Well done, Fencer!

It was a glorious day for the return of outdoor baseball in Minnesota, and the Twins won to improve their AL Central record to 6-2.

I've never gotten into baseball, it's been many years since I've watched a game lol.

Congrats, FencerforJesus, and good luck if you decide to go!

Now I have another potential decision to make. I mentioned on the previous page that two weeks ago, I hosted Steve Lillis, a professional pool player that uses his cue stick to bring the Gospel to college and church campuses. God made a connection between the two of us, because I have a very similar vision of what he is doing with the sport of fencing. To make matters even cooler, he founded his ministry, Gospel Trick Shots, on the exact same day I started fencing.

Well, I just got an e-mail from him last night about a trip he is planning with OM (Operation Mobilization), a well known missions organization. They want him to coordinate with other sport ministries for a summer event, and Steve Lillis wants me to come with him and do a fencing presentation on the tour. He even said he would be the first financial supporter for me for the trip (I would have to raise funds). He is currently (as I am typing) on his way to Atlanta for one of his shows and his host is the director of this program. He is going to talk to the director about the possibility of using my fencing skills for the trip. I have no idea what God is doing here, but I am seeing this as an opportunity to get out of El Paso and do my presentation in more places. God is doing BIG things in my life, through my education (pointing me towards education), through my personal life, and through sports in qualifying me for Nationals and showing me this door. I will wait until the weekend to hear how that talk goes and see what God does through it.

NBA Playoffs are in the conference finals. In the Eastern Conference, The Boston Celtics won two on the road to take a 2-0 lead on the Orlando Magic, who had swept their previous two opponents. In the Western Conference, the L.A. Lakers have a 1-0 lead on the Phoenix Suns, with Game 2 tonight.

The baseball world is abuzz today about the blown umpire's call on what should have been the last play of Detroit pitcher Armando Galarraga's perfect game against Cleveland last night. Umpire Jim Joyce called Jason Donald safe at first when he was clearly out. He later apologized for messing up on such a significant call.

It's worth noting that perfect games are extremely rare - in over 100 years and tens of thousands of games, there are only 20.

MLB Commissioner Bud Selig is considering overturning the call, and this will likely bring calls for extended instant-replay reviews in the sport. (As annoying as those delays in NFL games might be, I think it's worth it to get the call right at times like this).

The umpire showed a lot of class in acknowledging the mistake and apologizing, as did the pitcher, in accepting the apology.

Read more, and watch the crucial play here.

This has definately become a "Year of the Pitcher" in Baseball. There has been a no-hitter, two perfect games, a 'should-have-been' perfect game, and more. And hidden amongst the hype of Roy Halliday, the blown perfect game, Tim Lincecum, is Colorado Rockies ace Ubaldo Jimenez, who is on pace to break the wins and ERA record this year. In just his first 11 starts, he is 10-1, and that one loss was only because the oppossing pitcher was ever so slightly better. His 0.78 ERA is a MLB pre-June record and there is no sign of him slowing down. He has beaten Nationals ace Livian Hernandez twice. He smoked two time Cy Young winner Lincecum on Monday and is on pace for a sub 1.00 ERA and 30+ wins. The all-time ERA record is 1.12 and the all-time wins record is 31. And no other pitcher is close to him in either league right now. And all this in a place called Coors Field where all the experts claim to be impossible to pitch and easy to hit. GO ROCKIES!!!

It's crazy, the umpire is a 21 year veteran who has called World Series games. He is completely conciliatory now, even tearfully apologized to [Detroit Tiger pitcher] Galarraga in person after the game as soon as soon as he saw the video. The quote of his everyone is repeating is "I just cost that kid a perfect game".

That was painful all around. The pitcher showed class, the umpire showed integrity and love for the game, not to mention courage going back to work. Isn't that the guy you'd want to keep?

I guess in all the excitement the outfielder who made the diving catch gets a "and Worf came along" mention ... good old whats-his-name. So here's an Amazing Catch! for you.

In the baseball world, Ubaldo Jimenez hit a big speed bump in his race to finish the season with a sub-1.00 ERA by allowing 3 earned runs in only 6 innings. He still got the win, and is still on pace for 30 wins, which I am hoping he will do since that would be a truly incredible achievement. However I fear that it is no more attainable than the all time ERA record (1.12). Jimenez must now pitch 21 scoreless innings in order to make up for his single so-so outing to get his ERA back to below 1, something that will take at least 3 exceptional starts.

As for the perfect games, there have been so many of them recently it is almost ridiculous. There have now been 3 perfect games in two years, along with 2 other games that SHOULD have been perfect (the infamous Detroit game and also the San Francisco game last year where Jonathan Sanchez's perfecto was ruined by an infielder error), and another game that was incredibly close to being perfect (in San Diego earlier this year, the only baserunner of one game was on an infield single that by luck happened to hit the pitcher's glove and slow down it's bounces enough for the runner to get to first base in time). 6 perfect games in two years would have been utterly ridiculous, as the chance of a perfect game is 1 in 10,000 and there are about 3,000 games in a season. And it almost happened.

In baseball, I follow the Dodgers. On the hitting side of baseball, Dodgers outfielder Andre Ethier was leading all three categories of the triple crown (Batting average, RBIs, and Home Runs) by a large margin as late as mid-May and it seemed plausible that he could become the first player in 70 years to bat over .400. Then, he broke his pinkie finger while taking a swing in batting practice and was out for several weeks, and ever since he came back he's been in an awful slump. Quite a stat-nerd killjoy.

Jimenez had a huge problem in that game called heavy rain. He simply could not control the ball as he normally could. But to say he needs 21 scoreless innings to drop his ERA to sub 1.00, is really not that hard considering he has already done it TWICE this year. He has allowed a total of 12 runs in 13 starts with a 12-1 record and that is a very SCARY stat. If he starts all 34-35 games he is slated to play, he is on pace for a 31-32 win season. He'll return to form next game.

In this year of pitchers, nobody is going to hit over .400 this year. We have two in the AL that could stand a chance but they have to step it up soon to do so.

And as for standings, everything is up in the air. The Rays have come back from last season's flop after going to the WS. The Twins and Tigers are always up and at each other for their division. The AL West is a complete mess. The NL East has changed hands as Atlanta and the Mets have leapfrogged the Phillies. The Reds have come out of nowhere to take command of the NL Central. And it is a four horse race in the NL West with the Padres, Dodgers, Giants and Rockies all within striking distance. But if it weren't for Jimenez given the Rockies injuries to thier pitchers, they wouldn't be in the picture either. But once they get completely healthy, watch out for a late season run as they have done twice in the last three years.

A month later, most division races remain quite close.

The National League won the MLB All-Star Game last evening 3-1, for the first time since 1996. This is significant because the winning league gets home-field advantage in the World Series - and the home team has won most Series in the last 25 years.

Just sayin, who's with me in being happy the world cup is over? No offense to soccer fans, but I just can't get in to that sport... not to mention the vuvuzelas were terrible lol.

Kinda the same with baseball, but I like that better than soccer.

^ I'm happy its over to.

I know this is old news, but tdo any of you remeber Brain Beluga? The Pavkers drafed him. The only reason I bring this up is because he lived in the same town and went to the same grade school as me (this is some what unuasal because I live in IL.)

Go Pack Go!

Bumping this up from bottom of page 3.

College Football is underway. But this is part of the season that I really don't like. Many big name schools load their first 4-5 games with teams that truy stand no chance, just for money and for wins. Just for example, Oregon just wallopped New Mexico 72-0. I wouldn't want to watch a game like that, even if my team was winning. I'll be following my school, UTEP, but only as we play our games.

MLB is now on crunch time. There are several races to take good note of.
AL: Just two races here. AL East and AL Central. Yankees and Rays are going to finish 1-2 in either order with the loser taking the Wild Card. Boston is closest to the Rays at 7-8 games back. That's not happening baring a major collapse. The Twins and the Chi Sox is the only other race. Tigers are pretty much out.

The NL has five races. All divisions, the Wild Card, and a Triple Crown possibility. In the NL East, it's the Braves and the Phillies at just a game apart. In the NL Central, it's the Reds and the Cardinals. But the Cardinals are struggling, so this may not be a race for long. The NL West is heating up. The Padres have now lost 9 straght to make things VERY interesting. The Giants are in the thick of it and so are the Rockies seeking to make yet another late season push. The NL Wild Card is also a tight race with the Phillies, the Cards, the Giants, and the Rockies gunning for it.

And there is a possible Triple Crown in the works, which would be a first in 30+ years for anyone and 60+ years for the NL. There are three possible players to get it. Albert Pujols for the Cardinals, Joey Votto for the Reds, and Carlos Gonzales for the Rockies are all in striking distance. Pujols leads the home run race and ranks 5th and 2nd in the batting average and RBI. Votto is 1st in RBI, 2nd is BA, and 3rd for HR. And Gonzales is 1st in BA, 5th HR, and 3rd in RBI. No one else is close. The RBI is the easiest to overcome of the three, followed by BA and HR. Out of these three, Gonzales has a .011 lead in BA over Votto and over .02 lead over Pujols. Pujols has a 2 HR lead over Votto and a 4 HR lead over Gonzales. And Votto has a 2 RBI lead over Pujols and a 4 RBI lead over Gonzales. It's going to be really interesting to see how this turns out.

The only sports i really care about are basketball and netball. Since i play netball in winter and basketball in summer. The others i don't really care abotu execpt maybe gymnastics which i done for a couple of years.

And the Lions get robbed again today, But the Packers won!!!!!!

(As you can tell I'm a Packers fan.)