Posts by Paul Teetor
All Ball Sports: NBA partners in grime, Nuggets’ Lakers’ number
by Paul Teetor The next time you’re watching an NBA game and a gambling company like DraftKings or FanDuel invites you to bet on a 3-game parlay or the odds of Player x playing more – or less — than 30 minutes, don’t take them up on it. Don’t take them up on it even…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports Shohei is OK, OJ never will be
by Paul Teetor There was a giant whooshing sound emanating from Chavez Ravine on Thursday morning that soon spread out, like a coastal fog, over all of Los Angeles. It was a collective sigh of relief coming from everyone in the Dodgers organization, plus the millions of new Shohei Ohtani fans who had jumped aboard…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Happy Trails to USC Hoops Coach Andy Enfield
by Paul Teetor It was a week of much-needed change for the beleaguered USC men’s basketball program. They lost a coach, got a new one, and lost almost all their players – including the most famous one, Bronny James. On Monday Head Coach Andy Enfield announced that after 11 mostly mediocre years he was leaving…
Read MoreAll Ball: Say it ain’t so, Shohei
by Paul Teetor When the famous slugger “Shoeless” Joe Jackson was caught up in the 1919 “Black Sox” World Series game-fixing scandal, a little kid confronted him on the courthouse steps and uttered these immortal words: “Say it ain’t so, Joe.” That’s how All Ball is feeling these days about Dodgers slugger Shohei Ohtani. I…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Loyola’s Kelly crushes Mira Costa at home — his home; Dodgers Korean catastrophe
by Paul Teetor Hometown player crushes home town team The Mira Costa boys volleyball team, ranked first in the country, ran into a roadblock Friday night in the form of Loyola and its star outside hitter Sean Kelly. Ironically, Kelly, the top ranked player in the nations, is from Manhattan Beach. Kelly’s 30th and final…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Happy Trails to Aaron Donald, welcome Shohei Ohtani
by Paul Teetor It’s an image that will never be forgotten by hard-core LA Rams fans as long as they live: Aaron Donald half-running, half crawling on his hands and knees towards Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Joe Burrow late in Super Bowl LVI. The Rams were up by three with less than a minute left. But…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Girls Got Next: Redondo’s Zimmerman, Costa’s Yeh leading the way
by Paul Teetor Women’s basketball is having a cultural moment – locally with great players at both beach city high schools, nationally with USC’s star freshman JuJu Watkins and professionally with some great rivalries in the WNBA. After years of being ignored and belittled by the great unwashed mass of male sports fans –…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Lakers/Clippers last Hallway Series
by Paul Teetor The Lakers and Clippers squared off Wednesday night in the latest – and probably last – iteration of the so-called Hallway Series. The result was a stunning Lakers “road” win that gave them a 3-1 edge in the season series. Unless they meet in the playoffs this year – which, incredibly, has…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Shohei shows too much, UCLA, USC show too little
by Paul Teetor Remember the classic Seinfeld episode when George gets into trouble with the New York Yankees when his plan to put the players in light-weight cotton jerseys goes horribly awry? Well, believe it or not, in a case of real-life imitating sitcom life, someone is bound to get into trouble for the same…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Kansas City Blues, Sea Hawks bright
by Paul Teetor Come on sports fans, we’re better than this. America is better than this. Kansas City is better than this. The National Football League, violent and brutal as it can be on the field, is better than this. We’re all better than what happened Wednesday afternoon at the tail end of the Kansas…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Greatest Super Bowl finish ever, great start for MCHS
by Paul Teetor The first two hours of Sunday’s Super Bowl were ho-hum, a below average playoff game that was a snooze to watch. Even Taylor Swift looked bored. The last hour, however, was some of the most riveting football All Ball has ever seen. In erasing a 10-point second half deficit and winning his…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Harbaugh talks loudly, and carries a big stick
by Paul Teetor The new Los Angeles Chargers coach came, he saw, and he promised. Championships. Make that multiple championships. Jim Harbaugh didn’t take the modest, aw-shucks approach at his introductory news conference Thursday at the YouTube Theatre in Inglewood. He took the alpha dog approach: Follow me to the promised land and together we…
Read MoreMira Costa freshman Yeh’s two free throws send title game against Redondo into overtime
Photos by Ray Vidal by Paul Teetor It was exactly the situation every baller — high school, college or pro — dreams about and practices for in the backyard or driveway: you’re fouled on a buzzer beating shot and go to the free throw line with a chance to tie or win the game. All…
Read MoreAll Ball: LA Times on losing run, Zimmerman sisters lead RBUHS
by Paul Teetor It’s been a brutal couple of weeks for the dwindling band of Los Angeles sports fans who still get the bulk of their news from the LA Times. First came the shocking news last week that the paper’s top editor, Executive Editor Kevin Merida, was resigning less than two years after taking…
Read MoreAll Ball Sports: Rams get hosed, Chargers get their chance
by Paul Teetor With four minutes left in Sunday night’s riveting playoff game with the Detroit Lions, the Rams were marching toward a go-ahead score when, on third down, rookie receiver Puka Nacua ran a perfect route to get free for a first down catch, the kind he never dropped on the way to setting…
Read MoreMCH girls basketball surges, boys basketball on rebound
by Paul Teetor Monday night at home against Peninsula was supposed to be a get-well game for the Mira Costa boys basketball team. They were coming off the worst stretch of the season – four losses in five games – and they needed to get their mojo back after an 11-2 start that went off…
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