oh no, Monday!

La Liga- Valencia beat Alaves 2-1 to stay in second place behind league leaders Barcelona who beat Athletic Bilbao 2-0. Real Madrid suffered a shock defeat against Girona. The 2-1 defeat puts Real Madrid 8 points behind Barcelona. The most recent team to make up an eight point deficit and win the league was Valencia during Rafael Benitiez years. La Liga, which is looking like a 3 team race after 10 games, is going to be one entertaining title race to keep an eye on.

MLS Playoffs- The MLS Playoffs are well on there way, Seattle Sounders and Vancouver Whitecaps played the first match to a 0-0 draw. All I could say about the match is that the drama concerning the Columbus Crew SC and there potential move to Austin provided more entertainment. 

NFL- The best game of the week was between Seattle Seahawks vs the Houston Texans! Russell Wilson vs Deshaun Watson put on a show for the neutral spectator and almost put their two respective fan bases to suffer from cardiac arrests. 41-38 was the final score in favor of the Seahawks placing them 1st in their division ahead of the LA Rams.

NBA- It is great to have basketball everyday, still early in the season to make reasonable prediction on how the season will turn out. The Spurs started 4-0, but lost their last 2 games, The Cleveland Cavaliers are below .500 and the Warriors lost to the Detroit Pistons. I guess even if the finals are already set in the end, as predicted by some of the most intelligent NBA analysts, the regular season will provide plenty of entertainment. 

MLB- The world series! OMG! Game 5 between the Houston Astros and the Los Angeles Dodgers went to extra innings, lasted over 5 hours, and the final score was 13 to 12 giving the Astros a 3-2 lead in the series. Games 6 and 7-if necessary- will be played in L.A. This world series has been fun to watch. The best part is that I get to enjoy it without the allegiance to either ball club. Yet, that hasn't prevented me from experiencing a range of emotions during a single inning. I love October baseball.               

Oh No, Mondays!!

After a event weekend of sports here are a few thoughts on the variety of games I watched this past weekend.

MLB Playoffs-The ALCS proved the paradox that one team-in this case two- can be awful and great in the same series. The Houston Astros went on to beat the New York Yankees in game 7. Both teams were awful, really terrible when either ball club played away. Yet, when those same teams were at home they each played well enough where fans could argue that their team is world series caliber worthy. It was a fun series to watch from the neutral perspective.

NBA-The Los Angeles Lakers opened the new NBA season with a loss to the other L.A. Team. Lakers are going to be thriving in the loser column this season again, but the Clippers didn't look that much better than their rivals. It's the season opener and there are months ahead to play basketball, but I wouldn't be surprised if both L.A. teams do poorly this season.

MLS-Decision Day was entertaining. Having all games be played at the same time in order to keep the suspense to the very last minute is a good strategy to give each game an extra level of importance even for the teams that may be thinking about their holiday plans. The Columbus Crew will be the focal story during the off-season unless Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi decide to quick their careers in Europe and come to the MLS.

La Liga- Valencia beat Sevilla 4-0 taking Los Che to second place four points behind league leaders Barcelona. Under Marcelino's management, Valencia look well organized on the pitch and have enough talent up front and in the midfield to make the neutral observer enjoy a brilliant tactical display. It will be an entertaining to watch the league's big two teams be challenged by a team that used to be included as the big 3 in the early 2000 years. As usual Barcelona media accusing referees in helping Real Madrid and Madrid based media accusing referees in assisting Barcelona.

NFL- The L.A. Rams shutout their divisional rivals in London. The Arizona Cardinals didn't get on the board mostly due to their poor offensive line and the rams defense shutting them down all game. Carson Palmer went out with an injury, reports reveal that he broke his non-throwing arm and will be out for two months. The rams are 5-2 now and are looking like a complete team on all sides of the football.