Sports briefs: Aug. 12

HORSE RACING

Lasix banned for 2012 in juvenile graded-stakes races

Next year, 2-year-olds that run in the top Thoroughbred races in the United States, including major Kentucky Derby prep races, will have to do it without controversial anti-bleeder medication.

The American Graded Stakes Committee, which gives the races their designated ranking, announced late Thursday that it will not allow the use of furosemide, commonly known as Lasix. If tracks allow it on race day, the race will lose its coveted graded-stakes status but, otherwise, the move has no enforcement authority.

The use of anti-bleeder medications has come under fire in recent months, and the Breeders' Cup recently announced it will ban their use in the 2-year-old championships in 2012 and the 3-year-old championships in 2013. But the graded-stakes ban is a pilot project that the committee said it will evaluate after one year. Unless state racing jurisdictions or racetracks take action, other 2-year-old races apparently will allow the drug.

SPORTS IN THE COURTS

Village Person to sue Rays

You might remember him as "the Cop." And he is not happy. Victor Willis , lyricist, lead singer and costumed police officer for the original Village People, said Thursday in a news release that he plans to sue the Tampa Bay Rays "within the next 30 days" for misappropriating his voice and image. The current version of the Village People performed after a Rays game last August. Willis, who left the group in 1984, certainly would not be coming to the Trop. But promotions for the event included a 1978 video snippet of the Village People singing YMCA , featuring Willis front and center.

"His voice is very distinctive. People know that song," said Linda Smythe , Willis' publicist. "They get excited, thinking he is going to be there."

Willis, now 58, is not out for money, Smythe said. YMCA alone earns him more than $1 million a year in songwriting royalties. Every time a stadium or arena blasts it through loudspeakers, he earns a little payment. But Willis does want people to stop using his image and voice without his permission, she said. "What we would like ideally from the Rays is to ask them to apologize and give us assurances that they won't do that again."

BASKETBALL

UK's Miller has 8 boards in U.S.