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New Rival Challenges Baseball

NEW YORK -- A rival league to strike-paralyzed Major League Baseball will be unveiled in New York on Tuesday, the first major new circuit in the game in 80 years.


Founders of the United Baseball League have called a news conference in New York to announce their plans, but gave no details, and identified only a public relations spokesmen.


A source Sunday said that influential players' agent Richard Moss heads the group. The source, who declined to be identified, said Moss had the backing of a number of other players' agents.


In earlier, exploratory stages, Moss, a former counsel to the players' union, said he had received backing for a new league from 10 agents representing almost half of the approximately 700 striking Major League Baseball players.


The players went on strike Aug. 12 and owners subsequently cancelled the rest of the season and the World Series. The two sides have still not reached a contract agreement and the 1995 season remains in danger of being cancelled or played with substitutes for the strikers.


It remains to be seen whether the United League will ever get to the point of renting stadiums and playing games, or whether it will turn out simply to be a negotiating tool to give the players more leverage over the owners.

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