Posted on September 11, 2023

Weekly Update September 11, 2023

Weekly Update

Baseball: Weekly updates. Astros and Altuve on fire. Braves make post season. 9/11 DraftKings error.

Basketball: NBA stricter on star resting. Porter arrested. USA loses in FIBA.

Football – NCAAF: 4 losses in Top 25. Other headlines. MSU HC suspended. Briles on OU field.

Football – NFL: Week 1! Bosa highest paid D player.

Olympic Sports: 1000s DQ’d in marathon. Farah retires.

Tennis: Coco and Djokovic US Open champs.

Baseball – MLB:

  • This week’s updates: The Orioles outlasted the Angels in 10 innings, winning by 1 on Monday. Yankees Giancarlo hit his 400th HR of his career in the Yankees 5-1 win over the Tigers, adding to the Yank’s 5 game win streak. The Cubs had a hot streak going, winning 4 straight games including a sweep of the Giants but then lost 3 straight to the Diamondbacks. The Rays needed 2 extra innings to get the W over the Red Sox but did it in style, with a 3-run HR. Then on Tuesday, the Rays P Glasnow tied his career high of 14 KOs to beat them again, this time in regulation 3-1. The Cardinals hit 4 HRs for the 2nd straight game to beat the top team in the league, Braves 11-6. While Urias serves his 2nd suspension for domestic violence, his replacement Rookie P Pepiot pitched a perfect 6 2/3 innings in the Dodgers demolition of the Marlins Thursday 10-0. That night, the Tigers would end the Yankees win streak at 5, beating them 10-3. Dodgers 1B Freddie Freeman set their franchise record for most doubles in a season with 53 in their win over the Nationals 8-5 Friday. As if next game of theirs needed to be longer after a 4-hour rain delay the Washington and LA teams went to 11 innings to decide Saturday’s game. The Nationals took it off a wild pitch 7-6. Phillies LF Schwarber blasted HR #42 in their win over the Marlins 8-4. He would hit #43 on Sunday but they would lose 4-5. That moves Schwarber to #3 on the HR list this season (only behind Olson of Braves at 48 and Angels Ohtani at 44). The Orioles had won 7 straight (including a 13-12 nail biter on Saturday) before dropping their final game in the Red Sox series on Sunday 3-7. The Brewers/ Yankees game was scoreless til the 11th when both scored a single run. Before that, the Yankees hadn’t even managed a hit. The Brewers then scored 2 more in the 12th, surely that would be enough right? Nope the Yankees got a 2-run HR to keep the game going. Only in the 13th would we get a result, Yanks win by 1.

  • The Astros started their week off by dominating the Rangers 14-1 and 12-3 to sweep their fellow TX team. Altuve was on fire making history Tuesday night by hitting 5 HRs in 2 games, tying the most in MLB history. He HR’d at his first 3 at-bats, ending the game 3 of 5 at the plate. Combined with his HR in the 9th on Monday, he is the first player since 1961 (what they call the expansion era) to HR in 4 consecutive innings. They did drop their first game against the Padres but otherwise won 5 of their last 6 games.

  • We have our first team that has clinched a playoff berth: the Atlanta Braves in the NL with 94 wins. The only other team to have over 90 wins is the Orioles exactly on that amount.
    • Eliminated: (NL) Rockies* and (AL) White Sox*, Royals and A’s

  • Yikes! DraftKings issued an apology today after they ran a special on 9/11 on NY teams. They ran a promo that the Yankees, Mets and Jets all had to win their games today. Not a good look even if they did have the best of intentions.

Basketball – NBA:

  • The NBA is cracking down on resting stars with likely passing more stringent rules and punishments for doing so. The league’s board is expected to pass a motion that would give the ability to fine teams over $1MM for each incident for missed games of their stars during regular season games (likely on a building scale 1st offense $100k, 2nd for $250k and then $1MM for each after that). Specifically, the league wants to avoid instances with multiple All-Stars sitting out and resting during in-season tournaments and televised games. Also on the table, mandating that players participate in 65 regular-season games to be eligible for post season awards. A star is someone who made the All-Star or All-NBA teams in any of the last 3 seasons. There will be exceptions to this as well aka excused absences. The league would allow regular season back to back allowances for players who are 35 years old or more if they have career workloads of 34,000 regular season minutes or 1,000 regular season/playoff games IF they are pre-approved.
  • Rockets G Kevin Porter Jr was arrested for assault and strangulation involving his former WNBA player gf in a NY hotel room this morning.
  • In other not great news, the USA lost to GER in the FIBA Semifinal this week. GER did at least go on to win the entire thing, beating SER in the final 83-77 but still. To add insult to injury, USA lost to CAN in the bronze medal match by 9.

Football – NCAAF:

  • There were only 4 losses in the Top 25 this week.
    • We gotta start with the big one. #11 Texas upset #3 Alabama at home, handing Saban his first double digit loss at home since 2003 (when he coached LSU). This also snaps the Tide’s 21 home winning streak, which was the longest in the FBS. Now Georgia sits on top of that throne. The last time Texas beat a Top 5 ranked team, that team was Nebraska. Texas frankly looked better in this game than Alabama did. No sugarcoating it. Texas was up 13-6 at half and then Bama came back to take their first led of the game, 16-13 at the start of the 4Q. The horns let the Tide hang around for quite some time and it still could’ve gone Bama’s way but they got majorly beat in the QB position. Ewers is a better QB than Millroe is and it showed in 4Q, when UT put up 21 points to win 34-24.

    • Washington State beat #19 Wisconsin to keep the Pac 12 win streak alive. Wash St QB Cam Ward looked good throwing 2 TDs for 212 yards and going 20-32. They were up 24-9 at half and although the Badgers came back a bit in the 3Q, the Cougars were too much. They are now ranked #23.

    • Miami is back? Well TBD but they beat #23 Texas A&M this weekend after losing a snore fest last year (9-17). This year we had a lot more points scored including the ultimate momentum killer, a 98 yard kickoff return by the Canes. Miami put up double digits in the final 3Qs to win 48-33. Miami also broke into the Top 25 with this win, putting them #22.
    • #20 Ole Miss was put on the ropes by #24 Tulane. And not just #24 Tulane who beat USC in the Cotton Bowl last year, Tulane without its starting QB! Ole Miss did pull it out in the 4Q, scoring 20 points including a scoop and score to win 37-20.

  • Other major storylines:
    • #9 Tennessee scores the least amount of points in HC Heupel era beating Austin Peay 30-13.
    • #10 Notre Dame handles business against a good defensive team, NC State winning 45-24.
    • #12 Utah took their first lead of the game with 8 seconds left. Baylor then makes it to the 20 with an incredible pass with 1 second left on the clock. So they have 1 chance to toss it up and win. But a controversial no PI call would end the game. Utah escapes barely.
    • #13 Oregon also had a close call with unranked and win-less Texas Tech. In a game that went back and forth all day, Texas Tech gets a FG to go up by 2 with just 5 minutes left. ORE then takes the clock down to 1:10 to get their FG, putting them up by 1. The Red Raiders were driving, making it to mid-field before Shough threw a pick 6 to put ORE up by 8. TT then has 35 seconds to score a TD and a 2-point conversion to take the game to OT. But alas it was not meant to be, TT throws an interception as time expires.

    • Rice beats Houston in 2OT in the battle of Houston. Rice was up 28-0 before Houston came back to tie it and then still lost.
    • Pac 12 was 17-0 until Miss St took down Arizona in OT.
    • Weather delayed 25 hours of football games. Purdue VTech the most 5:54 hours!

  • Michigan St HC Mel Tucker has been suspended (and believed with the intent to fire) after being accused of sexual harassment allegations. Get ready people. He allegedly had phone sex with the lady who literally goes around to different universities to talk about sexual harassment with football players. You cant make this stuff up.
  • Another yikes moment. Oklahoma OC Jeff Lebby had ex and disgraced Baylor HC Art Briles on the field during the OU/SMU game Saturday night. The man is his father-in-law but still. ICYMI: Art Briles was fired from Baylor after he ignored and took no action after his team were names in several sexual assault allegations.

Football – NFL:

  • NFL season began this week with a shocker on TNF. The Lions, who went 9-8 last season, beat the defending Super Bowl champions, the Chiefs by 1. In other upsets, the Browns and QB DeShaun Watson destroyed the Bengals and QB Joe Burrow who had the lowest passing yard total of this career. Sticking with surprising QB news, Bucs new QB Baker Mayfield (bet you didn’t know who the starter was) beat the Vikings and newly popular Kirk Cousins 20-17. Derek Carr made a splash debut as a Saint, throwing for 305 yards and a win over the Titans. But the best QB performance was by Dolphins QB Tua Tagovailoa who threw for 466 yards, 3 TDs and to hold on 36-34 over the Chargers. There were 7 close games (under a TD point differential). The Cowboys/Giants rivalry game was not one of them. The Dallas team put on a beating, shutting out the Giants 40-0.

  • 49ers DE Nick Bosa (formerly from Ohio St) is now the highest paid defensive player in the NFL. He signed his agreement Wednesday for $170MM for 5-years. He is the highest paid non-QB in league history. $122.5MM is guaranteed in this contract. He is the reigning Defensive Player of the Year.

Olympic Sports:

  • 11,000 runners have been DQ’d from a marathon in Mexico City after thousands were found to cut the course, that is more than 1/3 of the participants. Some runners were even rumored to use vehicles and public transport. This is not the first time for the Mexico City marathon either. In 2017, 6k runners and 2018 3k runners were removed for similar infractions.
  • Speaking of marathons, the King has officially hung it up. GBR’s Mo Farah has retired from competitive marathon running after his 4th place finish at the Great North Run half-marathon Sunday. Farah is a 6x world champion and 4x Olympic champion, including successfully completing the golden double (5k and 10k) in 2013 & 2015 worlds and 2012 and 2016 Olympics. Although native to Somalia, he was human trafficked to the UK to run. He was also knighted by Queen Elizabeth.

Tennis:

  • The US Open is over and for the first time since 2017, we have an American champion!
    • On the Women’s side: We had 2 American women in, Coco Gauff and Madison Keys in the Quarterfinals. Both moved onto Semifinals and we were all hoping for a USA vs USA final. Coco did her job, beating Muchova in straight sets. That takes her to her first final and she is the youngest to make it there since Serena since 1999. However, Keys came out hot winning 6-0 in first set but then lost the next two in tie breakers to #2 Sabalenka. That set up the BLR vs USA Gauff. Home crowd helps. Coco dropped the first set 2-6 but rallied back to win the next two 6-3 and 6-2 to take her first Grand Slam title! She was in the crowd as a 9 year old and now she is holding the trophy! She is the first American woman to win sine 2017 (Sloane Stephens). You go Coco.
    • On the Men’s side: Last we left, we had 3 USA men left but they 2 were facing off (Shelton and Tiafoe) and then Fritz had to face Djokovic to claim his spot in the Final. Well unranked Shelton was the winner of the two Americans. And needless to say Fritz had his work cut out for him, Djokovic got him in straight sets. The other Semi was #1 Alcaraz vs #3 Medvedev. The RUS got the better of world #1 winning in 4 sets, only dropping the 3rd although the first went to a tie breaker. So the final was SRB Djokovic vs RUS Medvedev. #2 vs #3. Djokovic showed why he is the best in history, winning in straight sets (the 2nd went to tie breakers). Djokovic is now the only player, man or woman, to have 24 Grand Slam titles.

What to watch this week

Baseball – MLB:

  • Tues 9/12
    • Yankees at Red Sox @ 6:10pm on TBS
      • Rodon vs Crawford
  • Thurs 9/14
    • Yankees at Red Sox – or – Rays at Orioles @ 6:15pm on FOX
  • Fri 9/15
    • Rays at Orioles @ 6:05pm on Apple TV+
    • Phillies at Cardinals @ 7:15pm on Apple TV+
  • Sun 9/17
    • Cubs at Diamondbacks @ 6pm on ESPN
      • Wicks vs Nelson

Football-NCAAF:

Top 25 
Week 3
Top 25 Games
Visitor  Home Day Time (CT) TV Line
15. Kansas St Mizzou Sat 9/16 11:00 AM SEC -5
11. Tennessee Florida Sat 9/16 6:00 PM ESPN -6.5
Pitt West Virginia Sat 9/16 6:30 PM ABC -1
Colorado St 18. Colorado Sat 9/16 9:00 PM ESPN +22.5
*GameDay indicated in bold*

Football-NFL:

  • Mon 9/11
    • Bills at Jets @ 7:15pm on ESPN and ABC
  • Thurs 9/14
    • Vikings at Eagles @ 7:15pm on Prime
  • Sun 9/17
    • 8 games @ 12pm on FOX/CBS
      • FOX: Packers at Falcons or Seahawks at Lions – or – Bears at Bucs – or – Colts at Texans
      • CBS: Raiders at Bills – or – Ravens at Bengals – or – Chargers at Titans – or – Chiefs at Jaguars
    • 49ers at Rams – or – Giants at Cardinals @ 3:05pm on FOX
    • Jets at Cowboys – or – Commanders at Broncos @ 3:25pm on CBS
    • Dolphins at Patriots @ 7:20pm on NBC
  • Mon 9/18
    • Saints at Panthers @ 6:15pm on ESPN
    • Browns at Steelers @ 7:15pm on ABC

Motorsports:

  • Sun 9/17
    • F1: Singapore GP @ 7am on ESPN

Olympic Sports:

  • Wed 9/13
    • NCAA Volleyball: Wisconsin vs Marquette @ 7pm on FS1
  • Sat 9/16
    • Track & Field: Diamond League Final @ 2pm on NBC
  • Sun 9/17
    • NCAA Volleyball: Oregon vs Marquette @ 1pm on FS1
    • Track & Field: Diamond League Final @ 3pm on NBC

Soccer:

  • Mon 9/11
    • UEFA Euro Qualifying: POR vs LUX @ 8pm on FS1
    • UEFA Euro Qualifying: Armenia vs CRO @ 10pm on FS1
  • Tues 9/12
    • UEFA Euro Qualifying: ESP vs CYP @ 6pm on FS1
    • NCAAM: Notre Dame vs Michigan St @ 7pm on ACC
    • UEFA Euro Qualifying: SCO vs ENG @ 8pm on FS1
  • Thurs 9/14
    • NCAAW: Alabama vs Georgia @ 6pm on SEC
  • Fri 9/15
    • NCAAW: Miami vs Syracuse @ 5pm on ACC
    • NCAAM: Louisville vs VTech @ 7pm on ACC
  • Sat 9/16
    • Premier League: Wolves vs Liverpool @ 6:30am on USA
    • Premier League: West Ham vs Manchester City @ 9am on USA
    • Premier League: Teams TBA @ 11:30am on NBC
  • Sun 9/17
    • Premier League: Bournemouth vs Chelsea @ 8am on USA
    • Premier League: Everton vs Arsenal @ 10:30am on USA
    • NCAAW: NC St vs Pitt @ 1pm on ACC
    • MLS: Austin FC vs Portland Timbers @ 7:30pm on FS1

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