Category: Sports

By Regina Elling / San Diego Union-Tribune / September 4, 2024

Being able to watch some of the fastest powerboats in the world is one of the highlights of San Diego Bayfair. It is returning for its 60th year at Mission Bay and surrounding beaches. The three-day, family-friendly beach festival runs from Sept. 13 to 15. It has been hailed as the perfect way to end the summer for thousands in Southern California.

Stretching from Fiesta Island to Crown Point Park and East Vacation Island, in addition to powerboat racing, attendees can enjoy beach-based family entertainment, including extreme aquatic sports, live music, a car show, a cornhole tournament, beer gardens and local food vendors.

by Ernie McCray

I’ll forever remember
Snoop Dogg
at the Olympics
in Paris,
images of him
that range
from being quietly playful
and downright hilarious,
at all times gregarious,
embracing the spirit of the games
as though it was the dawning of the
Age of Aquarius,
carrying the Olympic flame
like many a blunt
he’s set aflame;

by Ernie McCray

The joy I’ve been feeling of late
was brightened
by our athletes’ performances
at the
Olympic Games,
as I’m still wearing
a smile
from watching

By Colleen O’Connor

If you didn’t watch the Olympics, you missed awesome talent, fierce competition, spontaneous joy and a history of new world records writ large. Not just excellence that dwarfed the past, but a whole new future.

A future I predicted in an April OB Rag column, titled, “It’s the Women, Stupid,” (a play on James Carville’s’ “it’s the economy stupid”) that will determine the outcome of the 2024 election.

That future was on full display in the Paris Olympics. Or as the NBC news headlines announced in bold print: “World beaters: Women athletes ruled the Olympics.”

Especially American women.

by Scott Hopkins / Peninsula Beacon / August 6, 2024

When Ryan Price saw Point Loma High’s head football coaching position was open he wasted no time in submitting his application. Principal David Jaffe selected him from a group of talented candidates to become just the fifth head coach in the school’s 99-year history.

During six years as head coach at University City High and his time as an assistant at La Jolla High, Price noticed qualities he admired in Pointer players.

“What I saw from afar is true,” Price said after a recent practice. “We have a bunch of scrappy, tough, really physical kids who are willing to work hard and have great attitudes. …”

Ethan “Duce” Gourson, a former infielder from Point Loma High School, has been selected by the Pittsburgh Pirates after his junior season at UCLA.

The Pirates selected the 6-foot tall, 200-pounder in the ninth round of the recent MLB draft, a result of the second baseman’s performance after three seasons in a Bruins jersey.

Gourson has batted .300 from the left side during his Bruins career, covering 168 games with 49 doubles, 21 home runs, 119 RBIs, and 117 walks. He was named a freshman All-American in 2022 and to the All-Pac-12 team in 2023 after a career-high .319 batting average and .515 slugging percentage.

By Steve Smith / 10News / July 9, 2024

The United States will send 12 athletes to the Paris Olympics as part of the team skateboarding team, and four of the skaters are from San Diego. Among those competing for the red, white, and blue is Point Loma High School graduate Tate Carew.

Like many kids, Carew grew up on a skateboard and knew at a young age that he was talented on four wheels.

By Mark Knudson / Mile High Sports / June 19, 2024

This much we know: Stan Kroenke likes to own things. And he likes to build big shiny new buildings, too. And he likes to put winning teams in multiple sports in those buildings. And he likes to do all this in multiple locations.

Stan Kroenke is not just a “Denver” guy as we all know. He owns championship winning teams in Los Angeles and across the pond in England, too.

What we don’t know for sure is why Stan Kroenke is reportedly set to become the “lead investor and limited partner” in the “redevelopment” of an almost 50 acre site in San Diego where plans are to build a big fancy new NBA/NHL ready arena.

by Ernie McCray

Jerry West’s passing
is very much on my mind.
The reason being he was a
true contemporary of mine
as we were born a month apart in 1938,
and our names, a couple of times,
were mentioned among
the top scorers
in the 1959-60
college basketball season,
both of us
basketball legends
at our respective universities
but my being in the spotlight in hoops
came to an abrupt end
while “Zeke from Cabin Creek”
took greatness to another level,
becoming the logo
that symbolizes the NBA.

by Ernie McCray

The other night
I saw a video
of a cheap shot
laid on Caitlin Clark
that was called a foul
but it seemed more like a mugging
to me,
way-way-way
unnecessary.

By Byron Morton aka Groucho Marx

The Rock n Roll half marathon ran past my house on Adams Avenue Sunday.

Not too many costumes this year.

by Ernie McCray

Bill Walton.
The Big Redhead.
Dear friend.
Gone.

And I will miss him immensely
for the sheer joy
he brought to my life,
beginning when I first saw him
on a basketball court
in high school,
never having seen
such dominance
in a basketball game,