Sportsman of the Week Ending 8/2/2026

As we hit the dog days of summer, baseball enters the home stretch for playoff pushes.  And no team has made a bigger push than the Boston Red Sox.  Given up for dead, fired their coach, but now they are storming up the American League East standings and look poised for a playoff run.  No player has been more in the center of it than Ceddanne Rafaela.  The centerfielder at the top of the lineup has been a spark plug since the All-Star Break and especially this week.  Rafaela torched the Los Angeles Dodgers and Athletics for a Ted Williams like .419 average while clubbing 5 HR, 2 2B, 11 RBI and scoring 7 times for the week.  The Red Sox went 6-1.  Since the All-Star break, the Sox have gone 14-3 sweeping the Tampa Bay Rays (best team in the AL), Los Angeles Dodgers (best team in the NL), and, just before the break, swept the Chicago White Sox (first in AL Central) and New York Yankees (second best AL team).  The native of Curacao is mimicking his best recent Hall of Fame inductee and countryman Andruw Jones in his star play, and is the Longhorndave Sportsman of the Week!

Sportsman of the Week Ending 5/15/2022

In what appears to be a dead ball season in Major League Baseball, seems not that uncommon for a no-hitter to be deep into a game on a nightly basis.  On pitcher finally finished it off.  Los Angeles Angels lefty Reid Detmers finished off a masterpiece CG no-hitter against perennial power Tampa Bay Rays on 108, pitches, 68 strikes.  He walked a man and was the benefactor of a fair scoring decision for an error that was pretty textbook and non-controversial.  Detmers is a 22-year-old rookie and may provide some hope on the pitching side for a potent Angels lineup featuring three former MVPs and to pair next to Shohei Ohtani as a great 1-2 punch.  Will this be the year the Angels get to the postseason?  Detmers may be a reason for optimism.

Sportsman of the Week Ending 10/10/2021

The Major League Baseball postseason hit full throttle this week and big teams and big names took center stage.  A surprise surging team was the Boston Red Sox.  On a wild final Sunday of the regular season, they Red Sox stage a huge comeback to avoid having a one-game playoff against the Toronto Blue Jays.  Bought them a one game blood bath against the Yankees.  And a win.  Turn the page to the ALCS against the Tampa Bay Rays and they stormed to a 3-1 series win in the ALDS.  The star?  Enrique 'Kike" Hernandez.  Overall the Sox went 4-1 against the two best teams in the AL East.  Hernandez was 10-18, 3 doubles, 2 HR, 5 runs, 6 RBI in the 4 wins.  Perhaps his most dramatic at bat was a series walk off against the top seeded Rays on a Sacrifice Fly.  He was nothing short of unstoppable in taking the Red Sox to their second ALCS in four years.  He has played in 3 of the last 4 World Series, winning a title last year.  He may make it 4 out of 5.  Our Sportsman of the Week!

Sportsman of the Week Ending 10/25/2020

 

The Los Angeles Dodgers continue to tear through the MLB Postseason and another hero emerges.  One of their best franchise players. Clayton Kershaw, despite those who feel his postseason performances have not been up to par, won two critical games in the World Series to edge his Dodgers up 3 games to 2 over the Tampa Bay Rays.  He won pivotal Game 1 with 6 IP, 2 H, 8 K in victory to send them to a 1-0 lead, then responded with a gutsy performance (5 2/3, 2 ER, 6 K) to win Game 5 to again push the Dodgers ahead.  This time, they need just one more game.  After coming up short in the World Series in two prior appearances, this may be the Dodgers year.  Heavy favorites after a dominant regular season, along with a loaded lineup and arsenal of arms in both starting and relief roles, this is their best chance to win a Series since the 1988 season.  And their ace set them up.  The Longhorndave Sportsman of the Week!

Sportsman of the Week Ending 8/16/2020

In just a few weeks from delayed "Opening Day", baseball is hitting it's playoff chase stride.  And one of the teams of interest is Tampa Bay Rays.  As spoiler.  They don't have the high payroll or big free agent names of other teams, but they do have young talented players.  Like Brandon Lowe.  The Rays 26 year old second baseman may be the biggest under the radar star.  Mainly because Tampa.  But this week he broke out.  Lowe scorched his fellow NL East opponent Red Sox and Blue Jays by going 14-29 with 4 HR and 10 RBI.  Most importantly, the Rays went 6-1, and this was coming off a weekend sweep of the New York Yankees.  Don't look now Bombers, the Rays are on your heels.  The Rays will be pests to the presumed NL East Champion Yankees and with this years expanded playoff format, likely to wreck other teams hopes as well.  Lowe is set up to lead the charge, and is the Longhorndave Sportsman of the Week!

Sportsman of the Week Ending 7/28/2013

This week was all about baseball, and our Sportsman represents the future of the sport.  Tampa Bay Rays OF Wil Myers continued a torrid streak (for himself and the team) in going 9-21, with 3 HR, 5 XBH, slugging .952.  The Rays have been red hot, thanks to the 22-year-old rookie, going 4-2 for the week, with a 21-4 record in their last 25 (and would you believe 2 losses to the Astros).  Wil Myers is a huge rising star in the game, and we'll likely see him in the postseason, when the rest of the country will finally get to know him.  For now, he is the Longhorndave, Sportsman of the Week!

Round Rock, TX, MLB City?

Round Rock, Texas, is throwing its hat in the ring for (presumably) relocating a struggling franchise. Round Rock City Manager Steve Norwood announced:

“This may seem like an ambitious plan, but I think Round Rock could be an ideal location for Major League Baseball,” Norwood said. “I just think it’s logical here. … You’ve got Miami with 400,000 people, Tampa is 325,000 [people], Oakland is 392,000 [people], Denver is 560,000—and here is Austin at 700,000.”

Courtesy Sportslogos.net

Interesting he mentioned two teams that have had very public struggles to get a serviceable stadium, and another which just got one and is now unloading players in what is being called a "bait and switch" for fans. Round Rock is officially 20 miles north of Austin, but the "Metroplex" blends together up the I-35 corridor as Williamson County has been one of the fastest growing counties in the United States since the Dot Com boom. Note the Williamson county does not include Austin proper, but suburbs only, and Travis County (to include Austin) is also busting at the seams with population.  Round Rock has hosted two of the most successful Minor League franchises, the Round Rock Express. In 2000, the original AA Round Rock Express were established after a purchase of the Jackson Generals by a group headed by Nolan Ryan. In 2005, the same Ryan group acquired a second franchise, the AAA Edmonton Trappers, moved them to Round Rock, and moved his AA franchise to Corpus Christi. The AA Express still owns the Top 4 single season attendance records in the Texas league (2001-4) pulling in 2/3 of 1M people each year. Since the AAA franchise moved in, they've been 1st or 2nd in Pacific Coast League Attendance every year since 2007, leading in 2011 and 2012. Enthusiasm must be tempered by limited near term expectation. Reid Ryan, Nolan's son and Round Rock Express president and CEO, who is in Nashville, Tenn., attending the winter baseball meetings, said that it could be difficult for Round Rock to score a Major League team. Reid Ryan stated:

“I think having visions like that are good...but with the rules it takes, unless there [are] some monumental shifts, I don’t see any new markets getting a Major League team in the near future. Baseball is not a sport that has a lot of changes.”

For another blog, it's interesting how an entire college conference landscape can shift in a matter of days, but major league baseball moves can be more decadal in nature. But Round Rock has put Major League Baseball on notice: "We're listening to opportunities and we have the market and baseball history to support it." And they started in AA, have been promoted to AAA, and are now just waiting for the call to the big show!

**Originally posted in Reading Between the Seams by this same author**

Sportsman of the Week Ending 8/19/2012

This week, there was definitely one athlete that distinguished himself, the THIRD person to throw a perfect game since I started this feature.  Didn't think I'd have that much business on that front.  But Felix Hernandez dominated the Rays.  27 up, 27 down, and a boat load of strikeouts. A personal side bar, got to see Felix pitch in the 2004 MLB Futures Game as an 18 year old (youngest player there).  But he is a great sportsman, so much so, he's the one of the week!