Scooter Chapman

I was going to do a piece on the Mariners, but they have been making so many changes, I’ll hold off for now and bring you a mid-season report later.

 

It was good to see them bring up Dustin Ackley from Tacoma and the 2009 first-round draft choice got his first hit and did a flawless job in the field before 34,000 fans and it looks like this might be one of those high-round draft picks they actually will keep around.

 

The young pitcher Michael Pineda also looks like a keeper. I like his composure on the hill and Ichiro has not hit a homer this year, but he’s found his sweet swing of late.

 

Lots of things going on, to let’s get to it.

 

Rickerson report — We congratulate Sequim’s all-around athlete Drew Rickerson and wish him well at Pacific Lutheran University in the fall. He earned his AA from Peninsula College (a running start student who excelled in the classroom as well as on the Sequim football field and baseball diamond) and has some $85,000 in academic scholarships at PLU.

 

They are interested in his football skills and baseball efforts, but Drew is leaning toward baseball in Parkland and it will be fun to follow his progress.

 

NFL — What are the chances the NFL will not play this season? Right now it looks like we might be rooting hard for college and high school teams.

 

If there is a season, two things to look for: Seattle has a good player in offensive tackle James Carpenter from Alabama and he will play as it looks like Seattle will not re-sign free agents Chris Carpenter, a center, or right tackle Sean Locklear and James Carpenter can be taught both positions.

 

Look for Matt Hasselbeck to be re-signed as soon as the back-to-work sign is put out or else he will be bound for Tennessee or Minnesota where he could mentor someone named Jake Locker or Christian Ponder.

 

Mat shuffle — There will be new weight classes this winter for high school wrestlers and most coaches like the changes.

 

The low weight now is 103 and that goes to 106. Teams were having trouble finding 103-pound boys willing to grapple.

 

The most notable other changes take 171 to 182, 189 to 195 and 215 to 220.

 

Holy Hockey — It was a great NHL series between Boston and Vancouver. I like the new style of hockey as there are a lot of great skaters and the action is fast without all of those useless fights which slowed down the game. It was sad to see the so-called Vancouver fans react the way they did with riots after the game. Never did understand what great thrill groups of people got out of turning cars over.

 

Scooter Chapman can be reached at scooter@olypen.com.