The Colorado Rockies signed first baseman C.J. Cron to a minor league contract Monday. Cron also received an invitation to major league spring training.

The Rockies' addition of the right-handed-hitting Cron follows the team's signing of first baseman Greg Bird, who bats left-handed, last week. Bird also signed a minor league contract with an invitation to spring training.

Josh Fuentes and Ryan McMahon also could be options at first or at third after the blockbuster trade that sent Nolan Arenado to the St. Louis Cardinals earlier this offseason.

The 31-year-old Cron had season-ending surgery after suffering ligament damage in his left knee after he was hit by a line drive on Aug. 10. Signed to a one-year deal by the Detroit Tigers last offseason, Cron hit four home runs in 13 games but struggled with a .190 batting average.

Cron was a key part of a powerful lineup for the 2019 Minnesota Twins, which set MLB's single-season home run record. He contributed a .253 average with 25 homers, a career-high 78 RBIs and a .311 on-base percentage while scoring 51 runs in 125 games.

Despite his power, Cron doesn't walk much -- evidenced by his 148 career walks vs. 582 strikeouts -- and is regarded as a mediocre defender at first base.

Cron played his first four major league seasons for the Los Angeles Angels, who selected him with the 17th overall pick in the 2011 amateur draft, and one season for the Tampa Bay Rays. He has 118 career home runs and 373 RBIs while hitting .257.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

MOORESVILLE, N.C. — The calendar may say 2021, but it appears the racing season is going to look a lot like 2020.

Don’t expect that to change anytime soon.

The last time the NASCAR Cup Series competed in front of a sellout crowd was last February’s Daytona 500. At that time, most Americans weren’t paying attention to the COVID-19 pandemic, figuring it wouldn’t impact them.

One month later, things in the United States, including sports, ground to a halt as the pandemic took hold.

Instead of 104,000 fans at this year’s Daytona 500, a limited crowd of 30,000 fans will be allowed to attend The Great American Race.

NASCAR believes it has a good handle on its schedule, but remains prepared to make changes as necessary.

By the first week of January, IndyCar had already made two major revisions to its schedule.

The start of the NTT IndyCar Series season will be delayed by an additional month with the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg moving from March 5-7 to April 25. As a result, the season is now scheduled to open April 18 at Alabama’s Barber Motorsports Park. St. Petersburg will now be the second race of the season.

It is the second major revision to the NTT IndyCar Series schedule after the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach, which was slated for mid-April, was moved to the final race of the season on Sept. 26.

Because positive COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are on the rise, local government officials are unlikely to lift crowd restrictions to start the season on time. Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg race promoters Kevin Savoree and Barry Green were able to host 20,000 fans at least year’s rescheduled race on Oct. 25. Savoree said it was essential to be back to 100 percent capacity in 2021 in order to make up for the financial losses incurred a year ago.

Currently, two COVID-19 vaccines have been approved, while a third has been rolled out for emergency use in the United Kingdom and is awaiting approval in the United States.

The United States is in the very early stages of vaccinations. It has been reported that between 70-90 percent of the population will have to be vaccinated in order to create herd immunity, so restrictions are likely to remain in place until at least mid-summer.

By moving the start of the season back, it gives IndyCar and its teams, promoters and fans extra time to help deal with the very slow process of battling the pandemic.

“It’s not surprising that an event of this magnitude (the Grand Prix of St. Petersburg), scheduled for the first week of March, is still subject to the implications of the pandemic,” Penske Entertainment Corp. President and CEO Mark Miles said. “We’re delighted we were able to work with Mayor Rick Kriseman’s administration and Green Savoree Racing Promotions to find a more suitable date, which helps consolidate the beginning of our schedule and allows us to stay on NBC network television.”

Because of the move, the Honda Indy Grand Prix of Alabama at Barber Motorsports Park will raise the curtain on the season.

The Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg will mark the 18th NTT IndyCar Series event in the Sunshine City. The traditional season opener since 2011 and a fan favorite on the IndyCar schedule, the St. Pete race received a three-year title sponsorship extension from Bridgestone Americas last October.

“We appreciate the officials at IndyCar for their support in setting a new date for the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg, and also to Mayor Kriseman and his team at the City of St. Petersburg for identifying a time when it will be conducive for more fans to attend,” said Kim Green, co-owner, chairman and CEO of GSSP, the race organizer. “We are grateful to keep the Firestone Grand Prix of St. Petersburg in the springtime window and also maintain the live national broadcast coverage of the race on NBC.”

Because of COVID-19, all schedules are subject to change and that’s something we just need to deal with.

Even with vaccines already developed, getting back to any degree of normalcy depends on how many citizens get vaccinated.

That may ultimately be as difficult as getting people to wear masks.

Borussia Monchengladbach manager Marco Rose will become the new Borussia Dortmund coach next season, both clubs confirmed on Monday.

Dortmund sacked Lucien Favre as manager in December and have since been coached by Edin Terzic on an interim basis.

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"Over the past few weeks, we held several talks on Marco's future," Gladbach sporting director Max Eberl said in a statement. "Sadly, he has now decided to trigger a clause in his contract valid until June 2022.

"He wants to make the move to Borussia Dortmund in the summer."

Sources told ESPN that Rose informed his squad of his decision on Sunday after their 0-0 draw at Wolfsburg.

Dortmund CEO Hans-Joachim Watzke confirmed to German wire SID that Rose will take over in the summer but refused to make any more comments.

"We are delighted," he said. "But there is not more to say at the moment. We will do that when he takes over in the summer. Also out of respect for all involved."

Both clubs are competing for a Champions League place in the Bundesliga and will meet in the DFB-Pokal quarterfinals on March 2.

Gladbach are seventh in the Bundesliga standings -- only one place behind Dortmund, who are sixth courtesy of their superior goal difference. Both sides are six points behind fourth-place Wolfsburg in the final Champions League qualification spot.

"Until [the end of the season], we will work with Marco, mobilise all our forces to achieve our goals in Bundesliga, the DFB-Pokal and the Champions League," Eberl said.

It has been a difficult season for Dortmund who were tipped as title contenders at the beginning of the campaign but now face a battle to finish in the top four. Terzic has so far picked up 14 points from his first 10 Bundesliga games in charge.

Rose joined Gladbach from FC Salzburg in 2019 and in his first season at the Borussia Park finished fourth, taking the final Champions League place from Bayer Leverkusen.

Gladbach face Premier League leaders Manchester City in the Champions League round of 16, while Dortmund go up against Sevilla.

Is football a better or worse spectacle since the introduction of VAR? Is it delivering justice or turning off the fans? Those are key questions for FIFA to consider.

What would be the result of a poll among professional players and managers if they given the chance to scrap the whole idea? I think I know. Liverpool captain Jordan Henderson has already said he is "not a fan," while Manchester City star Kevin De Bruyne declared himself unsure of what the laws of the game are anymore after so many tweaks. That is worrying.

The feeling grows among many ex-pros and pundits I talk to that football was better as it was, complete with the mistakes and controversies that make the sporting world go round. A perception has grown that the new technology is a killjoy, combing the action like a pedant and looking for reasons to rule out goals.

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As a TV commentator, I started as a big supporter of VAR. I thought it would right a few blatant wrongs and generally make the referees' job significantly easier. But it hasn't. I was wrong. So let us go back to the beginning here.

VAR was introduced to stop serious errors, like Diego Maradona's "Hand of God" goal for Argentina against England at the 1986 World Cup, or the unspotted Thierry Henry handball in extra-time that helped France end the Republic of Ireland's hopes of reaching the 2010 tournament. These and a few other incidents -- like the red card West Germany's goalkeeper Toni Schumacher escaped for wiping out and seriously injuring Patrick Battiston of France in an epic 1982 World Cup clash -- were major howlers that video technology would have helped to correct.

The original idea of VAR was a good one: to prevent serious miscarriages of justice, help under-pressure referees and produce a better game. But that laudable aim has been lost. It has become way too intrusive, which is why there needs to be a major rethink by FIFA about the way forward.

Realistically, VAR is not going to be scrapped. So how do we make it better?

Is there really a need for every goal to be scrutinised microscopically to see if there might have been an infringement at some point in the build-up, like the disallowed Liverpool goal at Spurs for handball on the halfway line a good 10 seconds before it was scored? A lot happened between that moment and the ball hitting the net -- surely all of that was just part of the cut-and-thrust of the game. The referee missed it, but how far back do you go? The kick off?

How about FIFA decreeing that any post-goal checks will involve only the scorer and the player who provided the assist? Or maybe put a time limit of five seconds before the goal?

Fans most despise the miniscule offside decisions, which are a flawed concept because if you are going to deal in millimetres, then you have to know the exact moment the ball was last played and the 50 frames per second technology being used by the cameras can't do that. What were once deemed perfectly good goals are now being ruled out on decisions so fractional as to be farcical given the misapplication of science involved. Most ridiculous of all was the one given against Leeds striker Patrick Bamford at Crystal Palace as he pointed where he wanted the ball to be played, meaning a bit of his shoulder was in an offside position.

Moments like that -- and there have been too many -- fly in the face of the spirit of the game we love. They leave a sour taste. As things stand, the difference between being onside or off might be the size of boots you wear, or whether you have close-cropped or long hair.

So another suggestion: by all means use a freeze frame and a single thick line to judge offside, but the decision has to be made with the naked eye as it was before. Once you need those dreaded artificial lines to sort it out, just call it level and onside. The "clear daylight" idea is a good one, too. The benefit of the doubt was always meant to be with the attacking team, and this would restore it.

Handball has always been a tricky area, and short of saying it is a penalty every time a ball is handled in the area, accidentally or otherwise, it's hard to know how to clarify the current improved interpretations. Having said that, the handball and penalty given against Southampton's Ryan Bertrand in the defeat against Wolves on Sunday had us scratching our heads. The ball was blasted at Bertrand from fairly close-range; he half-turned his back and the ball struck his hand, which was hardly in an "unexpected or unnatural" position given the evasive action he was taking. It's hard to see how that game-changing penalty was given, but it is another example of how convoluted and difficult the laws and interpretations have become. Simplification and consistency are both needed.

Generally speaking, it has been a bad season for VAR. Its supporters would argue there are more correct decisions than before, but at what cost to the flow of the game and the entertainment value of the product? The spontaneous explosion of joy for a goal has been devalued by the realisation that an invisible private investigator in West London may be about to rule it out for a reason the fans don't quite understand.

The referees have not helped themselves. The red card, later rescinded, handed out last week by Mike Dean to West Ham's Tomas Soucek for what was obviously an accidental use of the elbow was just embarrassing. Why did VAR Lee Mason get involved?

Arguably the worst challenge of the campaign was somehow missed by VAR, when Everton goalkeeper Jordan Pickford clattered wildly into Liverpool defender Virgil van Dijk and ended his season back in October. Bizarrely, there was not even a retrospective red card for that one!

VAR has a long way to go to win over the people who play and watch the game for a living, let alone the supporters. FIFA perhaps need to strip the whole thing down and re-stress to officials: "Stay out of it unless there was a very major miscarriage of justice."

Obviously VAR can still be a useful tool, but things have to change drastically to prevent the widespread perception that it has become a pain in the neck and has stopped football being fun.

South Africa will travel to Ireland for three ODIs and three T20Is in July, as Cricket South Africa look to fill the men's team's winter with fixtures following the postponement of a three-Test home series against Australia.

This tour is part of the 2018-2023 Future Tours Programme (FTP) with the ODIs forming part of the World Cup Super League. The matches will be played between July 11 and 25 in Malahide and Stormont.

This is the first time South Africa are visiting Ireland since 2007 when they played one ODI against Ireland and a three-match ODI series against India in the country. Vernon Philander debuted on that tour. Since then, South Africa have only met Ireland at 50-over World Cups and never in a T20I.

"The tour marks a significant new chapter in our history as we visit one of the fast-developing cricket nations for a six-match tour," Graeme Smith, CSA's director of cricket said. "Ireland have shown themselves to be highly competitive adversaries in recent years, with a growing profile in the world game. It will also offer our players further international action in unfamiliar conditions, so we are looking forward to the contest."

Ireland last played cricket in January, when they travelled to Abu Dhabi for series against the UAE - which was interrupted by several positive cases of Covid-19 in the hosts' squad - and Afghanistan. Their tour to Zimbabwe, which was due to take place in April, has been indefinitely postponed because of the difficulties in scheduling which sees Zimbabwe play Afghanistan later this month and then host Pakistan.

Ireland have also announced dates for Zimbabwe's six-match tour, which comprises three World Cup Super League ODIs and three T20Is. The 50-over fixtures will be staged in Stormont, with the T20Is at Bready.

Cricket Ireland confirmed that talks are ongoing with the ECB and PCB around the possibility of staging a two-match T20I series against Pakistan in England, as revealed by ESPNcricinfo last month. Dates for Ireland's three-match World Cup Super League series in the Netherlands have also been confirmed for early June.

"Given the significant changes to the Future Tours Programme due to the postponement of home series' from 2020 - and all other countries having to reschedule fixtures over the period 2020-2023 - it has truly been a jigsaw puzzle for world cricket administrators to try to make the pieces fit," Warren Deutrom, CEO of Cricket Ireland said. "We look forward to the season ahead and thank our touring opponents for working with us on this restructured season."

Ireland is currently still allowing South Africans into the country, although they are required to spend 14-days in quarantine on arrival. It has not been confirmed if the South African team will be subject to the same requirements but with the tour still five months away, it will likely depend on the status of the pandemic. South Africa are also exploring the possibility of rescheduling last year's postponed two-Test and five T20I visit to the Caribbean as well as travelling to Sri Lanka and India in the winter.

Cricket South Africa's (CSA) interim board has been granted a two-month extension by the country's sports minister, Nathi Mthethwa, in order to conclude its work. The board, chaired by Dr Stavros Nicolaou, will be in place until April 15 after initially being appointed on October 30, 2020 for a period of three months. This is the second extension granted to the board after they had their tenure stretched to mid-February last month.

"Bearing in mind that in announcing the Interim Board late last year, the minister anticipated that even with the best laid plans, no one had a crystal ball on how things would practically pan out. As the Minister takes deadlines that he sets seriously, he considered and was persuaded by the rationale for the requested two-month extension, which was influenced by such external issues as the disciplinary hearings as well as consultations with internal and external stakeholders," a statement issued by Mthethwa's office read. "The minister is persuaded to grant the extension on the grounds stated, he has consulted with the members council (the highest decision making body at CSA made up of the 14 provincial presidents) and it was unanimously concluded that this is the best decision for cricket."

The interim board is currently in the process of disciplinary proceedings against CSA's company secretary Welsh Gwaza and acting CEO Kugandrie Govender. It also needs to lay the framework for electing a permanent, and mostly independent board, and needs to ensure CSA is in a position to hold its AGM, which was postponed from September last year. Overall, the interim board's scope of work remains the same: "to generally do whatever is necessary and appropriate in order to restore the integrity and reputation of CSA," as the minister's statement put it, following years of maladministration.

But the board has not had it all smooth sailing. Last month, former interim board chair Zak Yacoob stood down following a verbal tirade on a journalist, while former board member Omphile Ramela is fighting the interim board in court over his removal as a director.

Debutant left-arm spinner Axar Patel has asked the critics of the Chennai pitch to change their mindset towards spinning pitches, pointing out that India never complain about seaming tracks when they travel.

The Chennai pitch has received criticism from former players such as Michael Vaughan, Mark Waugh, Damien Fleming and Sanjay Manjrekar.

"It's not as though someone has been hit in the helmet or the toes," Patel said. "It is a normal wicket. We are playing on the same wicket and scoring runs. I feel no one should have an objection about this pitch. When we go out and get a seaming track, we don't talk about excessive grass on the pitch. You have to change your mindset rather than think about the pitch."

The argument has been that a pitch with puffs of dust and mini-explosions on day one will only get worse for batting, turning it into lottery. But as Patel said, India have scored runs in both innings whereas the whole England side managed fewer runs in the first innings than Rohit Sharma's 161. He was even asked if there was extra determination from R Ashwin and Virat Kohli to bat on and score as many as possible even though they had more than enough runs on the board.

"We don't think of outside and if we have to send a message," Patel said. "We just batted normally. If it had been day four we would have thought of declaring."

Patel also said this wasn't a pitch where you just turn up and release the ball and the surface will do the rest for you.

"The way the wicket is behaving, you know there is spin, but the spin is there only if you put some strength behind the ball," he said. "If you leave it like that or flight it too much, then there is not much turn from the pitch. The speed has to be high. Otherwise the batsman is going back and has time to adjust. Speed is very important for a spinner on this pitch."

Patel had all the strength to give after missing his debut a week ago with a niggle in the knee. He said that while it was frustrating to miss that match, had he risked it, he could have ended up losing out on giving his best in both the matches.

"I was selected to play the first Test but I pulled out because of the injury," he said. "I didn't want to play with a niggle and take the risk of letting the team down halfway into the match. The physio told me if I gave it time I will be fine for the second Test. So the physio and I took that call. It was frustrating but the positive is that I could give my 100% here."

Mikaela Shiffrin won the women's combined Monday to set an American record with her sixth world championship title.

Shiffrin has four golds in slalom and one in super-G from previous worlds.

Shiffrin ranked third after the super-G portion but was fastest in the slalom leg to beat Petra Vlhova of Slovakia by 0.86 seconds. Olympic champion Michelle Gisin of Switzerland finished 0.89 behind for bronze.

Two of Shiffrin's main competitors failed to complete their slalom runs.

First-run leader Federica Brignone straddled the third gate as Italy keeps waiting for its first medal at this year's worlds after five events. Defending champion Wendy Holdener of Switzerland also skied out early in her run.

Lower-ranked skiers were still coming down the course.

The British supermiler answers your questions on training, commentating and taking on Jakob Ingebrigtsen in a 1500m race

Glimpse into the lives of world-class athletes as they answer questions from YOU each week on ‘Ask the Athlete’.

This week we are joined by Steve Cram – 1500m Olympic silver medallist, world and two-time European champion, commentator and coach.

He chats to AW about commentating on Usain Bolt, Mo Farah and Kelly Holmes, how he’d like to face Jakob Ingebrigtsen in a 1500m race, what advice he’d give to young athletes and so much more!

Plus all the information on his upcoming virtual training camp.

Have a read of some of Cram’s answers below and then enjoy the full 32-minute episode.

Subscribe to Athletics Weekly on YouTube to ensure you never miss an episode.

Former Ireland fly-half David Humphreys says the side's next two Six Nations games against Italy and Scotland are now "must-win" following the side's opening defeats by Wales and France.

"Farrell has to win the next two games," he told BBC Radio Ulster.

"Italy have shown enough in the past two games to give them a huge amount of confidence against Ireland."

The ex-Ireland fly-half says any thoughts over giving relatively inexperienced internationals more game time in Rome on 27 February are now likely to go out the window for Farrell as he chases an absolutely essential win.

After the game in the Stadio Olimpico, Ireland face a much-improved Scotland away on 14 March before completing their campaign against champions England in Dublin six days later.

Experienced half-backs Johnny Sexton and Conor Murray sat out the France defeat because of injury and Humphreys believes they have to return if fit.

"Andy Farrell will have to ask what team he needs to pick to win the Italy game, not what team does he need to pick to win the World Cup," he said.

Munster scrum-half Murray, 31, missed out on the France game with a hamstring strain and Ireland captain Sexton, 35, remained on the sidelines as he followed return to play protocols following a concussion sustained against Wales on the opening weekend.

Jamison Gibson Park and Billy Burns deputised for the duo, with the latter replaced early in the second half by Ross Byrne, and Humphreys says Murray and Sexton are still a level above their replacements.

"I thought Gibson Park played well but those two players (Murray and Sexton) are top-quality internationals. I understand the point about making the transition and looking at the World Cup but Andy Farrell has to win some games in this Six Nations.

"It is a huge dilemma. Not just for international coaches but for anyone involved in performance sport - you are judged by results, not just performance.

"When he first came into the job Farrell had the chance to put his own stamp on this team by making those changes. There is absolutely no doubt that Sexton and Murray are the best half-backs in Ireland by a considerable margin."

Ireland have to adapt to Farrell

While the defeat by Wales can be attributed to Peter O'Mahony's early dismissal and several individual errors, Farrell's men rarely threatened the French line and were undone by flashes of attacking flair by the visitors.

Humphreys, who won 72 international caps, says France "deserve credit" for their performance in Dublin but Ireland need to improve in attack if they are to move forward under Farrell.

"I thought France were the better team and they created some very clear try-scoring opportunities," he said.

"The biggest frustration he will have is that while Ireland had a lot of possession in the second half, they didn't really create any try-scoring chances.

"The one try they got was a French line-out which bounced into their hands. They have to go away and find a way of attacking against the best teams - like France or England.

"In the past under Joe Schmidt, the way his game plan was set out, he created those by how he trained and how he prepared. Farrell is trying to implement a heads-up, play what you see style of rugby but that is hard to do," he added.

"It is going to take some time for those players to adapt to that and you have to, with the possession that Ireland had, create more try-scoring opportunities than we saw against France."