Committees elect six to baseball Hall of Fame

Buck O’Neil, a champion of Black ballplayers during a monumental, eight-decade career on and off the field, joined Gil Hodges, Minnie Minoso and three others in being elected to the baseball Hall of Fame on Dec. 5.

Former Minnesota Twins teammates Tony Oliva and Jim Kaat also were chosen along with Bud Fowler by a pair of veterans committees.

Oliva and Kaat are the only living new members. Dick Allen, who died last December, fell one vote shy of election.

The 16-member Early Days and Golden Days committees met separately in Orlando, Florida. The election announcement was originally scheduled to coincide with the big league winter meetings, which were nixed because of the MLB lockout.

OKLAHOMA TARGETING CLEMSON COORDINATOR

Oklahoma is targeting Clemson defensive coordinator Brent Venables to be its new head coach, a person with knowledge of the situation told The Associated Press. Oklahoma was “going hard after” Venables and an agreement could be reached later Sunday, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity because the deal was not done. Venables would replace Lincoln Riley, who left last week to take over at USC.

FLORIDA COACH HAS BIG

PLANS » New Florida coach Billy Napier plans to hire an “unprecedented” support staff, he said. Napier had close to 40 analysts at Louisiana-Lafayette and could end up with even more in Gainesville. His vision for Florida – and athletic director Scott Stricklin’s willingness to make it a reality — stood out during Napier’s formal introduction.

NFL

LIONS GET FIRST WIN »

The Lions finally found a victory when Jared Goff threw an 11-yard touchdown pass to Amon-Ra St. Brown as time expired, lifting previously winless Detroit to a 2927 win over the Vikings.

BENGALS MISS OPPORTUNITY

» Joe Mixon’s first fumble in a long time was a costly one — just one small slice of a rough day for the Bengals. Joe Burrow threw two interceptions, lost a fumble and was sacked six times during Cincinnati’s 41-22 loss to the Chargers. Mixon totaled 54 yards on the ground against one of the NFL’s worst run defenses. The Bengals (7-5) were hoping to build on consecutive wins.