All Ball Sports: USC Football, Meet the new boss
by Paul Teetor Who needs Caleb Williams? Who needs the Heisman Trophy winner from two years ago and the first overall pick in the NFL draft last spring? And who needs a quarterback who constantly improvised, trying to – and often succeeding at – making something out of nothing, but in the process disrupting his […]
All Ball Sports: Steve Kerr joins Kamala’s team
by Paul Teetor Steve Kerr said he can already hear the push back to his speech at the Democratic National Convention: Shut up and blow your whistle. For those who don’t watch Fox News, that’s a clever riff on Fox host Laura Ingrahm’s response a few years ago to LeBron’s James Twitter fight with President […]
All Ball Sports: Passion play at the Manhattan Beach Open
by Paul Teetor Sunday was a day of spectacular teamwork, both on and off the volleyball court. USA Olympian Taryn Kloth is 6-foot-4 and built like a fullback on a women’s rugby team. Her volleyball partner, Kristin Nunn, is 5-foot-6 and maybe 130 pounds soaking wet — when covered with victory champagne like she was […]
All Ball Sports: LeBron Brings Home the Gold
by Paul Teetor This past weekend Lakers fans got a chance to see something they probably will never see again: a relentless, focused and, determined LeBron James leading a talented supporting cast to a championship. Team USA’s 98-87 victory over France in the Gold Medal game Saturday afternoon provided plenty of proof that LeBron is […]
All Ball Sports: Biles vs. Trump’s Trash Talk
by Paul Teetor For the last two weeks the great American gymnast Simone Biles has been the most famous – or at least the most publicized – woman in the world. Winning seven Olympic gold medals will do that for you. And on Friday she used her once-every-four-years world wide platform to not-so-subtly call […]
All Ball Sports: Dodger Dog Days
by Paul Teetor The Dodgers desperately need reinforcements – and the trade deadline is Tuesday afternoon at 3. So by the time you read this you’ll know if they’ve done anything significant to shore up a team that badly needs shoring up. Especially on their pitching staff, but also for the infield and the bottom […]
All Ball Sports: PV’s Charlap wins MB Tennis Open, Westbrook donnybrook, Jellybean’s fairytale
by Paul Teetor Nearly 200 players from the South Bay (and a few other more distant spots) gathered this past weekend for the annual Manhattan Beach Open Tennis Tournament. The Men’s Open Division, the marquee event with $1,500 going to the winner, is usually won by some touring pro ranked in the top 1,000 in […]
All Ball Sports: Kawhi to miss Olympics, Bronny misses a lot of shots
by Paul Teetor Kawhi Leonard withdrew from the USA Olympic Team Thursday, thereby avoiding a public relations fiasco for the LA Clippers. The unanswered question is whether he did it voluntarily or was pushed into it by Clipper executives who realized that the news coming out of the Olympic Training Camp in Las Vegas – […]
MCHS: 2020 Volleyball Olympian Alex Klineman
by Paul Teetor Editor’s note: Mira Costa graduate Alix Klineman (Class of 2007) and partner April Ross won the Gold Medal in beach volleyball at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics. Last June, Klineman had a baby, and in June Ross had a baby. Following the birth of her child, Klineman switched partners in a failed attempt […]
All Ball: Clippers curse continues
by Paul Teetor Clippers President of Basketball Operations Lawrence Frank has to be the luckiest man in all of LA sports. The Lakers have been such a mess for the last few months – getting crushed in the first round of the playoffs, hiring a coach who has never coached, drafting LeBron James’ eminently unqualified […]
All Ball Sport: Truly delusional Lakers hatch a nepo baby
by Paul Teetor Lakers owner Jeanie Buss should just get it over with and change her team’s name to the Los Angeles LeBrons. It would make more sense than the current name, which goes all the way back to 1959, when the team was based in Minneapolis, Minnesota – the land ‘o lakes. When they […]
All Ball Sports: LeBron’s World, ‘Say hey kid’ no more
by Paul Teetor LeBron James finally got his own hand-picked Lakers coach. But the way he did it was ethically questionable at best, and disloyal and sneaky underhanded at worst. It took the Lakers seven weeks to land on Jonathan Clay “JJ” Redick, but the smart money said it would be Redick on May 3, […]
All Ball Sports: Happy Trails to Jerry West, The Greatest Laker of Them All
by Paul Teetor When Gary Vitti was flying into LA to interview for the Lakers Head Athletic Trainer’s job in the summer of 1984, he received a jolt of adrenaline when he was told General Manager Jerry West would be picking him up at LAX. “He was my hero growing up, and now he’s going […]
All Ball Sports: Bill Walton’s long, Strange Trip and “basketball’s greatest ambassador”
by Paul Teetor A bunch of hoopers at Live Oak Park were talking about the late, great Bill Walton last Friday afternoon when a kid shooting baskets nearby chimed in. “What was so great about Bill Walton? Wasn’t he a crazy old hippie on TV who talked about everything except the game he was supposed […]
All Ball Sports: Clippers Dilemma, Grateful for Walton
by Paul Teetor Steve Ballmer deserves a refund. The Clippers multi-billionaire owner doesn’t need a refund, and he probably doesn’t want one either. He’s the seventh richest man in the world, with an estimated fortune of $147 billion. But by any normal business standard, he deserves a refund. He has invested more than $700 million […]
All Ball: Jared Goff, How do you like me now? And what about Bronny
by Paul Teetor Remember Jared Goff? Remember the Rams quarterback who took them to a Super Bowl in 2018 – but only produced a measly 3 points in the biggest game of his life, a 12-3 loss to the New England Patriots that could have been a historic win if only Goff had played like […]