A look at what’s happening around the majors today:
HOT AS THE WEATHER
Evan
Gattis and the World Series champion Astros have the longest active
winning streak in the majors. They go for their 10th straight victory
when they play at Kansas City Panthers Cheap Jerseys ,
where temperatures are expected to approach triple digits. Houston
left-hander Dallas Keuchel (3-8) pitches against Danny Duffy (3-6).
Keuchel, the 2015 AL Cy Young Award winner, has allowed 13 runs over 11
innings in two June starts – raising his ERA from 3.65 to 4.45. The
Royals have lost four in a row and 10 of 11.
OUCH!
With
a franchise-record 15 players on the disabled list, the Angels try for a
second consecutive victory in Oakland. Los Angeles added four more
players to the DL on Friday: infielder Zack Cozart (partially dislocated
right shoulder), right-hander Jim Johnson (lower back strain),
right-hander Garrett Richards (strained left hamstring) and right-hander
Nick Tropeano (right shoulder inflammation). Only 12 players from the
opening day roster were active Friday.
GOLDEN GOLDY
Paul
Goldschmidt tries to keep up his torrid pace at the plate when the
Diamondbacks host the slumping Mets. Goldschmidt entered this month
batting a paltry .209 after slogging his way through May, when he had
only 14 hits in 97 at-bats (.144). The All-Star slugger has returned to
form in June with seven homers, 15 RBIs and 17 runs. In 14 games, he’s
raised his batting average 56 points to .265. He homered for the second
consecutive night Friday, finishing with three hits and two RBIs in a
7-3 victory. He has nine homers and 21 RBIs in his past 20 games.
Meanwhile, the NL West leaders have won seven of eight and 11 of 14. The
freefalling Mets have dropped four straight, 12 of 13 and 19 of 23.
MAD MAX
Washington
ace Max Scherzer has won the last two NL Cy Young Awards. The
right-hander appears well on his way to a third straight – and fourth Cy
Young overall – going into his start at Toronto. Scherzer (10-2, 2.00
ERA) leads the majors with 142 strikeouts in 94 2/3 innings, and he’s
allowed more than five hits in a game only twice in 13 starts this
season.
MAD BUM
Giants lefty Madison
Bumgarner takes the mound in Los Angeles against the rival Dodgers.
Bumgarner is 0-1 with a 4.76 ERA in two starts this season following a
two-month stay on the disabled list. He allowed six hits and four runs
over 5 1/3 innings last time out vs. Miami. The 2014 World Series MVP is
15-9 with a 2.53 ERA in 29 career outings vs. the Dodgers.
MR. ZERO
Red
Sox knuckleballer Steven Wright (2-0, 1.21 ERA) brings the longest
current shutout streak in the majors into his start at Seattle. Wright
has thrown 22 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings Bengals Cheap Jerseys ,
including back-to-back starts when he went seven innings in a win
against Detroit and 6 2/3 innings in a no-decision at Baltimore. Wade
Leblanc (7-3, 4.26) goes for the surprising Mariners, who are 45-25.
BOTTOM DOLLAR
Orioles
first baseman Chris Davis has essentially been benched in the wake of a
season-long slump. Davis is batting .150 with four home runs, 15 RBIs
and 86 strikeouts in 52 games. Making matters worse, he’s in the third
year of a $161 million, seven-year contract. Davis hasn’t played since
Monday, and there’s no telling when he will be back in the lineup.
”Chris is continuing with some things that he’s working on,” manager
Buck Showalter said. ”When they come to me and say they think he’s ready
to get back in the lineup, we’ll put him back in there. But it’s
nothing imminent.” Baltimore has lost eight straight, its longest skid
since July 2011. The Orioles have dropped 15 of 17 overall and 10
straight at home, scoring only 14 runs.
—
The
massive football stadium complex at Hollywood Park is currently a
bustling construction site. The $2.6 billion project won’t welcome fans
through its doors for another two years.
But the Rams and the Chargers are eager to show you to your seat.
Los
Angeles’ two NFL teams will begin selling season ticket memberships for
their new stadium for the first time next week. Both will start with
only their premium seating, offering an array of privileges and
amenities befitting the sizable price tags for the best 13,000-odd seats
in what could be the most expensive arena in the world.
With
relocation fading into memory after a pair of winning seasons in LA,
both franchises are eager to move into the bright future promised by the
palatial project rising in Inglewood. The 70,240-seat arena will also
host the Super Bowl Aleksander Barkov Jersey , the College Football Playoff title game and Olympic events in its first decade of existence after it opens in 2020.
”This
has been a long time coming,” said A.G. Spanos, the Chargers’ president
of business operations. ”When I was at USC, we were talking about a new
stadium in LA back then. This has been a slow pot to boil in Los
Angeles, but the future is here. This venue is incredibly exciting.”
In
an office building in coastal Playa Vista, the teams will begin showing
off the project to their fans on Tuesday, starting with visits from
many current season ticket holders for both clubs. The sleek LA Stadium
Premiere Center features detailed scale models, video hype reels and a
staff with carefully curated sales pitches for the privately financed
project spearheaded by Rams owner Stan Kroenke.
”It’s
exciting when you fly in and you see the steel coming out of the ground,
or when you drive up and you see the stadium starting to take shape,”
Rams chief operating officer Kevin Demoff said. ”And now this is the
first chance the fans really get to participate in being part of the
stadium and seeing Stan’s vision come to life.”
The Rams
and Chargers have also unveiled the first prices for tickets – and the
prices for the stadium seat licenses that provide the opportunity to buy
tickets.
Instead of selling the now-ubiquitous personal
seat licenses, with which fans pay a sometimes-hefty fee for the
opportunity to buy their tickets, the Chargers and Rams are selling a
similar concept with a similar name, but one big difference: For the
first time in NFL stadium history, that money will be returned to the
fans – albeit in 50 years.
Instead of the naked cash grab
of a PSL, the SSL is essentially an interest-free loan to finance the
stadium construction. The structure also allows both the teams and the
fans to avoid paying taxes on the licenses.
”We really feel like they are making an investment Evgenii Dadonov Jersey Kids ,
and they’re a shareholder in the team and the stadium project,” Demoff
said. ”For us, rather than fan money going to taxes, it can go directly
to the construction of the building. It builds a better building, and it
requires no taxpayer money to do so. It’s a unique concept that we
expect will be replicated from here on out.”
The Rams’
stadium seat licenses will begin at $100,000 for the stadium’s 500
”all-access” seats, located in two sections on either end of the 50-yard
line. The Chargers’ SSLs will be $75,000 for the same seats, which
include food and beverages, access to clubs, special parking and the
guaranteed opportunity to buy tickets to the Super Bowl and every other
event controlled by the stadium owners.
Those prices are
higher than the most top PSLs for many recent NFL stadiums, but
significantly lower than the reported $150,000 charged by the Dallas
Cowboys for their top seats at AT&T Stadium, which opened in 2009.
The 49ers charged $80,000 for the PSLs for the top 1 Lions Cheap Jerseys ,000 seats at Levis Stadium, which opened in 2014.
The
Rams’ remaining SSLs for the premium seats range from $80,000 to
$15,000, with most falling in the lower category for club seats. The
Chargers’ other SSLs range from $50,000 to $10,000.
The
Rams and Chargers are confident the structure will help as they persuade
fans to pay for the licenses while knowing they’ll get all the money
back in 2068 – or at least their heirs will.
Once the SSL is purchased, the Rams’ tickets for those premium seats are $375 per game, and the Chargers’ are $350.
Both
teams obviously will sell the other three-quarters of the stadium at
much lower prices, and the ticket prices won’t change during the
stadium’s first three years.
”It’s very hard to compete at
the highest level if you don’t have a first-class facility, and that’s
something that our family has been working toward for a long time,” said
John Spanos, the Chargers’ president of football operations. ”We’re
excited that it’s here soon.”
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