Grip on Sports: When the cloud refuses to rain, things can get sticky
A GRIP ON SPORTS • The Internet has become ubiquitous in our daily sports life. From watching highlight videos on our phones, to sending emails to our favorite athletes to commenting about how they ignored those emails on social media, the average sports fan would be lost without the webby thing that binds us all. Read on.
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• And yesterday, we were lost. By we, I mean those of us who have to deal with the newspaper.
The Spokesman-Review’s web connection was not working yesterday evening. Which meant the sports department was like the island in that old Tom Hanks’ movie, the one in which the volleyball played a starring role.
At least as far as my weekly Mariner column was concerned.
You’ll see it on the S-R website. It’s linked below. But only because of the ingenuity of David Oriard and Gil Hulse. The two S-R sports desk veterans figured out a work-around when they couldn’t access my column via email, as is usually the case.
Instead of importing it directly into the S-R’s computer system via the paper’s email, Hulse asked me to email the column to him. He then called it up on his phone, which had cell service. And then he typed it into the S-R’s system.
Brilliant. Of course, I could have just gotten into my car and taken a thumb drive with the column on it to them myself. But I didn’t think of that until about 5:30 this morning. Improvising isn’t my strong point.
The work-around allowed my column to show up online. But some of the stories in today’s paper – Whitney Ogden’s Indians’ coverage and Jim Meehan’s story on the Lilac City Invitational golf tournament among them – aren’t available right now. So we can’t link them. Sorry. Our column, though, we can link. Sorry about that as well.
• We didn’t delve into it, but Felix Hernandez looked nothing like the old Felix Hernandez yesterday, and that’s OK. Because his results were vintage. He threw six innings of shutout ball, striking out eight and giving up two hits.
The M’s finished the “first half” with a 4-0 win over Oakland.
Hernandez can’t blow a fastball by many people anymore, but his velocity was a bit better on the warm Seattle Sunday. Which allowed a bit more separation between that pitch and his at-times devastating change up.
That helps.
Whether or not that uptick in velocity will stick around the rest of the season remains to be seen. But it was there Sunday. And Felix was a reasonable facsimile of Felix.
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WSU: The Pac-12 banned its basketball teams from playing games against Division II and lower schools. Which means the budget for conference teams took a bit of a hit.
Gonzaga: Zach Collins’ NBA summer league experience is off to a slow start. He promises to do better.
Indians: Hillsboro pounded out 16 hits and ran away from Spokane 8-2 yesterday afternoon. … Around the Northwest League, Eugene defeated Tri-City for a third consecutive time, Boise held off Vancouver and Salem-Keiser topped Everett again.
Mariners: Our column took us on the white-knuckle ride the M’s have booked this season. It’s scarier than a trip to the coasters at Silverwood. … Yes, Felix was Felix. And the M’s offense was a little better than usual when he throws, with Jarrod Dyson and Carlos Ruiz playing a big part by going a combined 5-for-5. … The Oakland folks don’t seem too surprised that Felix dominated the Athletics again. … After the game, Mariner bullpen coach Mike Hampton, the former pitcher, resigned. He wants to spend more time with his family. … There is still some hope for M’s fans.
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• All-Star week may be the least crowded sports week of the year. No baseball and little in the way of anything else. This year, though, Wimbledon is going on – seems really late to me – so there is always that. Expect some Coco Vandeweghe coverage at some point this week. Until later …