July 26, 1998

Chicago Cubs defeat New York Mets, 3-2; photo of Mets player John Franco (M)

Edward Wyatt column on faltering of some US companies as result of Asian financial crisis; Federal Reserve chairman Alan Greenspan again warns that bad bank loans could hamper US employment and income; graph (M)

High Southern murder rate remains key factor behind America's disproportionately high homicide rate compared with other democratic, industrialized nations; former slaveholding states of Confederacy all rank in top 20 states for murder, led by Louisiana, with rate of 17.5 murders per 100,000 people in 1996; rate doubles that of Northeast--divergence that has persisted as long as records have been kept; 10 states with lowest homicide rate are in New England and northern Midwest, with South Dakota's lowest at 1.2 murders per 100,000 people; much of disparity in murder rates between South and other sections of country stems from difference in character of Southern homicide; many murders are of personal and traditional nature, compared with elsewhere, where they usually begin with another crime; in 1996, US murder rate was 7.4 per 100,000 people, followed by Finland with 3.2, France 1.1, Japan 0.6 and Britain 0.5; photo; graph; charts; map (M)

Article describes successful marketing and merchandising techniques of Papa Johns, Pizza Hut, California Pizza Kitchen, Dominos and Telepizza pizza chains and frozen DiGiorno pizza from Kraft Foods; photos; drawing (L)

National Football League Players Assn, concerned about quality of agents representing its players, decided to literally put agents to the test; in late 1996, union sent basic quiz to agents on subject they should have known well: collective bargaining agreement, the bible for player contract negotiations; some 40 percent of 200 to 250 agents who took test either failed or scored poorly, missing some of most elementary questions about what players are entitled to and what teams can demand in negotiations; experiment underscored union's growing fears that too many unqualified agents were operating in increasing lucrative and opportune football marketplace; earlier this year, Securities and Exchange Commission, responding to complaints of agent misconduct, launched criminal investigation into whether agents have illegally served as financial advisers to their clients; photo of Jim Kelly, former Buffalo Bills quarterback, who has accused his agency of mishandling his money (M)