Thoughts on Tyler Shough, Ryan Crouser, Paul Castro, the Hops and Volcanoes, NBA-All-Star Weekend and the real G.O.A.T
Ryan Crouser (Source: Andy Nelson)
A wintry weekend? Snow way!
Thoughts on some sporting subjects:
• Item: Oregon quarterback Tyler Shough enters the NCAA transfer portal.
• Comment: Shough, a smart young man, could read the handwriting on the wall. Anthony Brown, the grad transfer from Boston College who saw extensive playing time in the Fiesta Bowl loss to Iowa State, has announced he’ll return for another year, which means the UO coaching staff assured him he has a good chance to start next season. There is added competition from highly regarded freshmen Ty Thompson and Jay Butterfield.
The odd thing about the situation is that Brown didn’t play a snap for the Ducks all last season until the Pac-12 Championship Game, in which he was 3 for 4 passing for 17 yards and a pair of touchdowns and ran twice for nine yards in the 31-24 win over Southern Cal. Did the coaches misjudge Brown’s talent that much that he couldn’t even play a down through the first five games? Or did they overrate Shough, who started all seven games for the Ducks and never came off the field until the SC contest?
Shough led the Pac-12 in pass efficiency in 2020, completing 106 of 168 attempts (.635) for 1,559 yards and 13 touchdowns with six interceptions. He also had 66 rushes for 271 yards and two scores. From what we saw this past season, I would judge him a very good runner but an only adequate passer and decision-maker. Brown — who was 12 for 19 passing for 147 yards and ran four times for 36 yards and two TDs in the Fiesta Bowl — seems like a better passer and an equally good runner.
Shough, who was on Oregon’s campus for three full years, has three seasons of eligibility remaining. Before choosing the Ducks, he had offers from the likes of Alabama, Florida State, Georgia and Michigan as well as most Pac-12 schools. He’ll wind up in an FBS program, and it won’t surprise me if he has some success there. But it appears he saw either Thompson or Butterfield as the Ducks’ QB of the future, and that it was time to exit, stage left.
• Item: Ryan Crouser sets the world indoor shot put record of 74-10 1/2 at a meet in Fayetteville, Ark., on January 24.
• Comment: The Barlow High grad and 2016 Olympic champion is off to a great start to the 2021 season as he pursues two major goals — successfully defending his Olympic title in Tokyo in this summer and breaking the world outdoor record of 75-10 1/4. Crouser, 28, owns an outdoor personal record of 75-2.
The 6-7, 325-pound Crouser — who now has five of the top 10 indoor throws in history — is the most under-the-radar of the state of Oregon’s greatest athletes. He is also a member of the most prolific and successful sports family ever in this state.
Father Mitch was fourth in the discus in the 1980 Olympic trials. Uncle Brian Crouser was a two-time Olympian and an NCAA champion from Oregon in the javelin. Uncle Dean won three NCAA titles in the shot and discus and still holds the UO record in both events. Cousin Sam was NCAA champion at Oregon and an Olympian in the javelin. Cousin Haley is a former national girls high school record-holder and a two-time Big 12 champion in the javelin.
I can tell you another thing about the Crousers — absolutely great people. Here’s wishing Ryan the best of luck in meeting his goals this summer.
• Item: Most broadcasters aren’t traveling with their teams these days in college and pro athletics due to COVID-19 restrictions.
Comment: It’s kind of cheesy, really, to have Dave Pasch calling Pac-12 basketball games from his home in Arizona and Bill Walton providing analysis from his place in San Diego. Nothing against them, but it’s not like actually being at the arena and feeling the game instead of just seeing it on a screen like all the television viewers.
Paul Castro (Photo courtesy of Paul Castro)
That’s life these days for Paul Castro, in his 26th season as Spanish language radio play-by-play voice of the San Antonio Spurs. The Woodburn High and Oregon State grad calls home games from a booth high in the AT&T Center but does not make road trips with the Spurs.
“There are a lot of restrictions,” Castro says. “We can’t go beyond a certain area in the building. You can’t go down to the court before a game to watch the guys warm up and hear what everybody is saying. That’s a little annoying.
“But I’m still enjoying every minute of my job. Next time I’m able to see them, I’ll reintroduce myself to everybody.”
Castro, 59, served three years as the Blazers’ Spanish language radio play-by-play man before joining the Spurs in 1994. He owns five championship rings that he keeps in a safe at home.
“I don’t wear that around town,” he says with a laugh. “I’ve been pretty lucky. That’s a lot of winning.”
• Item: The Hillsboro Hops sign a 10-year professional development league agreement with Major League Baseball, one of 120 teams to participate in the new stream-lined minor-league system.
The Hops are also being promoted to become the Single-A Advanced affiliate in the Arizona Diamondbacks system, which will increase their schedule from 76 to 132 regular-season games. That’s a better brand of ball than the Single-A short season in which they have participated and will be better for fans who enjoy going out to Ron Tonkin Field to watch professional baseball. It will be a six-team league with the same teams as played in the old Single-A Northwest League except Salem-Keizer and Boise.
Salem Senators 2021 uniforms (Source @SKVolcanoes Twitter account)
Salem-Keizer, meanwhile, joins a new four-team Mavericks Independent League that will feature non-drafted and released pro players. All the teams — the Volcanoes, the Senators, Campesinos de Salem-Keizer and even the Portland Mavericks, taking the name of iconic independent team of the ‘70s — will be based in the Salem area. All games will be played at Volcanoes Stadium. There will be single games on Thursdays and Fridays and double-headers staged on Saturdays and Sundays.
Jack Cain
Comment: One thing the Mavericks League has going for it is the commissioner: Jack Cain, who has a wealth of pro baseball experience. The Vancouver resident is a former Northwest League president, owner of the Portland Rockies and general manager of the Triple-A Portland Beavers.
“I’m a glutton for punishment,” jokes Cain, 77, whose last position in pro baseball was as a senior advisor to the Beavers in 2010. “It will be good to get back in baseball. It should be a lot of fun.”
Tryouts for the Mavericks League teams will be held in April.
“The Volcanoes have had 121 players send in information, including some ex-Triple A guys who have been released,” Cain says. “It will be a good opportunity for them to be able to show their stuff and get back into organized ball.”
The Volcanoes were affiliated with the San Francisco Giants for 24 years through the 2019 season. Now the Giants have hooked up with the Eugene Emeralds, who used to be with the Cubs.
“What’s sad is the Giants didn’t even have the decency to contact the Volcanoes and say, ‘We’re not coming back,’ ” Cain says. “There’s not a lot of loyalty in some places anymore.”
• Item: LeBron James says he has “zero energy, zero excitement” for playing in an All-Star Game this season.
Initially, the NBA announced it would not stage an All-Star Game because of the pandemic. The powers-that-be then changed their mind and decided to hold one in Atlanta next month.
“I don’t understand why we’re having it,” said James, who had a short offseason because his Los Angeles Lakers played into October while winning an NBA championship last season. “We were told we were not having an All-Star game so we’d have a nice little break, an opportunity for me to recalibrate. Then they throw an All-Star game on us like this. It’s pretty much a slap in the face. We’re also still dealing with the pandemic and we’re going to bring the whole league into one city that’s open? I’ll be there physically, but not mentally.”
Comment: It’s understandable that, from a selfish standpoint, James feels this way. He has played in 16 All-Star games through his career. His aging body could use a five-day break midway through this season. James isn’t the only one who isn’t excited about the prospects about an All-Star game in this convoluted season.
But there are other players who would love nothing more than to participate in one. Some players have incentive clauses in their contracts, too, in which they get a nice bonus for playing in the game.
Bottom line is, the All-Star Game is a major spectacle and money-maker for the league. It won’t hurt James to sleep-walk his way through All-Star Weekend and put up with the inconvenience of not parking himself on a tropical island for a few days. Everyone should get such a “slap in the face.”
Damian Lillard, by the way, is currently third among guards in All-Star voting for the Western Conference squad with more than 2 million votes, trailing only Golden State’s Stephen Curry and Dallas’ Luka Doncic. Lillard is unlikely to pass either in voting but is a lock to make his sixth All-Star team. That trails only Clyde Drexler among players in Blazers history. Clyde made it 10 times, including eight during his time in Portland.
• Item: BetOnLine.ag gathered votes throughout the country on whom sports fans consider the greatest athlete of all-time. Tom Brady is the most popular pick, the winner in 20 states. LeBron James and Michael Jordan are tied for second, winning 11 states apiece — LeBron, incidentally, taking Oregon.
• Comment: The real G.O.A.T, of course, is none other than Oregon’s Ashton Eaton, two-time Olympic and World champion and world record-holder in the decathlon.
Andre The Giant
Friend Dwight Jaynes, tongue in cheek, might offer pro wrestling’s Andre the Giant, once known as “the Eighth Wonder of the World.”
Readers: what are your thoughts? I would love to hear them in the comments below.
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