Elise's Point of View on Sports

What an exciting World Series so far. Who would have predicted that in October the World Series would have between the Cubs and Indians? The Cubs the last couple of seasons have been pretty good. Last season, they fell against the Mets in the Playoffs and this time they were able to reach the World Series. It's a pretty exciting to be a Cubs fan. The last time that the Cubs won the World Series was back in 1908 which was over 100+ years ago. The two players that have been consistent for the Cubs has been pitcher Jake Arrieta and third baseman and outfielder Kris Bryant. Right now however they are down a game against the Indians. It's been a crazy sports season for Cleveland and their fans. Back in June, Lebron James and the rest of the Cavs came back from a 3-1 deficit in the NBA Finals and were able to win their first NBA Championship against the Golden State Warriors. And then this season, manager Terry Francoma led the Indians on an extraordinary run to reach the Worl...

It's been a heck of a season for the LA Sparks. They finished with a 26-8 record to end up second behind their opponent they played in the Finals, the Minnesota Lynx (28-6). They have had a unique set of players who got them to the Finals. Side note, it also helps to have NBA Hall of Famer Magic Johnson to be part of the organization and very involved. Nneka Ogwumike, forward for the Spark was named the MVP for the WNBA season. She averaged 19.7 points per game along with 9.1 rebounds and shot 66.5% from the field, which was an WNBA best. She had a lot of help though. You can't talk about the Sparks without mentioning Candace Parker. Parker, a star at Tennessee came into the league having high expectations to perform at a high level like she did with Pat Summit. She hasn't disappointed. She has also won MVP awards in 2008 and 2013 and most recently received MVP award at this Finals. Parker personally has been one of my favorites to watch. It was fun to see her go he...

So I have always been a Yankees fan. I have loved watching players such as Hideki Matsui, Robinson Cano, Johnny Damon and of course I couldn't leave out Derek Jeter. (my favorite baseball player in the MLB). The Yankees are a team that you either love or hate. My Dad and my Brother both can't stand them. If you look at the recent history of the Yankees they have 27 World Series Titles, their last one coming in 2009 which I remember well. I have always wanted to go to a Yankees game. And maybe someday I will. It would be more fun to see them play against the Red Sox. In my opinion, that's the best rivalry in all of baseball. Both of the teams can't stand one another. And neither can the fans. The Yankees are currently 52-48 right now. They sit in 4th place right behind Boston who is ahead at 55-44. You wouldn't assume that Boston and New York would be at the positions that they are at because they are very talented but it's been Toronto and the Orioles t...

 In the NFL off season 7 new coaches were hired. I wanted to go in depth with each coach on their new team.. In my opinion, I believe Hue Jackson is going to have his hands full with a Browns team who haven't been to the playoffs since 2002. It's going to be interesting to see how his coaching style plays out in Cleveland. Cleveland Browns- Hue Jackson Hue Jackson, is taking over a Cleveland Brown's team that hasn't been as successful as it could be. Like I have mentioned before they haven't been to the playoffs in over 13 years and I think if I were a player it would be frustrating not being able to get more victories and get to the playoffs.  However, there is positive feedback  from players on Jackson. According to Jeff Schudel of the News-Herald & The Morning Journal, he mentioned that players are excited with Hue. He has made an impact on them and the players are impressed with his attitude towards meetings and practices. Jackson. Jackson was mos...

I decided to write this post because lately there have been many unfortunate situations in which sportsmanship has gone out the door. I know sports are competitive. If you know me really well you would know that I am one of the most competitive people out there. I'm passionate about sports and I have a love for them. Sometimes things go out of hand in sports. I understand you are playing to win and people's emotions gets the best of them in different situations. When calls are made that the players don't agree with they will obviously not be happy with it and some will go to higher degrees to show their displeasure. For example, in basketball the referees are obviously not perfect and missed calls are made. There's quite a bit of yelling both from the coaches and the player's themselves. It's nothing new to us basketball nerds (at least I refer myself as that). There's also fights that can break out and taunting as well. In basketball, it's a very phy...

Last night was game one of the Western Conference Finals between the Warriors and the Thunder. The Thunder ended up winning it primarily for a a few reasons. Turnovers, rebounding, out scoring them in the second half, and it helped also that Golden State was only 1 out 11 shooting in the 4th quarter on 3 pointers. The first half was definitely controlled by Golden State. They were hitting good shots, making good plays, and it also helped that OKC was missing their free throws. The game was in their favor and they held a 14 point lead but that all changed in the second half. In the 3rd quarter and an on to the end of the game the Thunder came out firing. If you look at the statistics you can see that both Durant and Westbrook didn't have the best shooting nights but they played brilliantly in the 2nd half to win on the road against the high and mighty Warriors, who have only lost one or two times this season. Westbrook was especially impressive. In the first half he was on a...

It's here! It's the best month of the year for men's college basketball. Every year never fails to disappoint with some of the most exciting Cinderella upsets. Last year it was Wisconsin defeating previously undefeated Kentucky to get into the National Championship game against Duke. It's going to very interesting to see what happens this year. The thing I love about March Madness is that you never know what's going to happen. Just because your a #1 seed doesn't mean you are going to go all the way. Quite a few #1 seeds have been upset in the past. It's crazy to think that last year's champion Duke, was out of the top 25 this past season. This season in college basketball was unpredictable. Usually there is a standout #1 team in the country that is strong and stays there for a long time. But that wasn't the case this past season. So many #1 teams got  beat, including Kansas and Oklahoma just to name a few. Apparently Obama and I both agree t...

The Broncos had a great season, finishing it off with a win against the Carolina Panthers in Superbowl 50. Recently though, Peyton Manning officially retired from football and now his backup, Brock Osweiler, who played for Manning when he was injured late in the season is expected to sign with the Houston Texans. Brock came in for the Broncos when Peyton was injured and led the Broncos to 5 victories and 3 losses. The most impressive wins were against the New England Patriots at home as well as against the Cincinnati Bengals. He had a great run as he helped the Broncos reach the Superbowl.  The big question now is who is going to be the next Quarterback for the Broncos? The only QB they have left on their roster now is former Northwestern QB Trevor Siemian. There have been rumours of maybe the Broncos trading for 49ers QB for Colin Kaepernick. Kapernick had a rough season for the Niners but I have still been a fan of his. He led his team to a Super Bowl w...

Conor McGregor vs Nate Diaz Tonight Nate Diaz takes on the challenge against Conor McGregor. If you aren't familiar with MMA they always have a press conference before with both fighters. Let's just say it got a little heated. Nate Diaz accused Conor McGregor of taking steroids. McGregor fought back defensively of the remarks made by Diaz. McGregor called himself an animal. Diaz went on to say that all of the UFC takes steroids. Steroids are a major substance that is not allowed in many sports and McGregor told Diaz and the rest of the people at the press conference that he strongly takes a stand against steroids. Underdog Nate Diaz is an MMA Fighter from Stockton, California. He has 18 wins and 10 losses, with his most recent victory against Michael Johnson back in December of lost year. He has a lot of confidence in his abilities and we will see on Saturday night if he can shock the MMA world and upset McGregor. McGregor hasn't lost in a long time. The last tim...

Last night, there was a double header of the Women's and Men's basketball teams. It started off with the BYU Women playing against San Francisco at home. Through out most of the game San Francisco had control over BYU. They couldn't find a way to stop Taylor Proctor. Proctor led her team in scoring with 27 points, 7 rebounds, 3 assists, 1 block, and 4 steals. They did a great job in creating turnovers for the Cougars.   The Cougars struggled in getting their shots to go down in the first half. At the three point line (in which usually they are pretty good at) they only hit 4 shots out of 19. The most frustrating part was the turnovers. The team all around had 17. However, they were much better in the second half, especially in the 4th quarter. Just like how the Dons were good in creating turnovers on BYU, the Cougars also did a good job with creating turnovers on San Francisco. Both teams had 39 turnovers. So it was pretty sloppy on both sides, but BYU made the plays dow...

In college women's basketball one team has dominated for many years. That team is the Connecticut Huskies. Under coach Geno Auriemma they have won 10 NCAA championship, including winning the last 3 years. Most team's successes comes from recruiting. Auriemma has been able to do that over the years. A lot of his players that he has coached have gone on and had success in the WNBA as well, including Rebecca Lobo, Swinn Cash and Sue Bird. In my opinion, they are like the Patriots of Women's basketball. They rarely lose. In the past 3 seasons alone they have won 100 games and have only lost once. Whether or not you like them or not, that's very impressive. They always have a lot of talent. I remember when BYU went to the Sweet 16 and they had to play Connecticut. Hamson and Bailey stayed with them in the first half but in the second half, unfortunately the Huskies took over. It's definitely going to be an interesting game tonight as they play a talented South...

Super Bowl 50 shocked a lot of sports writers and Carolina fans, including Golden State Warrior's own Stephan Curry. Curry said (and I paraphrase) that Carolina was going to blowout Denver. I respect and love watching Curry, but I would have wanted to ask him if he was paying attention to the Bronco's defense this season? Here's a Bronco's team that was able to beat Tom Brady and the Patriots twice. It's very hard to do that but the defense was able to get to Brady and frustrate him. They lost four times during the season. Once to the Colts in Indianapolis, once to the Steelers, and then losses to the Raiders and the Chiefs. Here's some stats compiled from the Bronco's defense this season. They ranked #1 in net yards. They held opponents to the least amount of yards all season. They only gave up 19 Touchdowns to opposing teams. They also had 14 interceptions and 52 sacks (the most in the league). Not a lot of people would have thought defense w...

This season of college of basketball has been like no other. Last season Kentucky held on to the #1 spot for a long time. In fact, they went 42-0 (including the NCAA tournament) until they finally lost to Wisconsin. This season there has been so many upsets and so many changes. Every team that has had the #1 spot in the rankings have all seemed to go down with upsets. In fact according to an article on Sports Nation,  the main title reads "Top ranked college basketball teams are being upset more than they have in 67 years". Ricky O'Donnell, the sports journalist goes on to explain how 5 #1 teams have fallen before the month of February. That's pretty incredible to say the least. In all my years of watching basketball I have never seen so many upsets happen to ranked teams. I  give credit to the state of Iowa. Their teams fought hard to knock off previously #1 ranked teams. It all started with Northern Iowa. They knocked off Marcus Paige and the Tar heels and...

Next Sunday will be another epic showdown between Tom Brady and the Patriots vs Peyton Manning and the Broncos. The Patriots are highly favored in this game. Statistically speaking Brady holds the advantage against Manning in passing yards as well as touchdown passes. Manning has been suffering through a foot injury though and just recently got back to play against the Steelers. The Broncos scored 5 field goals in the game against the Steelers on Sunday. They only had 1 Touchdown in the game, which came because of fumble by Steelers running back Fitzgerald Toussaint. In order for the Broncos to win against the Patriots they need to be scoring more Touchdowns than field goals on Sunday.  Brady and the Patriots are dangerous when they get in the red zone. Julian Edelman is now back from a injury so Brady has Edelman, Gronkowski, as well as Danny Amendola to throw to. These three have all came through for Brady, especially Gronkowski. The tight end has been very impressive t...

As we start a new year in 2016, I thought it would be fun to look back on 2015 and comment and post my thoughts on the top sport stories of 2015. There's a lot to choose from but I have narrowed it down to my favorites. This list is not in any particular order. To start off, let's go back in February of 2015 with the Super Bowl between the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks. Coming into the game the Seahawks were looking to become one of the few teams to win back to back Superbowl titles. The past season they blew out Peyton Manning and the Broncos. They were looking again to come back on top and win against a very different New England Patriots team. The Patriots, came into this game with a lot of controversy. The speculation was that in preparation for a game held against the Indianapolis Colts, the patriots were accused of deflating the footballs, therefore making it easier for Tom Brady to grip the ball. (A few months after the Super Bowl Tom Brady would be sus...