Category: Sports

Battle for the Paddle
Friday, September 25: 6:00 – 10:00pm

FREE for Spectators
-Great food and drinks
-Exciting competition
-OB-style community fun!

32 Player Bracket, Co-Ed Competition.
Stay tuned for more details and player sign-up info.

By Michael A. Hernandez

“Open Clairemont Pool Now!” That’s the message Clairemont residents had for the City of San Diego at a recent demonstration almost 2 years after the closure of the public swimming facility.

Frustrated community members gathered Saturday, September 12 in front of the pool by the South Clairemont Recreation Center with signs in hand demanding immediate action from the city, as the Clairemont Family Day event  took place behind them at the South Clairemont Park.

The annual event featured a car show, pony rides, civic groups and much more. Among the many booths were representatives of the San Diego Parks and Recreation Department who were there to answer questions about the city’s progress on the major renovations being made to the pool.

The protest group made up of local residents, students, and athletes was spearheaded by Clairemont resident Gina Spears, who once told ABC News 10 the pool’s closure directly affected her son and his water polo team.

Players Have Begun Petition to Restore Hours

By Michael Hernandez

A group of pickleball players are waving their paddles in frustration after a reduction of hours at the North Clairemont Recreation Center leaves them without a court to play on.

New hours of operation, as part of city council-approved budget cuts, went into effect for at least 16 different rec centers in San Diego at the end of last month, including at the North Clairemont Rec Center at Officer Austin Machitar Memorial Park.

For years, a tight-knit band of pickleball players have called the facility home, taking advantage of the free pickleball lessons offered every Tuesday and Thursday at 9 a.m. and the open-play from 10:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. However, under the new schedule, hours of operation would drop from 60 down to 40 hours, and the center would not open on Tuesdays and Thursdays  until 2 p.m., virtually eliminating their routine morning games.

By JW August

As the current MLB playoff picture reaches the final stretch, I find myself asking AI for help on what I think is a tough question:  Stats on the success rate for Major League umpires when challenged on balls and strikes.

I am particularly sensitive about the quality of umpires coming to San Diego for the Yankees-Padres series.

It was an umpire’s terrible call in a World Series game that favored the Yankees that possibly changed the history of baseball and has tormented many Padre fans since that black day.

It was Tuesday, Oct. 20, 1998.  I would suspect most Padres fans that evening were watching the game on television when the call was made.  It was about 8 p.m Pacific Time.

My AI assistant provided me with the estimated time and explained how it figured out the time of the pitch.

It was the 7th inning, Game 1 of the series, Yankee Stadium. Tie Game. Padres reliever Mark Langston threw a changeup right down the middle.

By Paul Krueger

Barnes Tennis Center executives are willing to renegotiate a lease agreement that pays the city just $50 per month on yearly revenues of more than $7 million.

The controversial lease for city-owned property in Point Loma was signed in 1994. The lease expires in June, 2029, and does not include any periodic increases in the $600 annual payment over the life of the agreement.

Committee member Vivian Moreno said she is “extremely angry” that the city has for decades received such a minuscule share of the Tennis Center’s $7.2 million in revenue. “Any San Diegan would love to have their rent frozen at 1994 levels,” Moreno said.

Committee member Henry Foster was also critical of the agreement.  “If we are writing contracts that aren’t beneficial to the city, shame on us,” Foster said during Wednesday’s meeting. “Quite honestly, this is a mess, and it’s a pattern. And (city) leadership needs to get this problem resolved.”

Details about the lease came to light last week with the release of the City Auditor’s investigation, which was prompted by an call to the city’s fraud hotline.

By JW August / Special to the OB Rag

Billy Hunyady, a popular girls softball coach for nine years at Point Loma High School, has been fired by the school’s Associate Principal. Not only was Hunyady fired, but the entire girls’ softball coaching staff of nine individuals were abruptly fired on July 29.

A veteran coach with 28 years experience, Hunyady calls it an unjustified termination.  More concerning to him, though, he says, is the potential for gossip and speculation in the community and among his players and their families wondering about why he was fired on at the end of July. He worries that some may believe he was fired for “horrible actions, such as a secret relationship with a player or stealing money or abusing any of the athletes in any kind of way,” Hunyady told the OB Rag.

Unfortunately those kinds of actions are not entirely uncommon, but that isn’t why Associate Principal Monika Montiel Turner fired him and the others, says Hunyady.

Hunyady said Turner told him he was let go because there was “too much chaos going on” surrounding the girls softball program, involving players and fans.

Although there were some warning signs, the firing still came as a devastating surprise to the Hunyady. Recognized as the California Interscholastic Federation (CIF) coach of the year in 2025, Hunyady is a graduate of Point Loma High, class of 1981, having played on the same baseball team as the school’s famous sports alumnus, pitcher David Wells, of New York Yankees fame.  “I was excited to be coaching  teams from my school, ” Hunyady said.

Junior varsity head coach Chris Ghio, who was a longtime friend of Hunyady, having graduated the same year from Point Loma High as Hunyady, said that when his friend told him the entire coaching staff of nine individuals was fired, “I thought he was joking. They had seen many administrations come and go, and “we have always been treated with respect and appreciation.”

Ghio said he thinks the entire community should be put on notice that they were “disrespected and discarded” by the current administration.

Neither the high school principal, Michael Santos, nor Turner have responded to numerous requests to tell us their side of the story.

Editordude: Before the stairs at Ladera Street at the cliffs, there was nothing except slippery toe holes, a small stretch of rope and the cliffs themselves. Making your way down holding onto a 9′ 6″ log was taking your life in your hands — which I did countless times back in the mid-60s. This was the reality of getting to Garbage Beach below until the 1980s. Thanks to Doug Smith, it all changed.

By Shona Neufeld / San Diego Reader / Aug. 5, 2026

“San Diego City built a staircase at Sunset Cliffs Boulevard and Ladera Street.”

— from Kathy Blavatt’s San Diego’s Sunset Cliffs Park: A History, written for the Ocean Beach Historical Society

There are other entry points to the beach below Sunset Cliffs; but none of them are as easy to navigate as the Ladera Street stairs. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people use them every week. Families come to check out the tidepools, bringing young kids and old folks who otherwise might have trouble making it down there. And of course, there are the surfers, who use them to reach the break at Garbage Beach.

There is no mention of Doug Smith in Blavatt’s account of those stairs. And even after Adam Bloomberg and the Garbage Beach Surf Club held an event on March 29th of this year to honor Smith’s contribution to the stairs’ creation, you could be forgiven for never having heard of him. They intentionally kept publicity to a minimum, handing out only a few fliers to the regular Cliffs crew in order to reduce crowds and allow easy access for the 91-year-old Smith and his friends. “If we had advertised, it really would have been out of control,” said Adam. (I learned about it from local surfer Richard Aguirre while I was out riding my bike.)

by Debbie L. Sklar / Times of San Diego / July 22, 2026

Before there was Del Mar, there was another racetrack.

There’s no sign of it today, but Pacific Beach once had a racetrack — and for a brief period in the 1880s, it became one of the region’s most notable gathering places.

Today, Pacific Beach is known for its boardwalk, beach traffic, and nightlife. In the late 19th century, however, it was part of a developing coastal landscape shaped by real estate speculation, rail expansion, and ambitious efforts to create destination communities.

One of the most ambitious of those early projects was the Pacific Beach Driving Park, also known as the American Driving Park, a horse racing facility established during San Diego’s 1880s land boom.

The track was developed in 1887 after the Southern California Breeders’ Association acquired property for a formal racing venue. Located on what was then undeveloped land near Pacific Beach, the site included a racetrack, stables, and a grandstand designed to support organized races and public events while also helping promote surrounding land sales.

Public Has Until August 24 to Give Feedback to Port

By City News Service / 7SanDiego / July 10-13, 2026

The comment period for a proposed redevelopment of East Harbor Island for a Topgolf and Waterfront Park Project is open, Port of San Diego officials announced Friday.

The port published a Draft Environmental Impact Report for the project, with the public comment period open through Aug. 24.

The project, if approved, would entail a 10.1-acre public waterfront park with a promenade, plaza areas, playgrounds, restrooms and public art. It also includes a 16.5-acre section designated as an entertainment district, with 9.8 of those acres set aside for the popular arcade/ driving range company Topgolf. The remainder is slated as “eatertainment” concepts, to be determined by a competitive public solicitation process.

Additionally, the proposal calls for realignment of Liberator Way with new public parking, sidewalks, planting buffers and reconfiguration of adjacent intersections.

By: Ben Higgins / 10News / July 16-17, 2026

Major League Pickleball is back in San Diego, bringing professional competition to Barnes Tennis Center in Point Loma this weekend [July 18-19].

The event marks year two of Major League Pickleball in San Diego. Day one drew local fans to the venue while cameras and commentators streamed and broadcast matches for viewers around the world as pickleball’s popularity has continued to grow over the past decade.

The So Cal Hard Eights swept the Florida Smash on the opening day of competition. Among those leading the charge was Murrieta native Meghan Dizon, a pickleball pro who said the sport caught her attention during the pandemic.