Washington Nationals Roll, OKC Thunder Falls Short In Opener

It was an interesting night of sports. The Washington Nationals continued their march with destiny as they routed the favored Houston Astros by a 12-3 count ad thus on consecutive nights beat Cole and Verlander on the road. Think about that sentence…on back to back games on the road—these Nationals beat two of the toughest pitchers in baseball….and in Game 2 it was a rout.

For those not keeping count these Nationals have now won eight straight games in post season and eighteen of their last twenty games overall. This is a team on a roll of epic proportions if they can win two more games against these favored Astros who were the best team in the majors this baseball season.

Game 3 is Friday night in D.C. as the nation’s lawmakers will be able to forget the impending impeachment of the most corrupt POTUS in the history of our Republic for one night and agree on something.

The Nationals are setup beautifully with Anibal Sanchez to pitch Game 3 at home. Dave Martinez will then have in this order I assume Patrick Corbin, Max Scherzer, and Steven Strasburg to start the next three games.

The Astros are tough. They won’t roll over, but what they face in the next three games is a daunting task to get back to Houston for a Game 6.

Now…as far as the Thunder they played hard last night in Utah and only lost by a score of 100-95 against a Jazz team which is going to need a great deal more from Mike Conley if they aspire to be anything beyond a first or second round exit in post season.

Donovan Mitchell was an absolute hoss when it mattered and should be a player to watch with great interest in this his third season in the league.

The Thunder were a Vegas 9.5 road underdog last night and from my perspective it was a closer game than most thought it might be.

The Thunder are in hell right now as they appear to have only three players on their current roster who can score the basketball with any reliability.

The thing which makes this unfortunate is that two of these players…Chris Paul and Gallanari are on the trading block as part of Sam Presti’s rebuild-reclamation project in Oklahoma City.

The only player beyond those two who apparently will able to score the ball consistently will be Shai Gilgeous-Alexander who scored 26 points in this opener and did indeed show he is a player you can build with as long as he has nice players around him.

Steven Adams and Terrance Ferguson were offensively horrific in this game. Adams always struggles with Rudy Gobert so I won’t go overboard here, but the Thunder got nothing from him offensively.

I’ve now watched the Thunder play two games this season and in those two games combined Terrance Ferguson has yet to score a point. Not a point from the starting shooting guard position in two games. It’s good to see Sam Presti has finally figured out the role of the shooing guard in today’s NBA. That was sarcasm.

Dennis Schroder was 1-8 from the field and remember this is the same Dennis Schroder of the Atlanta Hawks when they tanked hard to accumulate to top end draft picks.

I’m going to be very cautious about how I blog about this Thunder season. If Chris Paul and Gallanari are around all season I could see this team possibly winning anywhere from 37-41 games. Without them…this team could be a freak show to witness. It could be like watching the Kurds in Syria if these guys aren’t around to stabilize this roster of players who can’t shoot the basketball.

Next up the home opener with the Washington Wizards coming to Oklahoma City. Like most Wizard fans I won’t be watching. Instead I’ll be watching Game 3 of the World Series to see if Anibal Sanchez can put a death grip on this series for the Nationals and a place of honor in baseball history.

Thunderchick….Send Me Your Bracket

Send me your Western Conference Bracket Sheet and I’ll put it up on here with mine so we can keep track of how our scores are doing. Surely….you need more competitive stimulus than you’re getting over there from Little Nick Gallo’s Daily Thunder blog.

What could it hurt?

You don’t want to do MLB, NHL, or college football with me right now…as in I’m on fire. You might surprise yourself and hang with me.

Washington Nationals Beat Cole in Game 1 Thriller

Even with Max Scherzer struggling to get through five innings it didn’t matter. Or even without Anthony Rendon or Howie not having big nights it didn’t matter. It didn’t even matter when centerfielder Victor Robles lost his glove at a key juncture on a pop fly to shallow center.

If this had been a post season game with Clayton Kershaw on the mound the Dodgers would have found a way a to lose this game twice.

Reason doesn’t matter currently as these Washington Nationals are on fire and have DESTINY in their hip pockets so far this post season.

Manager Dave Martinez used his bullpen brilliantly on a night when Scherzer was lucky to survive five innings.

Martinez went with Patrick Corbin, Tanner Rainey, Daniel Hudson and then closed it with Doolittle. It went to script and the Nationals won 5-4.

I’m sure coming in the Nationals would have been gleeful just getting a split in these first two games. But now they enter Game 2 tonight with Strasburg on the mound to take on Verlander and Altuve’s Astros.

Martinez needs Strasburg to be special tonight. He needs him to go seven innings or so as he doesn’t have to go with someone like Fernando Rodney early in the game.

But Martinez probably feels pretty good right now given the fact his team is playing the best postseason ball of any team in recent memory.

We should have known this after the improbable comeback against the Brewers in the wild card game.

All of us should have known these aren’t Bryce Harpers’s Washington Nationals. That train left the station.

In Dead Solid Perfect on his way to winning the U.S. Open…Kenny Lee said, “Piss on destiny. Fairways and greens.”

So far these Nationals are hitting greens and fairways…and making all the putts that matter.

Western Conference Regular Season Bracket Sheet

The NBA season gets started this evening along with the World Series. It should be interesting on both counts.

The Western Conference is loaded even more than last season as Kawhi Leonard is now an LA Clipper and apparently LeBron James is healthy alongside Anthony Davis.

The Oklahoma City Thunder are in a different situation. Sam Presti traded the Thunder’s best three players this summer in Paul George, Russell Westbrook, and Jerami Grant. Paul George is now a Clipper. Westbrook is now a Rocket. Jerami Grant is now a Nugget. All three were placed on contenders by Sam Presti. It’s good to know Sam Presti made someone a contender this summer.

In exchange for dismantling his team Sam Presti now has Chris Paul’s contract, Danilo Gallinari on an expiring contract, 15 first round draft picks in the next six years, and two first round draft swaps.

It is what it is…. the Thunder are in a rebuild mode and none really know when and where Chris Paul will eventually land or how many games he will play in Oklahoma City this NBA season. Thus, it’s hard to know if you should place Oklahoma City as a No. 11 seed or a No. 13 seed. I hedged and put the Thunder as a No. 12 seed. But if Presti unloads both Paul and Gallinari in December then that would be too high a landing for the Thunder.

I have the Denver Nuggets as my No. 1 seed in the West because of Nikola Jokic, the team’s very deep roster 1 thru 12, and the addition of the versatile Jerami Grant who should prove helpful for Coach Mike Malone.

This doesn’t mean I’m picking the Nuggets to advance to the NBA Finals, it just means I think they’re structured to be the best team in the West for the course of the regular season if Jokic stays healthy and plays at the level he did last season.

The West should be a great season of fun for NBA junkies. Every game should be tough… and even OKC has a decent roster right now before the movement of Chris Paul and Gallinari.

Here’s my seeding sheet for the West regular season only.

1 Denver Nuggets

2 LA Clippers

3 LA Lakers

4 Utah Jazz

5 Houston Rockets

6 San Antonio Spurs

7 Golden State Warriors

8 Portland Trailblazers

9 Sacramento Kings

10 Dallas Mavericks

11 New Orleans Pelicans

12 Oklahoma City Thunder

13 Minnesota Timberwolves

14 Phoenix Suns

15 Memphis Grizzlies

It should be a great season of NBA hoops in the West. Let the games begin. Have fun.

Jose Altuve Sends Houston Astros to the World Series

Oh, my. I knew I was going to put some Jose Altuve love on my blog, but I had no idea it would be with a walk-off homer in the ninth to end the NY Yankees season.

I’ve spent the last three days in Denver getting to know my grandson, eating great food, and watching sports around the clock. He’ll be getting his first set of skates at three months on Christmas.

My son took me to the University of Denver vs. Boston College hockey game on Friday night at a sold out Magness Arena. Denver is the No. 1 ranked team in DI and Boston College is No. 6. Denver University hockey is iconic as they’ve won eight DI national titles in hockey. That would be eight more national titles than Mike Gundy’s feeble O State Cowboys will ever win on a football field. At some point in this coming week—I’ll have to comment on O State football without Boone.

The Colorado Avalanche are on fire in the NHL. It will be a great hockey season for me… which coupled with the Boston Bruins and OU’s football run should make up for the Oklahoma City Thunder’s season which starts on Wednesday on the road against a Utah team which will be better than last season.

Plus, as I wrote on here earlier—I’m adopting the Golden State Warriors as my team on here as a hedge move for the blog. I loved the Warriors’ competitive heart last post season as they fought though the injuries and made the NBA Finals. I still believe they would have beaten Toronto if Klay hadn’t gone down with the ACL injury..

I’ve given a lot of thought to this Thunder season and will start blogging on it tomorrow with my Western Conference Regular Season Standings Predictions which have beaten Vegas nine out of the last ten years. Last year was the outlier for me as LeBron James and Anthony Davis literally destroyed my bracket sheet..

But these picks won’t go into the Daily Thunder contest which forever has sullied itself with me for the nonsensical Little Nick Gallo bullshit which makes Oklahoma City look like the dumbest hick market in the NBA—which of course it is. But you don’t have to be so overtly obvious about advertising you’re the dumbest market of thirty cities.

The Western Conference is brutal as in tough. I picked my top twelve teams of the entire NBA and my split had nine teams from the West and but Milwaukee, Philly, and Toronto from the East.

I suspect some of the Little Nick Gallo millennials will peek at my Western Conference picks and contemplate cheating… but that’s out of my hands and I can’t be concerned.

It’s time for NBA basketball.

At the hockey game at Magness Arena which is on campus—the sold out crowd of seven thousand stood in unison and sang Take Me Home Country Roads with John Denver on the sound system.

They substitute Colorado for West Virginia, Rocky Mountains for Blue Ridge Mountains, and Colorado River for Shenandoah River. Give it a try.

Anthony Rendon: The Reason Mike Rizzo Could Let Bryce Harper Go


My favorite player in major league baseball is Colorado Rockies’ third baseman Nolan Arenado. My current favorite players in the upcoming World Series will be either Howie Kendrick, Anthony Rendon or Houston’s Jose Altuve.

It should be a great World Series.

Washington GM Mike Rizzo is smiling right now. He didn’t waste his money on Bryce Harper. He’ll need it though because Anthony Rendon becomes a free agent after this season.

Who’s better…Arenado or Rendon? I don’t know. They’re both quiet unassuming franchise players who play third base and hit the cover off the ball.

Hopefully…this World Series take us to Christmas so I can pretend for as long as possible the Oklahoma City Thunder was granted an executional stay from Adam Silver and only aspiring millennial bloggers from the Daily Thunder have to watch them play. I take back everything I wrote about Little Nick Gallo last NBA season. LNG…can you forgive me?

As soon as Houston clinches I’ll give Altuve some love on my blog.

Washington Wins National League Pennant

What a lovely fairytale this major league baseball season has given us from of all places Washington D.C.

Nobody saw this coming and yet maybe they should have after these Nationals pulled themselves up after the 19-31 start to in essence become one of the best teams in the majors this baseball season.

There was the departure of franchise player Bryce Harper. The early season injuries to Trea Turner, Juan Soto… and unassuming super star Anthony Rendon. But most of all this was a franchise known for being an early post season choker. A team which could never get out of its own way and win when the spotlight was brightest.

Even though I’ve never been a Nationals fan…I feel some love for these guys. I was at Coors Field last season to see them play the Rockies on the last day of the season and they were brutal. Max Scherzer was scheduled to pitch, but was a scratch. They were beaten 14-1 and showed no life whatsoever. Nobody circled the Nationals to come back this season and win a pennant.

And yet here they are fresh from beating Milwaukee, Los Angeles, and St. Louis for the right to play either the Astros or Yankees in the World Series.

The Nationals will be a Vegas underdog to both. But I think these guys relish being underdogs. Relish being somewhat discarded and removed from the championship relevant spotlight. Nobody outside of baseball geeks really even know what a stud Anthony Rendon is and even he doesn’t seem to care.

Howie Kendrick won the National League Post Season MVP. It’s fitting for Kendrick who was at one time an LA Dodger himself to turn out to be the ultimate Dodger killer in the twilight of his career.

At one time Kendrick played for the minor league Cedar Rapids Kernals. I found this video of Kendrick being honored as an inductee into the team’s Hall of Fame. It’s fitting of Kendrick and the Nationals. He was pumped to be a Kernal Hall of Famer and here he is on the biggest stage holding the National League post season MVP trophy.

His MVP postgame interview was eloquent and touching. He talked of the journey. Of his love and respect for his teammates. It was old school. It was something you would have heard from a Green Bay Packer back in the days of Lombardi, Jerry Kramer, and Camelot.

Vegas will tell you the Astros are the team to beat, but I wouldn’t bet against these Washington Nationals at this point. They still have one more trophy to win as a team on their season of redemption.

Strasburg Pitches Nationals to 3-0 Lead Over St. Louis

The Washington Nationals are one win away from making the World Series. Three starting pitchers in a row have destroyed the bats of the St. Louis Cardinals. Anibal Sanchez, Max Scherzer, and Steven Strasburg have given up one earned run in 27 innings of baseball in this National League Championship Series.

Game three was an 8-1 rout as the Nationals’ bats warmed up with Victor Robles and Howie Kendricks leading the way. Robles is back in centerfield and responded with a home run while Howie Kendricks had three doubles all gappers hit to the wall. Kendricks tied a major lead record for hitting three doubles in a post season game.

Maybe it’s destiny. Maybe it just took awhile for the team to jell under manager Dave Martinez. Maybe the best team in the National League just peaked at the right time.

It’s a beautiful thing to watch though when a baseball team peaks at just the right moment in post season play.

Most will say the Houston Astros are the best team in baseball this season. They very well could be as they have two starters of their own in Gerrit Cole and Justin Verlander who are at times unhittable.

We’ll just have to wait and see if both of these loaded pitching staffs advance to the World Series.

But first things first. The Washington Nationals are one game away from the fall classic after almost being eliminated in the one game wild card game against the Milwaukee Brewers.

All of this is a great diversion for me. The Sooners, the Green Bay Packers, and the Washington Nationals are giving me something to write about sports wise on my blog in this impending season of NBA tanking by the Oklahoma City Thunder.

The Nationals started the season 19-31 then went thirty games over. .500 the rest of the season. The big push started in August as the Nats grinded out the best two last months of any team in the majors. Here’s Steven Strasburg after a so-so 7-4 win over the Reds with his post game thoughts in August.

Murray, Lamb Lead Sooners Past Texas in the Cotton Bowl, 34-27

What a great autumn day of college football as OU beat Texas 34-27 in the Red River Rivalry game to take control of the regular season Big 12 standings as the No. 1 seed for this December’s Big 12 Championship Game.

It was a coming out party for Alex Grinch’s defense as for the first time this season his defense faced an elite national caliber quarterback in Sam Ehrlnger.

For those who didn’t watch—the Sooners sacked Ehrlinger nine times and in total tackled Longhorns behind the line of scrimmage fifteen times on the day.

For the first half of this game what the college football nation saw was a glimpse of the past when a coach named Switzer had his defenses swarming to the ball like a horde of rabid Dobermans with fangs guarding a Trump rally in Alabama.

This wasn’t your OU Mike Stoops Part II defense. This wasn’t the defense Ruffin McNeil ‘coached’ last season either after Mike Stoops was fired the day after the loss to Texas.

This was a defense which held the Longhorns to 340 yards on the day and but three points in the first half. This was a defense which had to bring a smile to both the face of Jalen Hurts and his father. Because they now know if son gets the chance this is a defense which can play with Alabama, Clemson, LSU, and Ohio State if OU gets back to the Final Four.

OU clearly has to stay away from injuries on the defensive side of the ball. OU’s defense is already better than what LSU trots out there right now. This isn’t your normal LSU, this is what LSU would look like if they hired Mike Leach.

Alabama and Clemson are different and Georgia doesn’t have a quarterback to hang with Hurts, Lawrence, Tua, Burrows or Fields. Auburn, Georgia, and Florida are on borrowed time. Depending on what you think of Wisconsin we’re down to five or six teams in the hunt for the national championship.

Did the PAC 12 even field a football conference this season?

But back to Dallas and the Red River Rivalry. This wasn’t Jalen Hurts’ best day and yet there was never a doubt who was the best team on the Cotton Bowl field on this sun drenched crisp October day.

This day belonged to linebacker Kenneth Murray, to wide receiver Ceedee Lamb, to Canadian nose guard Neville Gallimore and to Alex Grinch and to Lincoln Riley.

For those not keeping score—Riley is now 3-1 versus Texas as the head man who took over for Bob Stoops and eventually had to fire his brother one year ago to the day.

The future burns bright for Sooner Nation this Sunday morning. The nation’s best offense for three years running now doesn’t have to play Clemson and the SEC with one arm tied behind their back. In fact…they now have a defense which can cover their back for in reality the first time this decade in the score crazy world of Big 12 football.

OU’s offense and Lincoln Riley now have some drooling Dobermans of their own who can run to the ball and tackle in space.

What a simple plan by Lincoln Riley. Put players on the field who can tackle and run to the ball.

I thought I was putting a Barry Switzer interview on here, but ended up with Barry Sanders instead. I think I’ll leave it though because Switzer to this day says Barry Sanders is the biggest recruiting miss which occurred during his tenure at OU. I’ll do the Coach Switzer interview tomorrow. Small world…my father actually represented Barry Sanders in a lawsuit after his career with the Detroit Lions was over. I have this photo autographed in my study.

Anibal Sanchez Almost No-Hits Cardinals in Game 1 Win

Like the Washington Capitals two years ago with Alex Ovechkin this baseball team in our nation’s beleaguered capitol has the look of a team on a mission.

After ‘losing’ Bryce Harper to free agency and starting the season 19-31 this team has been the best team in major league baseball even without their starting centerfielder Victor Robles in the playoff lineup.

It is a team hitting on all cylinders at just the right time. Clutch hitting, great starting pitching, and the bullpen coming around when it matters in post season play.

They went on the road for their first ever Game 1 in a NLCS and their fourth starter Anibal Sanchez promptly threw a brilliant one-hitter for 7 2/3 innings against the St’ Louis Cardinals as the Nationals won the opener 2-0.

It was a masterful performance which bodes well for the Nationals with Scherzer, Strasburg, and Corbin all rested and back in their normal rest rotation.

It was a gritty win with the heart of the Nationals lineup not getting their normal clutch hitting with runners on base.

But they found a way to win on the road doing the little things behind a great pitching performance by Anibal Sanchez who was an Atlanta Brave before joining the Nationals and reshaping his pitching style.

Here’s Anibal Sanchez last season as an Atlanta Brave before he joined the Nationals. Funny how you can lose a franchise player like Bryce Harper and then get lucky with a mid level pickup which fits just right for a baseball team.

Game 2 later today after the OU-Texas game. What a great time of the year on the sports calendar.