The End of Summer

This summer has seen many thrills and none larger than the spotlight on Rio at the Olympic games. The United States Olympic team stole the show, winning 121 medals. The second most winning country was China at 70 followed by Great Britain at 67. Of course, many of you may have had favorite events such as track and field or swimming. But my favorite event was men's basketball. You may argue that it was the United States gold medal to lose, which it was, but the dominance that they showed at times was so entertaining that I was not able to leave the couch. Critics argue that that is why it is so boring. They know that the US team will win gold. But why not enjoy the show as they do so? During the tournament, they were given some difficult tests against teams such as Serbia and France (who was playing without their best player, Tony Parker). Eventually they wound up winning gold anyways. Many other historic and memorable moments occurred during the games, and I don't have time to mention them all, but how about Michael Phelps winning his 26th gold medal? That was amazing. The men's 1500m final in track and field was also incredible as we saw an American win gold for the first time since 1908 in the form of Matthew Centrowitz. Usain Bolt won three gold medals at his final games, which gives him nine altogether in his career, the most decorated track and field star ever. Leave a comment below as to which event was your favorite and which moment was most memorable.

Meanwhile, the Padres have slipped to the third worst record in the majors thanks to inconsistent pitching and offense, and seeing a tee-ball team compete against a high school varsity team. I love my Padres. It just hurts to see them not doing so well. Edwin Jackson shut down the Red Sox over seven shutout innings yesterday, however and Adam Rosales delivered a two-run shot to provide the only offense for the Padres as we won 2-1. The Red Sox are looking to take the AL East, so a win of this magnitude means a lot. We'll see if that happens again tonight. Tons of Red Sox fans will fill the stands at Petco park to support a team they haven't seen in San Diego since 2007. I remember that series, especially the last game of the series where aces dueled with Jake Peavy facing off against Josh Beckett. The Red Sox won that day, and had we won that day, we would have won the wild card over the Rockies instead of witnessing Trevor Hoffman's collapse in the eleventh inning against the Rockies on October 1, 2007. In the end, however, the future looks bright for the 2016 Padres. Plenty of prospects are slowly rising up the ranks and we will start seeing some of them here in a couple of weeks.

College football has also begun! Unfortunately, this is sad news. LSU, the fifth ranked team in the country, lost to unranked Wisconsin on Saturday 16-14. Total collapse from QB Brandon Harris led to the loss. Leonard Fournette was not able to get into any rhythm and Les Miles is back on the hot seat. In order to make the playoff this year, they will have to win every game the rest of the year, including taking on Alabama. Possible? Yes. Doable? Doubt it. Here are your games for the week:
-BYU vs Utah, 7:30 ET, FOX
-Virginia Tech vs. #17 Tennessee, 8 ET, ABC (From Bristol motor speedway)
Those are really the only good games for the week. There will be many others but fans will most likely witness some landslide victories or boring games.

Thanks for reading! Have a great week and tune in next week! I'm not sure which day I will consistently post this semester, so tune in to find out!