CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Richard Petty's famed No. 43 Dodge was rescued from near ruin when Gillett Evernham Motorsports agreed to merge with Petty's slumping organization to create a new team.

GEM had been in exclusive negotiations with Petty Enterprises to combine the two teams into one four-car organization, and an agreement in principle was announced. The deal is not expected to be closed until the end of the month.

The team will be co-owned by Petty, Petty Holdings — which is owned by majority shareholder Boston Ventures — and Gillett Evernham Motorsports. Ray Evernham, who formed his team in 1999 but sold majority interest to businessman George Gillett Jr. in 2007, will be a minority owner in the venture.

BUFFALO TWP— The third annual Firecracker 100, a 100-lap World of Outlaws Late Model event, will take place June 26 and 27 at Lernerville Speedway.The Don Martin Memorial Silver Cup XVIII, OutlawsSprint race, is July 21. Both events pay $30,000 to the winner.The Outlaws Late Models will run May 5 at Lernerville and the OutlawsSprint cars return Sept. 26.

LOS ANGELES — Filmmaker Ken Burns is adding a tenth inning to his nine-part "Baseball" documentary series that aired in the 1990s on public television.PBS said Wednesday that the new film, titled "The Tenth Inning," will air in spring 2010, along with a rebroadcast of the original nine-part "Baseball" documentary series that debuted in 1994. Meanwhile, the series is running Tuesday nights on the new MLB Network.The new film will track baseball history from 1993 through 2008, beginning where the original series ended, and feature interviews with Felipe Alou, Joe Torre and other baseball figures.