Category Archives: Sports news

local news, Sports news

Hoping the council will share the credit with predecessors

I noticed some pictures today of the announcement that a Double A baseball franchise is coming to Amarillo.

I saw plenty of dignitaries and the chairman of the team that’s coming to the Panhandle. They’re excited as the dickens at the prospect of building that shiny new ballpark downtown. They should be!

But when they finish the job, when they chalk the field for the opening game of the 2019 Texas League baseball season at the new place in downtown Amarillo, I am hoping that the City Council will be sure to extend an invitation to the festivities to the individuals who did much of the work to make it happen.

I refer to the previous City Council.

Amarillo voters turned over the entire five-member council this past May. The new folks took over and then watched the Local Government Corporation hammer out the details of the San Antonio Missions’ baseball franchise relocation.

This, of course, didn’t happen overnight. It didn’t even transpire in the span of a month or two. It took years to cobble together this agreement.

I recall when President Obama strode to the microphone in May 2011 to announce the killing of Osama bin Laden. He made it clear that the effort was done after years of diligent work by intelligence and military agencies over the course of two administrations.

He has said the first call he made when he new bin Laden was dead and the commandos who killed him were out of danger was to former President George W. Bush.

I don’t intend to put too fine a point on this, but Amarillo’s next big step forward is the work of a lot of individuals and local agencies. Yes, I was critical of the previous council over a number of issues. However, it was that council’s hard work that brought about the big announcement today.

My candidate for throwing out the first pitch in April 2019? Former Mayor Paul Harpole.

local news, Sports news

Now we get to wait for the first pitch

I likely won’t be around when they throw out the first pitch, but I’ll be cheering the event nevertheless.

Amarillo’s Local Government Corporation has secured a deal that brings organized baseball back to the city. It comes in the form of the San Antonio Missions, which will depart the Alamo City and relocate in the Panhandle in time for the start of the 2019 season.

This is a good deal. It’s a huuuge deal. It revives the hope of those of us who want to see the city build that multipurpose event venue downtown and want to see the city’s central district restored in a new fashion.

The Elmore Sports Group, owner of the Missions, wants to move to Amarillo because of the promise of the downtown ballpark that will be erected across the street from City Hall. It will cost $45.5 million — give or take — and it will be funded primarily with hotel occupancy tax revenue.

According to the Amarillo Globe-News: “We are very excited,” said D.G. Elmore, group chairman. “We have moved teams at various times in our 36-year history of owning ballclubs, and as I reflect, I don’t think there is a time we have seen the level of business support like this.”

“In many ways, it’s unprecedented,” Elmore said. “This type of support is fantastic.”

Is this project criticism-free? Hardly. We are going to hear from those who do not believe the city should invest so heavily in its downtown district. They want the city to spend money on other areas, on other neighborhoods, on other projects.

What I see happening is a revival that is going to ripple across the city. The MPEV/ballpark will generate considerable interest for the city’s downtown district. That interest translated directly into revenue for the city. That revenue can be spent — wisely, of course — on myriad projects and improvements all across Amarillo.

Now that the LGC has received the commitment it wanted from the Missions, work can begin in earnest on specific design plans for the MPEV. Crews have cleared out the lot. The Coca-Cola distribution center that once occupied that downtown property has relocated to a business park on the east side of the city.

The sounds of baseball being played downtown will be new to those who have lived here for any length of time. My wife and I have called Amarillo home for more than two decades. Our life is set to change in due course as we continue to prepare for our relocation.

The city’s life is about to change, too. Also for the better.

Affiliated minor-league baseball is returning to Amarillo, which used to be home to the Gold Sox, a team affiliated with the San Diego Padres of the National League. And that makes the Missions’ relocation somewhat poetic and symmetrical, as that team also is part of the Padres organization.

There’s much to do. But with the announcement today that the Missions have signed on the dotted line, the LGC can claim much work has been done already.

Let’s get busy.

local news, Sports news

More downtown construction at hand?

Amarillo’s brand new City Council is going to make an announcement Wednesday.

I am waiting with bated breath.

The council members might have some big news to share regarding the future of the city’s effort to remake, reshape, revive and re-create its downtown business/entertainment district.

That long-awaited multipurpose event venue might be coming closer to reality.

The city’s Local Government Corporation has been negotiating with San Antonio business officials about how to relocate that city’s Double A baseball franchise to Amarillo. The LGC has made it clear that it wouldn’t proceed with MPEV construction until it strikes a deal with some franchise to occupy the venue.

I am acutely aware that a number of soreheads are going to gripe about it. They complain about the escalating cost of the ballpark. Amarillo voters approved a non-binding referendum in November 2015; the MPEV cost was listed at $32 million on the ballot measure. The price tag has escalated to around $45 million.

My own hope is that the price of the ballpark doesn’t go much greater than its current level.

The council, though, has taken great strides already in the redevelopment of the downtown district. That five-star hotel is nearing completion; we’ve seen that parking garage go up.

Amarillo doesn’t have any kind of organized baseball activity occurring this spring and summer, which I am sure upsets the city’s baseball fan base. The MPEV, though, would play host to a number of other activities, which would jazz up the nightlife in the city’s long-slumbering central district.

My hopes have gone up, slumped, gone up again and then receded. As of this moment, I am once again cautiously optimistic we are going to get some good news.

Sports news

Boxing has come to this?

Once upon a time — a lifetime or two ago — I was a big boxing fan.

Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. would win the heavyweight boxing championship in 1964, change his name to Muhammad Ali and then dominate the sweet science for, oh, the next 15 or so years.

Yeah, he was stripped of his title for more than three years over his religious objection to the Vietnam War. Even then, he was The Man.

Boxing eventually took a turn away from the simplicity of the sport. It formed a lot of governing boxing authorities. Each of them recognized their version of “world champion.” They expanded the number of weight classes. There were so many “world champions,” no one could keep track of them. Some of these weight classes are topped by something called “interim champion,” whatever the hell that means!

Now the sport has come to a new level of carnival spectacle. It has scheduled a match between a retired “world champion” and a mixed martial arts goon. The boxing/MMA world is agog over the prospect of former champion boxer Floyd Mayweather fighting MMA champ Connor McGregor sometime this year.

Who’s going to win? I don’t know and I don’t care.

I do know that boxing has now resorted to creating circus acts to gin up attention for a sport in serious decline.

If only we could return to the era when the heavyweight boxing champion of the world was the baddest man on Earth.

Oh, do I miss Muhammad Ali.

Sports news

Tiger hits another bump on the road back

When TV commentators and other media representatives refer to you as a “legend” in your particular profession, everything that goes wrong in your life is magnified exponentially.

So it is with “golf legend” Tiger Woods.

The fellow who has won 14 major golf titles got himself arrested and charged with “driving under the influence” in Florida.

Woods has been sidelined for some time now. He’s seeking to recover from injury and at least two surgeries on his back. He’s also had some more personal difficulties, stemming from a 2009 incident involving his then-wife and reports that surfaced later about his serial marital infidelity.

Now this.

Woods had said something just the other day about how he hadn’t “felt this good in years,” meaning, I suppose, that his back pain is subsiding and that he might be able — maybe soon — to return to golf.

We don’t yet know whether he was “under the influence” of alcohol or something else.

I am a fairly avid golf fan. I am pulling for Tiger to come back. It’s just not the same without him competing for tournament victories on Sunday.

But, c’mon man! This isn’t the way back to where you need to be — or where your many golf fans want you to be.

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How about that MPEV? Any news … at all?

Amarillo’s new City Council will take office very soon with a heaping plate of unfinished business.

Downtown revival is proceeding nicely. But the city has this big ol’ vacant lot across Seventh Avenue from City Hall that it’s got to fill with something. They knocked down the old Coca Cola distribution plant and relocated it to a business park near Rick Husband Amarillo International Airport.

That something happens to be a ballpark/multipurpose event venue. You remember it, right?

Amarillo voters in November 2015 approved a “non-binding referendum” that authorized the city to spend $32 million on the MPEV. The cost of the structure has escalated a bit since then, to around $45 million.

But the city has assured residents it will be built. Some things must happen before we start busting up pavement. First and foremost is that the city needs a commitment from a minor-league baseball franchise to come to Amarillo. The council formed a Local Government Corporation to lead the negotiation with owners of the San Antonio Missions, which is looking — one still hopes — for a new place to play some hardball. San Antonio wants a AAA franchise; the Missions are a AA outfit.

Meanwhile, Amarillo is without baseball of any kind since that joke of a team vacated the city to relocate in Grand Prairie. Why did the team bolt? They didn’t have an adequate place to play ball.

The MPEV is supposed to solve that issue. It will be a shiny new venue that will serve many purposes in addition to being the home field for an affiliated minor-league baseball team; the Missions are part of the National League San Diego Padres organization.

City Hall has been quiet about the MPEV negotiations, which might be a good thing. Lame-duck Councilman Randy Burkett popped off a few months ago about a deal he said was on the verge of being struck, but LGC chairman (and former mayor) Jerry Hodge quashed any hope of an imminent deal; he said the LGC was still working on it and said he was “ashamed” of Burkett’s big mouth.

We’ve got five newbies coming aboard at City Hall. Let us hope they can nudge the negotiation along, with the help of City Manager Jared Miller. My faith in the LGC’s ability to finalize a deal remains fairly strong.

The MPEV issue, though, has tested many residents’ confidence that the city can deliver on its promise to bring minor-league baseball back to Amarillo — and to put it downtown.

Welcome to the thick of the fray, City Council.

Sports news

You go, Patch!

Under normal circumstances, I wouldn’t give a hoot about the Kentucky Derby, a horse race that occurs each May in Louisville, Ky.

This year, though, is different.

A thoroughbred named Patch is going to take his place Saturday in the starting gate. I want Patch to win the race.

Why? The beast has just one eye.

I get excited about horse racing only when the same horse wins the first two legs of the Triple Crown — the Derby and the Preakness. My favorite horse races of all time were the 1973 and 2015 Belmont Stakes, the final Triple Crown race.

In1973, Secretariat won the Triple Crown by damn near lapping the field at the Belmont. In 2015, American Pharoah broke a 37-year Triple Crown drought by leading from wire to wire in a stunning race.

This year, I’m hoping to watch the Kentucky Derby and am going to cheer for Patch to show up those other horses. He’s about a 30-to-1 underdog. Hey, horses have come from farther down on the odds chart to win.

Go for it, Patch!

Sports news

Mixed-gender relays in the Olympics? Sure, why not?

I kind of like this notion.

The International Association of Athletics Federations is considering an idea to allow track and field relay teams to comprise men and women competing in the same races.

It’s not as though the IAAF would allow female shot putters to compete against the men. Or pole vaulters. Or discus throwers. This idea deserves a fair hearing.

Let the women run with the men

They’ve done this already at a meet in the Bahamas. The 4-by-400 relay featured two men and two women on each team. They ran in no particular order. The home team won the event, which thrilled the fans. But the race reportedly drew a lot of attention leading up to it.

“The crowd was incredible, I still have goosebumps thinking about it. These are the kind of things we need to look at,” said Olivier Gers, head of the IAAF.

My own preference would be to have men and women running against competitors of the same gender in each leg of the relay. But what the heck, it’s not my call.

Frankly, such an event at the Olympics would spur my interest even more. I suspect it also would gin up interest around the world as well.

Sports news

Tebow can play hardball, too!

Call me surprised … in a most pleasant way.

Tim Tebow, the one-time standout college football quarterback who didn’t cut it as a pro, has turned to baseball.

I once thought the Heisman Trophy winner’s stint with the New York Mets organization was little more than a publicity stunt.

You may dip me in sesame seeds. It turns out Tebow is starting to get the hang of the game he didn’t play seriously since high school. Tebow is learning how to hit pro baseball pitching while playing for the Columbia (S.C.) Fireflies. He started out abysmally, but has gone 9 for 20 of late, raising his batting average to a respectable .246.

Tebow’s status as a bit of a cult figure goes a good bit beyond his athletic prowess. He is known as an devout Christian who introduced a new verb to the English language: Tebowing. It’s meant to describe the kneeling pose Tebow would use whenever he scored a touchdown. Tebow would kneel while saying a brief prayer of thanks to God.

Yes, I was skeptical about his baseball adventure. I feared the Mets had denied another more deserving young man a shot at making it in the big leagues by giving a high-profile celebrity-athlete a chance to play some hardball.

Tebow gave up football after being unable to make the grade with a number of National Football League teams. He fell victim to the curse that occasionally hits Heisman Trophy-winning athletes, those who are unable to lift their game to a competitive level in the pros even after excelling at the college level.

Baseball, though, is providing him with another opportunity.

I wish the young man well and hope he continues to improve.

Sports news

Jackie Robinson stood tall and proud

They unveiled a statue today at Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles.

It honors a young man who 70 years ago stepped onto a baseball field while wearing a baseball uniform. He played for the Brooklyn Dodgers back then.

But this wasn’t just an ordinary young man. His name was Jackie Robinson. He had black skin and started playing Major League professional baseball at a time — the year was 1947 — when only white players were allowed to take the field.

Many of those who ran Major League Baseball knew at the time that this would be a special athlete. He was a gifted hitter, fielder and base runner. His contribution to the Grand Old Game, though, went far beyond his prowess on the field.

He became a champion for the rights of all Americans to pursue their dreams. Robinson’s was to become a professional baseball player, to play the game in the big leagues.

I wrote about this young man a year ago in a piece for Panhandle PBS, which broadcast a special in Robinson’s memory.

http://www.panhandlepbs.org/blogs/public-view-john-kanelis/jackie-robinson-blazed-daunting-trail/

Major League Baseball recently retired the No. 42, which was the number Robinson wore on his back. It’s the first time MLB had done such a thing. Each year about this time, teams take the field with all the players wearing that number. They do so to honor the courage Robinson showed in facing down the racism he encountered when he took the field.

They also honor the man he became after he no longer played ball. He remained an iconic figure in the battle to obtain equal rights for all Americans.

Robinson died too soon, in 1972, from diabetes-related complications.

This great man’s legacy, though, lives on in the young African-American and Latino athletes who came along right behind him on that trail he blazed.