Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
Serving Waitsburg, Dayton and the Touchet Valley
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After dropping the opening game of the Oakland series in Seattle, the Mariners rebounded with three straight wins by one run to win the series. They also beat the Astros on Monday, coming back from an early seven-run deficit to win 11-8. This stretch has moved them up to one game behind the A’s for second place in the division and one game out of the second wild-card spot. With the trade deadline coming up on July 30th at 4 p.m., it’s surprising the Mariners haven’t been more active trying to improve the team for this year and beyond. The T...
The Seattle Mariners are currently in third place in the American League West behind the Houston Astros and Oakland A’s at 50-44 on the season. They are also just three games out of the second wildcard spot. With forty games left against AL West opponents, they certainly have an opportunity to move up in the standings. Outside of Mitch Haniger offensively, they haven’t been that impressive, and as a team, they are hitting just .219/.295/.380. The offensive scores an average of 4.13 runs per game which ranks 22 in the league out of thirty tea...
The NCAA hasn’t had a good year. First, they lost a Supreme Court ruling; then, in a rush to respond to the name, image, and likeness state laws some states had passed, the NCAA quickly pushed out their interim (NIL) policy across the league. Now a new league has formed targeting the very best high school basketball players and paying them a minimum of $100,000 a year to skip college and the NCAA altogether. The new league is called Overtime Elite and is an offshoot of the distributed sports net...
Jack Lohrke started his minor league baseball career in 1942 at age eighteen when he signed with the San Diego Padres of the Pacific Coast League. After seven games he was sent to Twin Falls, Idaho, in the Class C Pioneer League. He hit .271 as the team's third baseman and won the team's MVP award. He wouldn't play baseball again until after returning home from World War II. The train that took him to ship off to war derailed. Three people were killed and many others were severely burned by...
We’ve all heard stories about professional athletes that have squandered millions in salary and ended up homeless. The following story is not one of those. It is about a great decision made by a major league baseball player who retired in 2001. Thanks to a good agent, high interest rates, and a leap of faith retired player, Bobby Bonilla has been getting a check for $1.19 million every July 1 from the New York Mets since 2011. He will continue receiving a check through 2035 when he is s...
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court sided with the plaintiff Shawne Alston against the NCAA. It essentially ruled that the NCAA could not place limits on education-related benefits schools may make available to student-athletes. The ruling did not touch on whether student-athletes could be paid directly to play but hinted that the Court might rule in favor of the athletes if such cases were raised. College sports are about to go through significant changes. Supreme Court Justice...
Seattle began the week by dropping both games in the Dodgers series and losing the first game of the Cleveland series. This put their losing streak at five games and made it their longest of the season. The first game in Los Angeles was particularly disappointing as the Mariners led 4-3 going into the eight-inning only to lose the game when Gavin Lux hit a three-run home run. It was Lux’s first home run of the season. Rafael Montero, the Mariners closer, got the loss in the game for giving up the home run. He also recorded his fifth blown s...
The Mariners (18-17) continue to be tied with the Houston Astros for second place in the American League West. It was a disappointing week in which they lost two out of three games to both the Baltimore Orioles and Texas Rangers. In the Orioles series, they were no-hit by Orioles’ ace John Means who improved to 4-0 on the season with a 1.37 ERA. The best game of the week had to be the 5-2 win over the Orioles, where Justin Dunn gave up only one run in 5 1/3 innings. Kyle Lewis and Kyle Seager both homered for Seattle. The Mariners bullpen c...
If the Oakland A’s hadn’t put together a thirteen-game winning streak, the Mariners would still be first place in the AL West. The Mariners are only two games behind the A’s in the standings and would have been only a game back if not for a bad eighth inning against the Orioles on Monday, a game they were leading 1-0. It was a bullpen game in which the Mariners used seven different pitchers. Injuries to starting pitchers Marco Gonzales and Nick Margevicius have the team scrambling a bit to get another pitcher stretched out enough to start games...
Monday, Governor Jay Inslee signed into law House Bill 1356, a ban on public schools in Washington State from “..the inappropriate use of Native American names, symbols, or images as public school mascots, logos, or team names.” The new law will take effect on January 1, 2022. In the statehouse, the vote was 90 to 8, and it passed the state senate 40 to 9. Since the statehouse is currently made up of 57 democrats and 41 Republicans, and the state senate is made up of 28 Democrats, 20 Republicans, and one Democrat that caucuses with the Rep...
Being outscored by your opponents for the season, starting pitching’s lack of quality starts, and too much reliance on the bullpen were the reasons I was prepared to list why the Mariners' quick start can’t last. Then the series with the Houston Astros happened and it has changed the way I look at this team. I’m still not prepared to say they can win their division but after beating the Los Angeles Dodgers last night 4-3 the Mariners have gone 6-2 in their last eight games and are now in first place in the American League West. Before this...
The Mariners have started off the season going 5-4 through the first nine games. They have won series against the San Francisco Giants and Minnesota Twins. They lost a series to the Chicago White Sox, a team that several baseball analysts are picking to win the central division this year. An odd scheduling quirk has the Mariners playing their first American League West team on April 16. Most teams have already played teams within their division by this point in the season. Also, the Mariner’s schedule is backloaded, with twenty-five of the t...
After defeating UCLA in dramatic fashion in overtime to win 93-90, the #1 seeded Gonzaga Bulldogs advanced to the championship game against #1 seeded Baylor Bears. For Gonzaga, it was a chance to be the first undefeated basketball team since Indiana in forty-five years. For Baylor, it was the team’s first finals appearances in team history. Baylor won the jump ball, and on their opening possession, Mark Vital missed his first two shots but grabbed the offensive rebound on both before Davion Mitchell hit a jump shot for the first points of the g...
The PAC-12 continued its dominance this week in the NCAA tournament, with three teams advancing to the Elite Eight. USC, UCLA, and Oregon State each won their third games of the tournament. Only Oregon failed to advance, losing to USC 82-68. A great start allowed USC to get out to a big lead at the half 41-26. It was a lead that Oregon would cut to 69-60 in the second half but could get no closer. Normally a great three-point shooting team, the Ducks had a down day shooting 5-21, good for only 23.8%. USC made five more three-pointers, 10-17 for...
It is often difficult to determine how strong a conference is going into the national tournament. This year was especially difficult, with most teams limited to games inside their own conference. Based on the results so far, the PAC-12 conference was certainly underrated and under seeded for the tournament. Four of the five PAC-12 teams have advanced to the sweet sixteen-round. USC, Oregon, UCLA, and Oregon State. Overall, the PAC-12 is 9-1 in the NCAA tournament, with the only loss the Colorado Buffaloes dropping their second-round matchup...
Gonzaga, Eastern Washington, Oregon, and Oregon State were all selected to the NCAA Division I tournament this year. Due to COVID-19, the entire tournament will be played in Indiana across multiple locations in the state. If a team chooses not to participate or has an outbreak, there is a 48-hour window to name another team to take its place. Once the tournament begins, there will not be any replacements, and if any team cannot play for medical reasons, they will forfeit the game, and their opponent will advance to the next round. As long as...
Ok, first off, the author, Adam Shein, makes some devastatingly good points. If we trade Wilson now, it's most likely the apex of his value, given his disgruntledness and the uncertain state the Seahawks seem to be in right now. Some high draft picks would be nice. The salary cap is always an issue. Bobby Wagner and KJ Wright are aging superstars. Shaquille Griffin, in my opinion, has never developed into the CB we hoped he would be. He's been good, so maybe that is unfair given the...
Rumors have continued to swirl around whether or not Russell Wilson will be traded this offseason. One of the teams on Wilson’s trade list, the Dallas Cowboys, has just signed Dak Prescott to a four-year $160 million extension with a full no-trade clause. Unless both Wilson and Prescott agree to switch teams, the number of trade partners is down to the New Orleans Saints, Chicago Bears, and the Las Vegas Raiders. Let’s start with the Saints. From Russell Wilson’s standpoint, it’s easy to see the attraction here. The Saints are a great team, a...
The Mariners have signed free agent pitcher James Paxton to a one-year $8.5 million contract with bonuses that could push that up to a total of $10 million. The incentives are based on the number of starts that James Paxton makes in the upcoming season. He could receive up to an additional $750,000 should he start in a total of ten games and add up to another $750,000 should he start twenty-two games. Paxton slots into the top spot in the rotation and gives the Mariners something they haven't...
Mariners team President/CEO Kevin Mather resigned this Monday over comments he made during a Bellevue breakfast rotary club meeting on February 5th. Before today I couldn't have told you his name or the name of any other Major League Baseball President except for Randy Levine of the Yankees. The only reason Levine is known to me is from headlines he made a few years ago for belittling a player who lost a salary arbitration case against the Yankees. Baseball managers, general managers, and the...
Russell Wilson made news this week for comments he made on The Dan Patrick Show. He suggested he was getting sacked too often and implying the problem is with his offensive line. Wilson said, "I think that sometimes you hold onto it a little bit just because you're looking for that play and you find it, but also so many of those times it turns into touchdowns too. But you never want to be sacked that many times. Four hundred times basically is way too many - four hundred too many. So, I think th...
Mariners’ general manager, Jerry Dipoto, was asked several questions about the upcoming 2021 season in a recent interview via Zoom. When asked about whether or not the team’s finances this offseason would be affected by COVID-19, he responded, “Economically no….it had nothing to do for us with the revenues or economic issues that clubs may have experienced in 2020.” “We can set the goal of competing for a playoff spot,” Dipoto said about the goals for the upcoming season. He did note that he didn’t expect the team to be at the top of the Amer...
This year’s Super Bowl will be broadcast live on Sunday, February 7th at 6:30 E.T (3:30 p.m. local time), on CBS. The Kansas City Chiefs will travel to Tampa Bay to play the Buccaneers. This is the first time in Super Bowl history a team gets to play in their home stadium. Kansas City is the favored team but is still dealing with a few injuries going into the championship game. The Chief’s wide receiver, Sammy Watkins, is listed as questionable with a calf injury. Both wide receiver Dem...
Don Sutton didn't make it into the Baseball Hall of Fame on his first try in 1994, but he finally made it in on his fifth try in 1998. Sutton was the only person inducted that year, with six others on that year's ballot. Tony Perez, Ron Santo, Jim Rice, Gary Carter, Bruce Sutter, and Bert Blyleven would go on to be inducted themselves in later years. Except for his 1980 season when he led both leagues with an earned run average of 2.20, Sutton didn't have to have stand out seasons. Instead,...
Hank Aaron passed away on January 22nd at the age of eighty-six. He was named to the All-Star team all but two of his playing seasons, the first, which he won the rookie of the year award, and his last. He holds the major league records for runs batted (2,297) and total bases (6,856). Aaron’s WAR total is a staggering 143.1 placing him fifth on the career leaders list. Aaron’s career WAR total is greater than the WAR totals of Hall of Famers Ken Griffey Jr. and Willie Stargell combined to put...
