Its got to be big dreams and youve got to go places to do it. | Forum
Mitglied wzh123
Okt 28 '19
CLEVELAND -- Blinking back tears, LeBron James extended his right ring finger, the one sparkling with 400 diamonds, and touched the championship banner. Ian Gibaut Jersey .As it rose from a golden, miniature Cleveland skyline toward the ceiling, Queens We Are The Champions filled Quicken Loans Arena and Cavs fans sang along with Freddie Mercury just as they did in June.And, incredibly, this was just the warm-up act for a night this city wont soon forget.Welcome to the center of the sports galaxy -- Cleveland, Ohio.On the same night the Cavs celebrated their historic comeback in the NBA Finals, winning a title that not only ended a 52-year drought in Cleveland but energized an entire region, the Indians hosted Game 1 of the World Series against the Chicago Cubs next door at Progressive Field.A perfect sports storm on the shores of Lake Erie.This type of thing never happened in Cleveland, where sports heartbreak was passed down from generation to generation like family heirlooms. But those days are over. This is a new Cleveland -- city of champions.The Cavs flipped that tired sports script, storming back from a 3-1 deficit to shock the 73-win Golden State Warriors and give Cleveland its first title since 1964, when the Browns won the NFL title. Before receiving their rings on Tuesday night -- about an hour before the Indians and Cubs got started -- Cleveland re-lived those special days earlier this summer when one its teams finally fought its way all the way to the top.James was the final player to be introduced and handed his 6.5 karat ring by NBA Commissioner Adam Silver. After slipping it on his hand, James, the kid from Akron who delivered on his promise to win a title for Cleveland, looked at the jewelry with admiration and perhaps some astonishment.Yes, it really happened. Here.This is for you guys, James told the crowd, repeating a message he screamed after the Cavs won Game 7 at Oracle Arena on June 19. This is all for you.James paused and then reminded Cleveland that it remains underdogs -- even in victory.At this point, if youre not from here, live here, play here ... then it makes no sense for you to live at this point, said the three-time champion. Cleveland against the world.James made sure to wish luck to the Indians, who overcame adversity all season and won their first AL pennant since 1997. Theyre trying to end a 68-year Series title drought against the Cubs, those lovable losers 108 years removed from their last championship.Once the pomp and pageantry ended, James posted a triple-double as the Cavs opened the season with a 117-88 win over the New York Knicks. The Cubs-Indians game was shown on smaller scoreboards during timeouts and James, now 3-0 in ring ceremony games, applauded from the bench when he saw Robert Perezs homer give Cleveland a 3-0 lead in the fourth inning.In the moments before they took the floor for the ceremony, the Cavs, wearing new white-and-gold warmups with 2016 NBA Champions written on the back, looked like little kids getting ready to storm the Christmas tree and tear open presents. Kyrie Irving did a little dance in the hallway outside Clevelands locker room and shared a big hug with Kevin Love before James joined them and the team headed into the darkened arena where 20,000-plus fans roared.Following a video that showed highlights from the epic Game 7 -- James huge block, Irvings 3-pointer -- Silver introduced Cavs owner Dan Gilbert, who has spared no expense in building a super team. Clevelands starting five this season will make $100 million in salary.Gilberts gotten greedy, and Cleveland fans dont mind one bit. After all, most of them have waited a lifetime to see one title.Why not another.When this is all over and that banner goes up there, there is really only one thing left to do -- repeat, Gilbert said. And, go Tribe.There was still an opener to play, but that hardly mattered.In the hours leading up to the ceremony and Game 1, fans of the Indians, Cavs -- and a sizeable contingent of Cubs backers -- posed for photos around the two buildings. They were savoring a day many never dreamed possible.Indians outfielder Coco Crisp stopped and signed autographs on his stroll to work. For Crisp, in his second stint with Cleveland after the Indians traded for him in August, the chance to play in the World Series for the team he started with is beyond special.Its a dream come true, said Crisp, who also played for the Indians from 2002-05. To be here now in this situation is unbelievable. And for Cleveland, I mean, what a day. These fans have done a great job of keeping the faith.It was rewarded by the Cavaliers, whose championship transcended all three teams and connected Clevelanders like nothing else.Coach Tyronn Lue, who took over the Cavs midway through last season, shared the story of what it meant to a pair of fans he met after Cleveland won the title. The father and son approached Lue as he had dinner in Las Vegas.Lue said the man told him, You dont understand how much this means to the city of Cleveland. My dad is not alive but he supported all three sports every year. Its so sad hes not here to see this. I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart.Then he broke down and started crying, Lue said. That was one of the best moments I experienced this summer. Jeff Russell Jersey . That left plenty of energy for pitching books and swatting away free agency questions. Anthony had 24 points and nine rebounds, and the Knicks avenged an embarrassing home loss with a rout of their own, beating the Boston Celtics 114-88 on Wednesday night for their third straight victory. Bartolo Colon Jersey . -- Anaheim Ducks defenceman Luca Sbisa will be out at least six weeks with a torn tendon in his right hand. https:///...-jersey-rangers.html . Kozun faked to the forehand and beat Monsters starter, Calvin Pickard, pad side in the second round for the winner. Spencer Abbott also scored in the shootout for the Marlies (25-13-4). If Jessica Moore needed a crowd around her to make pitching worthwhile, she might never have picked up a softball in the first place.Crowds are hard to come by in Sutter, the town in northern California that offered olive groves aplenty, but no stoplights and little more in the way of grocery shopping when the Team USA pitcher grew up there. Sutter is near Yuba City, Moore explained recently to an outsider, not realizing that information might not help non-locals come any closer to finding it on a map. The nearest population center of national significance is Sacramento, about an hour south. In a town of around 3,000 residents, her high school senior class barely reached triple digits.Sutter is the kind of small town, she said, that shuts down for a high school football game. But it was not the kind of place where a young girl playing softball was likely to be spoiled with attention or the newest and priciest equipment. It was the kind of place where she wore out a rut in the grass in the backyard, her foot dragging each time she threw a pitch to her dad.Whether its more accurate to say those surroundings shaped her or suited her, the place and the person meshed.I dont really like to be the center of attention, Moore said. Some people, they look at [the pitcher] as the player who wants to have the spotlight on them. Im not necessarily that, but I like to be the one who is in control. I trust myself to do the job -- and obviously my teammates. But I like to have things riding on me. I like that pressure. I love to compete.As much as the drop-ball that tumbles off the table before it reaches batters, as much as the international experience available to the longest-serving pitcher on Team USAs staff, it is her background that makes Moore such an asset at this particular moment in the sports history.She worked to earn the chance to pitch for her country. That means everything to her. How many people are watching means less.The worlds attention is turning to the Southern Hemisphere and the Olympics, even as 31 international softball teams gather much farther north, near Vancouver, British Columbia, for the World Baseball Softball Confederation World Championship. There is optimism within softball that by the time the globe next gathers for the Olympics four years from now in Japan, the sport will return to the program from which it was evicted after 2008. A decision is expected by the time Brazils Olympics begin. But for now, as was the case when Japan won the title in Canada in 2012 and then defended it in the Netherlands in 2014, the world championship remains the sports biggest international prize.Vancouver, a megacity in every other respect, will play the role of Sutter in the shadow cast by Rio de Janeiro. There will be no television coverage in the United States and only modest media attention -- just plenty of competition for Moore and her teammates.Moore is not the household name, even in softball households, that Team USA pitchers of old like Lisa Fernandez or Jennie Finch were. None of the pitchers who make up the teams staff, which includes Kelly Barnhill, Ally Carda, Delanie Gourley and Jaclyn Traina, fit that description. Part of the reason are offensive tides in the sport that make it more difficult for pitchers to dominate. Some of it is because without the Olympic stage, it takes more effort for fans to keep track of players beyond college. That isnt to say the pitchers lack credentials.While recent graduate Cheridan Hawkins rewrote many of the University of Oregons records, Moore finished her college career as the Ducks all-time leader in wins and with four of the top five strikeout seasons in program history. She was thrice a first-team all-conference honoree.It says as much as anything that she started each of the first 20 postseason games Oregon played during her time there.I hated facing her, said Team USAs Valerie Arioto, formerly a Pac-12 rival at California. If you look at the stats, Im pretty sure she got me out every single time. So thats a little upsetting. She can just spot the ball, move the ball, drop it off the table. She was always one where I just hoped my teammates picked me up.Arioto was being generous, as teammates are wont to be. It wasnt a complete whitewash; among the most accomplished hitters in recent memory, she did manage exactly one single in 15 career at-bats against Moore.Shes a bulldog, Team USA coach Ken Eriksen said. She goes right after the batters. Its not trying to nibble here and nibble there. TThe most successful pitchers are the ones who avoid the walks, and shes that type of pitcher where shell go right at you. Phillips Valdez Rangers Jersey. She got a late start pitching, not playing organized softball until she was around 10 years old. Once she started, she wasnt content to be the big fish in a small pond. She played for high-level travel softball teams based far away from Sutter. She chose Oregon, at the time a struggling program in a conference that was still producing the national champion on an almost annual basis.The surroundings never intimidated her, even if she felt some people doubted the small-town pitcher could survive. It wasnt that she thought she was so good that she wouldnt struggle. She craved the challenge. It mattered more than manners, more than making friends.I think that was the hardest thing for me going in, was getting people to understand what Im really about because I am a little rough around the edges, Moore said. I think people sometimes mistake my sheer competitiveness and my demeanor. I guess I dont always look like the nicest person on the field. You cant put me in my element and expect me to be nice.Balance came as college continued, with help from a kindred spirit in former Oregon assistant and current UNLV coach Lisa Dodd. It was fine to expect the best out of teammates, Dodd suggested, but better to help them get there than shut them out if they fall short. By the time Moore was a junior, she was the Pac-12 pitcher of the year and a leader on a team that ended a long World Series drought. Yet no invite came to try out for Team USA, even as it rebuilt its roster for the first world championship it would contest without its Olympic-era core.So she went out and put up similar numbers as a senior. Finally, the invitation came in 2013. Four summers later, she is still here.I had the opportunity to work with the best pitching staff ever put together for the United States of America, Eriksen said of his role as an assistant on the 2004 Olympic team. When Im using my measuring stick, Im looking at Lisa Fernandez, Cat Osterman, Lori Harrigan and Jennie Finch. Thats, to me, the elite level. We have some pitchers that have that opportunity to get there, but they have to have the mental capacity to do that.She is one of those people that has that capacity to continue to elevate her game.If there is a temptation to pass those off as the words a coach has to say, consider that Eriksen last year hired Moore as his pitching coach to assist him in the job that actually pays his bills as head coach at the University of South Florida. Whether or not she ever dominates hitters to the same degree those former USA pitchers did, she thinks about the game and the process of pitching the way they did. That is rare enough.The United States doesnt enter the upcoming tournament as the favorite. Team USA doesnt hold any major title at the moment, silver medalists in the last Olympics in 2008, the most recent world championship and last years Pan-Am Games. Japan, which won three of four games against Team USA this year, is the favorite, with or without Yukiko Ueno, the legendary ace who was not on the roster when Japan played in an invitational tournament in Oklahoma City a week ago.Moore and her teammates arent seeking the worlds validation.Just an opportunity to again be its best softball team.I dont think I need anything to validate this experience because the experience is the experience itself, Moore said. Every time we get on the field, we want to win. We play to win. But at the end of the day, sometimes you cant control that. We can play phenomenal and we could come in second place. At some point, you cant be OK with it, but youve got to be able to swallow that. But thats the beauty of this game, too.If youre chasing gold medals, somewhere down the line thats going to catch up with you.But neither are they placeholders, not merely wearing the uniforms until the Olympic glory returns and others take their places. They compete for the same reason those in Brazil will compete.And its not because of how many people are watching.You cant just have a small-town focus, Moore said. Its got to be big dreams and youve got to go places to do it. You cant just do it out in Sutter. Youve got to play against the best to prove youre the best. There is still a lot to be proven, but I think Ive started a good legacy at least. ' ' '
Mitglied vourdalak
Mai 16 '20
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