EL BARRIO, EL FALLS – I took a break from the sports pages this week because it was the deadest week in American Sports. All the sports are in their off-season except baseball, which is the All-Star break. Although soccer is trying to make it the 5 major sports in America, it is not there yet. So I won’t count it. As slow as it was, there was a bit of worthwhile news that happened in the last few days. With that, today’s topics will are: Harden-Westbrook Reunion, Angels No-Hitter, USWNT Fair Pay.
Harden-Westbrook Reunion: With Paul George already traded and the team filled with draft picks and no appeal for bigger free agents, the Oklahoma Thunder decided to properly blow things up and trade Russell Westbrook. Lucky for them, the Houston Rockets were dealing with a growing personality rift between stars James Harden and Chris Paul. So the Rockets agreed to trade Paul to the Oklahoma City Thunder along with two first-round picks and two pick swaps, for Westbrook. This reunites Harden with his former teammate in OKC and someone he has known since childhood. It also continues to reshape the Western Conference. You have the defending Warriors, which still have the core of the team (Steph Curry, Klay Thompson and Draymond Green) that won them their first title, Thompson’s injury not withstanding. Anthony Davis and LeBron at the Lakers, Kawhi Leonard and the aforementioned George on the other side of LA with the Clippers and now this Rockets revamp. The top four in the Western Conference looks etched in stone. The Eastern Conference will now be known as the NBA Junior Division.
Angels No-Hitter: Having to deal with the death of a friend publicly must be weird to say the least. On July 1st, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in California pitcher Tyler Skaggs was found dead in his hotel room. The Angels postponed their game that day but had to play the rest of the series and then deal with the All-Star break. With the break over and no one sure where these guys heads would be at, cause to talk to someone one day and the next day their dead, is hard to grasp, they had games. So last night with all the players wearing Skaggs number and a mural on the wall for him, the Angels pitched a combined no-hitter in a rout. There is a movie in this kind of story, I am telling you. We don’t know what will happen tonight or the rest of the season but this was great for the team and huge step towards healing. Congrats to the team as they did themselves and their teammates memory proud.
USWNT Fair Pay: Now I don’t get paid to be here but if I did and could justify in more clicks, I would be upset if say someone like DJ Eberle was still getting paid more than me. The US Women’s National Soccer Team made less money for winning the Women’s World Cup on Sunday than the men did for losing the Gold Cup final. The Women are helping grow the game by bringing more young girls and fans into it because everybody loves a winner… which the men damn sure ain’t. And the WWC out-performed the Men’s World Cup in US ratings because the Women didn’t choke in qualifying, like the men. That said, I think it is long past due to pay the women equal pay for representing the nation.
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