GOT A TEXT message from Poulsbo’s Randy DuBois earlier today. The local sprint car driver was on his way back from Indianapolis,where he watched his first Indy 500. Not only that, but he spent the day before the race and the day of the race with Tony Kanaan’s winning team. “Lots of tears,” writes DuBois. Gonna catch up with DuBois later. Sounds like he had a helluva time at the Brickyard.
WENT TO SAFECO FIELD on Memorial Day. Great game for the M’s. Aaron Harang throws complete-game shutout, but the Padres hit a lot of balls hard. Still pretty impressive considering how bad he’s been. Starting to really like Kendrys Morales a lot. The switch-hitter is fun to watch at the plate, and he handled himself pretty good in the field at first base, too. Morales is hitting .500 (16-32 with seven doubles and a homer) in his last seven games. Carlos Triunfel’s still waiting for his first hit (he’s o-for-10) since coming up from Triple-A, but the guy oozes talent. Pulling for him, too. He smoked one ball, absolutely crushed it, but right at the second baseman. Nick Franklin made his MLB debut. Triunfel and Franklin could be the middle infield combo of the future, or one of them could be trade bait. A lot probably depends on Brendan Ryan and Dustin Ackley. Will Ryan continue to hit? Can Ackley get untracked?
“WE HAVE TO GROW UP.” That’s was the message sent by Cam Chancellor and other Seattle Seahawks’ veterans during a recent team meeting. Good call. It would be nice not to read about PEDs and the Seahawks in the same sentence.
BALTIMORE’S JASON HAMMEL goes eight innings in 6-2 win over Washington Nationals. South Kitsap grad is now 7-2 with a 4.59 ERA. He’s bounced back with two strong outings after a couple stinkers.
ANOTHER SK GRAD, Willie Bloomquist, was 2-for-4 with a triple and 3 RBIs for Reno in an 11-10 loss to Tacoma on Monday. Bloomquist is hitting .455 (5-for-11) since starting his injury rehab in the minors. Look for the D’backs to rush him back to the big club, where he’ll probably see most of his time at second base. Arizona’s using Josh Wilson (.204) and Cliff Pennington (.193) at second since Aaron Hill went down with a fractured bone in his hand earlier in the year. Rookie Didi Gregorious is doing a nice job at short, but Willie Ballgame will also fill in there.
SPEAKING OF SOUTH KITSAP, my heart tugs for the Wolves’ baseball team. Nine errors in a championship game. It’s hard to see a team lose like that. Imagine how it feels? It probably doesn’t feel like it now, but the Wolves had a helluva year. They put together a pretty impressive run to reach the 4A title game, and hopefully that’s what they’ll remember, not the 8-5 loss to Skyview.
UNLV GOLFER CARL JONSON, sophomore from Bainbridge, tees it up with the Rebels at the NCAA Championships in Atlanta on Tuesday. So do the Washington Huskies, led by the strong 1-2 punch of Chris Williams and Cheng Tsung-Pan.
MORE GOLF NEWS: A one-day qualifier for the Washington State Men’s Amateur will be held June 5 at Gold Mountain. The state Am is June 18-20 at Chambers Bay in Tacoma. The Bremerton City Am is June 1-2 at Gold Mountain.
COMING THIS WEEK: The Kitsap Athletic Roundtable sponsors the annual Senior Baseball All-Star Games and Softball Showcase at the Fairgrounds. Softball at 3:30 p.m., baseball at 4. Stop by and see some of our area’s best athletes. Softball is one 9-inning game, while they will play two 7-inning baseball games.
