you and have been able to do it." Fame among fans is one thing.

The real challenge for Spieth this year is being a target for the other players, and the scrutiny he now faces from the media and public. He already is getting more attention than he wants for his global travels over the last four months South Korea, Shanghai, Australia, the Bahamas, Hawaii, Abu Dhabi and Singapore. Spieth spoke of being tired in Abu Dhabi, which fueled opinions that he was chasing appearance money instead of preparing to win another green jacket. Winning five times on the PGA Tour, including two majors, and reaching No. 1 in the world inevitably comes with a bull's-eye on his back.

And it probably got even bigger when Spieth started the new year with an eight-shot victory at Kapa-lua in which he became only the second player in PGA Tour history to reach 30-under par in a 72-hole event. Spieth, however, saw that as easing the burden. "It was the first one of the year, all the questions of a new year and then actually going out and getting the job done, that was big," he said. "That was the only PGA Tour event I've played, and that's where I'm most comfortable playing, where I play my best golf. So it's still real early." It also helps that he has finished no worse than a tie for seventh in his last seven events dating to September, the longest such streak of his young career.

Spieth never looked at 2016 as a new year, rather a continuation of the year before. But given the schedule, it's easy to break this year into sections. First up was Hawaii and then a pair of trips overseas (Abu Dhabi and Singapore). Next up is the first critical chunk of the season, which starts at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Spieth is playing four of the next five weeks and seven of the next nine events through the Masters.

Five weeks into the year, no one has really asserted himself as a serious challenger. Rickie Fowler is off to his best start with a victory in Abu Dhabi and a playoff loss Sunday in the Phoenix Open, which was his tournament to win until he lost a two-shot lead with two holes to play. But even Fowler has said he won't be considered part of the elite until he wins a major. PGA champion Jason Day has played only twice, finishing 15 shots behind Spieth in Hawaii and missing the cut at Tor-rey Pines while struggling with the flu. Rory Mcll-roy had a pair of top-lOs in the Middle East, where he typically thrives.

He is expected to join Spieth next week at Riviera. It's early. The attention remains is squarely on Spieth, and he understands that. He also knows from experience how quickly it can change, which is why this talk about a "Big Three" makes him uncomfortable. "I think it needs time," he said.

"If you're going to say 'Big Three' you're using a term for three of the greatest five or six players of all time. We had one season. Yeah, it was exciting and fun. But the point is it's so early. There's so much yet to see.

You never know who's going to be up there at the end of the year." Before he died, Moore lived in the same Oakland City home he purchased in 1948. An outstanding defensive first baseman, he earned a top salary of $250 a month in 1941. Moore retired from baseball in 1948. ajc staff2013 in their only year in the majors. The team won the Negro American League's second-half championship and Moore was named to the first of three all-star teams.

Starting in 1939, Moore had several stints with the Black Crackers and the Baltimore Elite Giants. While with Baltimore, he roomed with future Hall of Famer Roy Campanella and earned his top salary: $250 a month in 1941. But his playing career, like those of many others black and white, essentially ended in 1942 when he joined the army. After returning returned home in 1945, he played sparingly for the Black Crackers, who had returned to the minors, before hanging up his cleats in 1948. "I wasn't much of a home run hitter, you understand.

I was a spray hitter, a singles hitter, what you call a hit-and-run man," Moore said in a 2006 article published in the AJC "But I was fortunate one time to hit a home run in a ballpark you might've heard of, called Yankee Stadium." After baseball, Moore took a job in an East Point warehouse and in 1961 became the company's first black foreman. He retired in 1981. Before he died, Moore lived in the same Oakland City home he purchased in 1948. Moore, who was believed to be the last living member of the Atlanta Black Crackers, brings America another step closer to the end of a living era of Negro League ballplayers. The last Negro League player to play regularly in the Major Leagues is Atlanta's Hank Aaron.

Moore never got his chance. But he said he was never bitter. "It just shows that people had to see us to believe us," Moore said in 2013. "We proved we were ready by our performance on the field." Moore continued from CI including the Newark Eagles and Atlanta Black Crackers. Since the early 1990s, he had been an ambassador of the game, particularly in his hometown of Atlanta, where he visited schools and baseball fields all over the city to talk about the game.

He was inducted into the Atlanta Sports Hall of Fame in 2006 and was feted by the Atlanta Braves and the White House. "There was a time six or seven years ago that we took Red on a road tour to do educational programs on the Negro Leagues," said Larry Winter, president of the Atlanta Sports Hall of Fame. "He used to wear a jacket with all the Negro League patches on it. He was a living part of history." "When I first met him, I knew that he had a wonderful story to tell that was part of Atlanta history, sports history and societal history," said Greg White, a longtime friend and spokesman for Moore. "I saw him as an icon.

And he saw himself as an ambassador for the Negro Leagues." Raymond Doswell, vice president and curator for the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum, recognized the same qualities. "Mr. Moore was a very gracious gentleman who enjoyed baseball and his place in it," Doswell said. "I had not spoken with him in a few years, but I sensed from him someone who truly appreciated the remembrances and recognition the players from his era were receiving for their contributions to history." Moore was born Nov. 18, 1916, in the Bush Mountain community of Oakland City and graduated from Booker T.

Washington High School. His first baseball bat Braves continued from CI work out an off-the-record deal with a team and wait to sign July 2 in the new signing period. "We're going to go hard after Maitan. We're just not sure where we're going to be able to go (with a potential offer) for the Cuban kid (Armen-teros)," said Braves special assistant Gordon Blakeley, who heads up the team's international scouting effort, a point of emphasis since the front-office overhaul in October 2014. Maitan is rated by many, including Braves officials, as the jewel of the international free-agent class that becomes eligible July 2.

The Cardinals and Padres are among the many other teams that have heavily pursued Maitan. "He's a 6.6 (second) runner in the 60, so he can run," Blakeley said. "He has power from both sides of the plate; was a mop and his first balls were rocks. He never played baseball at Booker turning instead to neighborhood teams like the Oakland City Cubs and East Point Bears. "We had some good players in the Negro Leagues," Moore told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution in 2013.

"But in my mind, I was always set on playing in the majors." At the time, that was just something to aspire to. Major League Baseball was not integrated and the Negro Leagues operated in their own world, on one hand a thriving, but somewhat underground business, and on the other hand, a reminder of racism and what could have been. By 1934 at age 17, Moore signed his first contract for a team in Chattanooga, before returning home to play for the he can hit a ball out of a big-league ballpark now. He's got good hands. He's probably going to end up 6-3, 215 (pounds)." And if that doesn't already get pulses jumping in Braves Country, consider this: "My comparison when I talked to our people was Chipper Jones," said Blakeley, an international scout for 30 years who previously worked for the Yankees.

"Chipper, until he hurt his legs, could play short, could play third, could have played center. Chipper could have done anything Chipper wanted to do. Maitan reminds me a lot of Chipper Jones. "Big-time power from both sides and does it easy. Bat whip.

Loves to play, loves to compete." Maitan will probably command a signing bonus of more than $3 million and perhaps top $4 million. That's only a fraction of what Armenteros is projected to receive. His bonus could easily top $15 million and perhaps $20 Atlanta Black Crackers, which competed in the Negro Southern League, considered the minors. In 1936, Moore joined the Negro National League's Newark Eagles, and became part of team owner Effa Manley's "Million Dollar Infield," which included Dick Seay at second, and Hall of Fam-ers Willie Wells at shortstop and Ray Dandridge at third base. Known for his glove, Moore was described in the "Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues," as the "most perfect first baseman ever." "I could pick 'em," Moore told the AJC.

"And people used to come to the games early to watch me. I could put on a show." Moore moved back to Atlanta in 1938 to play for the Atlanta Black Crackers million. Some teams are more willing to spend lavishly on Cuban free agents after the recent major league successes of Cubans such as Yoenis Cespedes, Jose Iglesias and Yasiel Puig. But Armenteros defected at a younger age than most Cubans and the scouting reports on him aren't as thorough as a result. Armenteros stands to benefit from a perfect storm of sorts, as a group of moneyed teams including the Dodgers, Giants and Cubs, have already spent more than their annual international sign-ing-bonus allotments.

That triggers a ban that prohibits them from signing such players for more than $300,000 beginning July 2. As a result, those teams and others could decide to spend whatever they want to on Armenteros now, even though it would mean paying a 100-percent tax. A team could also elect to sign Armenteros to a contract July 2 that puts that team over its international bonus allotment for the period that starts that day. The Braves determined some time ago that this year the period begin-ningjuly 2 would be the time they make a huge splash in the international market by signing multiple players. That could mean spending more than their allotted bonus pool, which will trigger the ban on signing international free agents the following year to bonuses of more than $300,000.

Not only will many players who they covet become available July 2, prospects including Maitan, catcher Abrahan Gutierrez and switch-hitting shortstop Junior Sev-erino. But the Braves also will not have to compete for them against big spenders including the Cubs, Dodgers, Yankees and Red Sox, teams that will be restricted from spending more than $300,000 per player in that international free-agent class. Jordan Spieth followed up his dominant performance last season with an eight-shot victory in this year's first event in Hawaii. Spieth will play seven of the next nine events through the Masters, wong may-e associated press.