Sports Roundup

San Luis Obispo

Freshman men’s swimmer Chad Dugger and sophomore softball center fielder Danielle Flores are the Cuesta College Athletes of the Month for May.

Dugger etched his name in the Cuesta record book at the Western State Conference Championships by breaking All-American Joey Gendron’s 1995 record in the 200 breaststroke with a time of 2 minutes, 10.89 seconds, breaking Gendron’s record by 0.09 of a second. Dugger enjoyed an outstanding meet and qualified for the state championships in both breaststrokes, the 50-freestyle and as a member of four relays.

He also plays on the water polo team and was named to the All-Southern California second team in the fall.

Flores has been a major factor in the Cougars’ softball success this season. She is second on the team with a .380 batting average and hit .451 in WSC play. Flores led the Cougars to the WSC title by going on a 12-for-17 tear with five RBI in final five games of the regular season.

Buffalo, N.Y.

The Buffalo Bills will receive $78 million —more than double their calculated 2006 operating income — to play eight games in Toronto over the next five years.

The payment to the Bills was disclosed for the first time in Rogers Communications’ 2008 first-quarter report released Tuesday. The Torontobased company is part of a consortium that negotiated a deal with the Bills to have them play five regular-season and three preseason games, starting this year, at the downtown Rogers Centre.

In becoming the NFL’s first team to play annual games outside the United States, the Bills are scheduled to host Pittsburgh in a preseason match at Toronto on Aug. 14, followed by a regular-season game against Miami on Dec. 7.

San Diego

Unable to land a tackle early in last weekend’s draft, the San Diego Chargers signed veteran L. J. Shelton to a two-year deal.

Shelton, entering his 10th NFL season, was released by the Miami Dolphins in February. He’s started 125 of 130 games during his career. He started all 16 games at right tackle last year. In 2006 with the Dolphins, he started five games at left tackle before moving to right guard for the final 11 games.

Shelton has also played for Cleveland and Arizona.

Concord, N. C.

Ken Schrader will replace the injured Dario Franchitti in Saturday night’s NASCAR race at Richmond International Raceway.

Franchitti broke his left ankle last Saturday in a hard crash at Talladega Superspeedway and was unable to race in Sunday’s Sprint Cup event. He was replaced by David Stremme, who led laps in the No. 40 Dodge and was headed to a stellar finish until a 12-car wreck on the last lap relegated him to a 28th-place finish.

Because he’s under contract as a test driver to Penske Racing, Stremme could not fill in for Franchitti beyond last Sunday. So Chip Ganassi Racing turned to Schrader, who did not have a ride lined up for Richmond.

Schrader qualified third at Talladega but finished 42nd. He’ll be responsible for qualifying the No. 40 car for the race because it is not guaranteed a starting spot since it is outside the top 35 in points.

—Staff, wire reports