Marbury inactive; Knicks weigh options

Stephon Marbury was inactive again for last night's game, and Knicks president Donnie Walsh plans to speak with coach Mike D'Antoni and his point guard this week in hopes of clearing up an uncomfortable roster situation. Marbury is so far out of the plans that D'Antoni tabbed Jerome James instead of Marbury to replace the injured Eddy Curry on the active list against Milwaukee, even though the 7-foot-1-inch, 285-pound James played in just two games last season and would seem a horrible fit for an uptempo system. Marbury has asked to be traded but his $21 million salary makes him hard to move and he's made it clear he won't take a buyout for less than his full salary.

Ruben Amaro Jr. will replace Pat Gillick as general manager of the World Series champion Philadelphia Phillies. Amaro just completed his 10th season as assistant GM and was considered the front-runner for the job after Gillick said last year this would be his last season. The Phillies will introduce Amaro at a news conference today, five days after the team beat the Tampa Bay Rays to capture the second championship in franchise history. Amaro, 43, got the nod over Mike Arbuckle, who spent the last 15 years with the Phillies.

Ryan Palmer made a 10-foot birdie on the 18th hole to break out of a six-way tie for the lead and win the Ginn sur Mer Classic in Palm Coast, Fla., earning a two-year exemption on the PGA Tour. Michael Letzig, the 54-hole leader, needed a birdie on the par-5 18th to force a playoff. But his wedge spun 35 feet down the slope and he had to settle for par and a 73 to finish one shot behind along with George McNeill, Nicholas Thompson, Ken Duke, and Vaughn Taylor . . . Andy Bean breezed through 32 holes of play to win the Champions Tour's Charles Schwab Cup Championship in Sonoma, Calif., pulling away for a nine-stroke victory over Gene Jones. Jay Haas also had reason to celebrate despite his 16th-place finish at 4-under 284. Haas claimed the Schwab Cup at Sonoma Golf Club for the second time in three years as the winner of the tour's season-long points competition . . . Robert Karlsson became the first Swede to win the Order of Merit title when closest challenger Lee Westwood couldn't catch Soren Kjeldsen at the Volvo Masters in Sotogrande, Spain. Westwood needed a victory at Valderrama to have any chance of claiming his second European money title, but shot a 1 over 72 to finish four shots behind winner Kjeldsen. Karlsson lifted the Harry Vardon trophy despite finishing 32d at Valderrama after shooting a 75 . . . Candie Kung shot a 3-under 69 to win the LPGA Kolon Championship in Incheon, South Korea, by one shot over Katherine Hull . . . Annika Sorenstam defeated Ye Liying in the second hole of a playoff at the Suzhou Taihu Ladies Open in China, a 54-hole Ladies European Tour event.

With no golf on his schedule, John Daly says he went to North Carolina to have fun with some friends. What followed was a night in jail to sober up, a photo of Daly in orange coveralls with his eyes half-open, and the kind of publicity that seems to accompany the two-time major champion no matter where he goes. "Nothing is going right in my life right now," Daly said in a telephone interview. According to Winston-Salem police, Daly appeared "extremely intoxicated and uncooperative" when he was found outside a Hooters restaurant early Oct. 27. With no other means of transportation, he was taken to the Forsyth County jail for 24 hours to get sober. Daly said it could have been avoided if his friends had realized he tends to sleep with his eyes open when he's tired and has been drinking. He said the driver of his private bus, parked near Hooters, panicked when he saw Daly and called the paramedics.

Daunte Culpepper and the winless Detroit Lions have agreed on a contract, although the length and financial terms of the deal were not clear. Coach Rod Marinelli, who made the announcement after his team's 27-23 loss to the Chicago Bears, would not answer questions about the deal but did say it hinges on the results of a pending non-orthopedic physical. How much help Culpepper, 31, can provide remains to be seen. Dan Orlovsky started the past four games, with Jon Kitna out for the rest of the season with a back injury, and Marinelli would not say who will start against Jacksonville next week.

Lewis Hamilton became Formula One's youngest champion, making a last-lap pass to finish fifth in the Brazilian Grand Prix in Sao Paulo and win the title by one point over Felipe Massa. Ferrari driver Massa won the race in front of his home crowd, but it wasn't enough to erase the seven-point lead Hamilton held entering the season-ending race. Just one year after Hamilton lost the title by one point after entering the final race with a seven-point lead over eventual champion Kimi Raikkonen, the 23-year-old McLaren driver passed Toyota's Timo Glock on the last lap to win the title . . . Devils goalie Martin Brodeur will miss at least one game with a bruised elbow, ending a career-high streak of 51 regular-season starts. The team said Brodeur will not start tonight against the Buffalo Sabres after being injured Saturday in a 6-1 win over Atlanta. He was set to undergo an X-ray and MRI yesterday . . . Jo-Wilfried Tsonga beat defending champion David Nalbandian, 6-3, 4-6, 6-4, to win the Paris Masters and earn the eighth and final spot in the season-ending Masters Cup in Shanghai next week . . . The owner of Kentucky Derby and Preakness winner Big Brown added the nation's top juvenile filly to his stable with a $5.7 million purchase of Stardom Bound. Michael Iavarone, co-owner of IEAH Stables, said it was a little more than he wanted to pay, but trainer Rick Dutrow, sitting beside him at the Fasig-Tipton sale, wouldn't let him stop bidding. The sale of Stardom Bound, coming off a win at the $2 million Juvenile Fillies at Santa Anita, marks the first time a horse was sold at auction in the same year as a Breeders' Cup victory.