Some questions, some thoughts, some predictions and a Mike Leach quote:
Would the Mariners win the Nippon Professional Baseball League? Probably, but I don’t think they would run away with it. The gap between MLB and Japan baseball is narrowing. If you don’t think so, then you weren’t paying attention to the last two World Baseball Classics, both won by Japan.
I think Seattle second baseman Dustin Ackley hits 20 or more home runs, challenges for the American League batting title this season and will be a a multiple all-star before he retires.
If you believe what you read, former Central Kitsap star Drew Vettleson — an outfielder and one of the Tampa Bay Rays’ top minor-league prospects — will open the season at Class A Bowling Green, Ky. Their nickname? The Hot Rods.
Speaking of the bluegrass state, can you imagine the insanity that’s going on over the upcoming Louisville-Kentucky Final Four semifinal game? If only Murray State, the David in that state, could have joined the Goliaths in New Orleans. How crazy would that have been?
The Washngton Huskies won’t finish in the top half of the Pac-12 next season if Terrence Ross and Tony Wroten both leave for the NBA.
Would Matt Flynn has put up those gaudy numbers in the two games he played if he would have been coming off the bench to quarterback the Seattle Seahawks last season? I think not. Green Bay’s offense was pretty explosive and Flynn had a few more weapons at his disposal than what Tarvaris Jackson had to work with in Seattle.
If you had the first pick, wouldn’t you pick Kevin Love over Dwight Howard if you were choosing teams? Wouldn’t you pick Kevin Love over any big man in the game? Seems like Love goes for 35 points and 20 rebounds every other night. Big fella from Portland can play.
How many of you who watched the Mariners’ 3 a.m. opener on Wednesday plan to be awake for Game 2 at 2 a.m. on Thursday? Sushi and and Sake Bombers to those of you who do. You really gotta love those guys to tune in at that hour.
Did you know that this year’s Final Four Louisville team lost by 31 points to Providence, the school Rick Pitino coached to his first Final Four in 1987?
How many of Golfweek’s top-10 in-state golf courses can you
name? In order, they are:
1) Chambers Bay, University Place
2) Wine Valley, Walla Walla
3) Palouse Ridge, Pullman
4) Salish Cliffs, Shelton
5) Loomis Trail, Blaine
6) Olympic Course at Gold Mountain, Bremerton
7) Semiahmoo, Blaine
8) Trophy Lake Golf & Casting, Port Orchard
9) Suncadia (Prospector), Roslyn
10) Desert Canyon, Orondo
Tiger Woods is the talk of golf heading into the next week’s Masters, but if I was a betting man, my money would be on Rory McIlroy, Phil Mickelson and Hunter Mahan. Have a hunch it could be Rickie Fowler’s time, too. Gig Harbor’s Kyle Stanley and Puyallup’s Ryan Moore also have the games to tame Augusta.
New Washington State football coach Mike Leach, has started spring practices. So far there hasn’t been a lot of news coming out of Pullman. No Pirate sighting that I know of. The candid, likeable Leach seems to be all business on the field. That said, here’s a Leach quote from an interview on KJR that I liked:
“One night we were just trying to get familiar with the town, so my wife and I had gone to a movie. So we drive downtown and I’m just curious where my team and charges are hanging out. There’s nothing downtown. Downtown’s dead. So we drive up College Hill. As we’re going up College Hill, shoot there’s mini-skirts and hot pants everywhere. So I ask her ‘what’s the temperature?’ I go, ‘it’s gotta be pretty warm out there, huh?’ Thirty-seven degrees! Thirty-seven degrees! I don’t what’s in the water and exactly how tough these people are. Certainly they didn’t need jackets to be necessary at 37 degrees.”
