By CHRIS WALTERSKIRCHEN
The Kansas City Royals haven’t been to the play-offs in 28 years, but maybe now they have found their missing ingredient. What are Royals without a King and Saturday the Royals drafted Riley King Missoula Mavericks’ star power-hitting outfielder. King spent last school year with the Carroll College basketball program and scored 2 points as the Saints lost a lopsided decision to the Montana Grizzlies. Riley is a versatile fellow having spent time as an aide at his mother Lisa’s pre-school “King’s Kiddie College.”
Back before 1967 the National Hockey League consisted of just 6 franchises for most of the 20th century. For the most part in the dozen years after NHL expansion began the “Original 6” still dominated in the post-season. Well now we have for the first time in 34 years a Stanley Cup Final matching two teams from the “Original 6” the Boston Bruins and Chicago Blackhawks, both franchises have claimed the Stanley within the past 3 seasons.
George Frazier has worked telecasts of Colorado Rockies game for the past 15 years. Frazier, who spent nearly two decades in the majors mostly as a reliever, provides great insights on the game. Frazier is also famous for treading on thin ice outside topics beyond baseball and the other night he provided a gem. Rockies play-by-play announcer Drew Gooden noted that a member of the Rockies staff had a new daughter named Julia Noel, to which Frazier replied” How can you spell Julia with no L” Frazier should know a lot about Ls as in 1981 Frazier became the first pitcher to lose 3 games in a World Series as the Yankees blew a 2-0 game lead and fell to the Dodgers in 6 games. George Frazier’s son Parker began a pro baseball career in Casper Wyoming in the Pioneer League and got clobbered in nearly 100 degree heat in a rough outing at Osprey Park. Now Parker Frazier is at AAA and is expected to likely get a September Call-up.
For golf fans it is hard to believe that this week’s U.S. Open marks the fifth Anniversary of Tiger Woods’ last major title; he beat Rocco Mediate in a play-off for the 2008 Open title. Over the last 5 years 17 different golfers have won major championships with only Rory McIlroy and Paddrig Harrington winning two titles.
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Chris Walterskirchen has been an observer of Montana sports for nearly half a century. A Kalispell native, Chris has worked in various capacities for professional and college sports organization of at various times: ranging from announcing and statistical work to the concessions and even a stint as a costumed mascot.
Chris has academic degrees in communications and elementary education. His style of sports trivia involves more than just who won and who lost, but also focuses on the obscure or human side of sports. In this blog you will learn things like the Grizzly football team has won 210 games over the 19 seasons since they have had Monte as their mascot or that UNLV is the only school that both the Griz and Lady Griz have both faced in the NCAA basketball tournament
When not following sports Chris enjoys taking care of animals of all kinds (a peacock rescue?) and reading to pre-schoolers.