Page 6 November 20, 2014 TORRANCE TRIBUNE Serving Sick and Homeless Children Children In Hospice Centers Children Awaiting Treatments for Life Threatening Diseases Harry’s & McCoy’s Moving Family Owned & Operated for 66 Years Time starts at your door Free use of boxes & wardrobes Short notice moves Home-Office-Apartments Local and Long Distance Licensed & Insured – CAL-T-160-989 Jerry Cohen, CEO with his granddaughter Moving handled with patience and kindness! Free Estimates 310.329.3493 www.mmbha.webs.com Racking Up the Awards By Adam Serrao If you’re a sports fan in Los Angeles, then chances are you don’t quite realize just how good you have it. In a town that puts so much pressure on its teams to win championships year in and year out, it could become easy to forget about certain players, or make them scapegoats should their team experience a losing season or two along the way. Case in point: Kobe Bryant. Kobe is not the only truly great athlete in Los Angeles, though. Just a couple of miles down the road, there is another guy racking up awards who may be the best we’ll ever see in our lifetime. Clayton Kershaw is arguably one of the most dominant pitchers ever to play the game of baseball. As he continues to bring home one award after another, it’s important to stop and recognize how truly great his ability to pitch is. By taking home both the Cy Young Award and the MVP this past season, it may be possible that we have just witnessed one of the greatest regular seasons ever pitched in the history of the game. It was a great week to be Clayton Kershaw last week. Perhaps he even said it best himself when last Thursday he took to Twitter with excitement, “What a night! Can’t even explain the feelings from these last two days. Thank you so much for your support. It is deeply appreciated.” To explain, last Thursday night Kershaw capped a week where he first won the National League Cy Young Award and a day later took home the NL’s Most Valuable Player Award. If that wasn’t good enough, on Friday he landed an endorsement deal with Subway, the largest food franchise by number of stores in the United States. So get ready to start seeing Clayton Kershaw everywhere. With his history and accolades at the ripe young age of 26 years old, it’s a wonder why he hasn’t been all over the place as it is. To put it as briefly as possible, Kershaw has now won the pitching Triple Crown (2011), a Gold Glove Award (2011), the Roberto Clemente Award (2012), the NL MVP (2014), and he is a fourtime All-Star (2011-14), three-time Cy Young Award winner (2011, 2013, 2014), a two-time NL wins champion (2011, 2014), a two-time NL strikeout champion (2011, 2013), a fourtime MLB ERA champion (2011-14), and has pitched a no-hitter. Must be great to be him. Kershaw’s the first NL pitcher since Bob Gibson to sweep both the MVP and Cy Young Awards in the same season. Gibson accomplished the feat in 1968. Kershaw received 18 of 30 first place votes for the MVP and got 355 points in balloting by members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. The only two other players to receive votes were Miami outfielder Giancarlo Stanton (eight firstplace ballots, 298 points) and Pittsburgh Pirates center fielder Andrew McCutchen (four firstplace ballots, 271 points). “You know you’re a finalist,” Kershaw explained, “but I guess I never really anticipated to win that, especially when you’re associated with guys like Andrew and Giancarlo. To say you’re MVP, I don’t know if I could ever get used to that, but it’s obviously a huge honor.” Kershaw had better get used to taking home honors. At the ripe young age of 26, it looks like the lefty ace is remarkably only getting started. To explain just how valuable Kershaw was to the Dodgers this past season, one might only have to look at his stats on the mound: 21-4 this year for the Dodgers in only 27 starts. To put that even more into perspective, when Kershaw wasn’t the guy starting the game on the mound, the Dodgers were only three games over the .500 mark. After spending more than a month on the disabled list after the major league season opener in Australia, Kershaw was able to rebound and win what is now his third Cy Young Award in four years. While in the process of attaining the award, Kershaw not only pitched his first nohitter, but he led the entire league in wins and ERA and might have led in strikeouts (239 in 198 1/3 innings) had he not spent a month on the disabled list. The one award that Kershaw missed out on this past season was the Gold Glove, for which he was a finalist as well. Kershaw’s season that has passed is important and, well, dominant, for many reasons. Not only did he throw a no-hitter, but it was probably the most dominant no-hitter ever throw in baseball history. Not one walk and 15 strikeouts with the only batter to reach base doing so on none other than a Hanley Ramirez throwing error. Kershaw also didn’t allow an RBI to a left-handed hitter until September; he posted a 41-inning scoreless streak; he has a higher on base percentage as a batter (.235) than hitters had against him (.231); he only pitched with the bases loaded twice all season long; he had a career best 10.8 strikeouts per nine innings, allowed three runs or less in 26 of 27 starts, and led MLB starting pitchers in 44, yes that’s right, 44 different categories. Shouldn’t there be more awards that we can give him? When it comes down to it, the one thing that becomes pretty obvious with Kershaw’s sweep of baseball’s two biggest awards is that he certainly is a special talent. A special talent that plays right here in our very own backyards. Like Kobe Bryant, players of this caliber don’t come around pretty often and although we haven’t witnessed very many championships of late, it is important to sit back and appreciate talent for what it is. With another Cy Young and MVP to add to the list of his accolades, it is obvious that Clayton Kershaw is a special talent. At only 26 years of age, there is certainly a lot more to come from the youngster but for us, it is never too early to start valuing him and his talent for what it already truly is. • The Tournament Has Begun By Adam Serrao The playoffs have finally arrived and head coach Greg Holt and his West High Warriors have taken the Pioneer League’s best record, an undefeated record at that, into round one, where they faced off against the Santa Monica Vikings last Friday night at West High. It was a cool night and there was a crispness in the air; the perfect weather for a fall football game that truly brought all of one’s senses alive. If you’re a West High fan, one of those senses was sparked even more so as the clock on the scoreboard ultimately read zeroes and the fourth quarter came to a close. It wasn’t altogether pretty, but the Warriors fought hard and behind Dale Rouse’s magnificent play on the night, pulled out a 34-18 victory over the Vikings to advance into the second round of the CIF Southern Section Western Division playoffs. The game started off as most West High games this year typically have, with the Warriors getting on the board first. The opening drive of the game wasn’t necessarily a long one. It took up about ten minutes of real time as a matter of fact, and before you knew it, the Warriors were up 7-0 behind star running back Brett Ojiyi’s 3-yard touchdown. It wasn’t long before Santa Monica would answer. With 1:42 remaining in the first quarter, the Vikings were able to get on the board with a touchdown, but had the extra point blocked, cutting West’s lead to 7-6 as they refused to let coach Holt’s undefeated team take much of a lead. “I thought offensively we might have left one or two touchdowns on the field,” coach Holt said. “We had opportunities after turnovers to convert and we just didn’t do it.” In the second, West finally listened to their coach and started converting. The defense stepped up and kept Santa Monica off the board for the entirety of the quarter while the offense went to work. Quarterback Trevor Mallett hooked up with his favorite receiver, Dale Rouse, for a 24-yard touchdown. Later the West High defense, led by Bobby Fujioka, blocked a field goal attempt with just seconds remaining in the half as he returned it 82 yards for a touchdown. Just like that, behind a hard working defense and a smoothly running offense, the Warriors led 21-6 at the half. After two fumbles in the first half of play, one by Mallett and one by Ojiyi, things got a little uglier in the third quarter for West. Mallett was picked off again and Santa Monica was able to capitalize as they ran it back 82-yards for a TD. The Vikings were able to score on a 17-yard touchdown pass at the end of the third quarter to cut West’s lead to 27-18 after a missed point after. Ultimately, however, the Warriors were too much to handle. Another Mallett to Rouse hookup followed by a Rouse interception for a touchdown in the fourth quarter put this game away for good. Mallett finished going 12 for 26 for 111 yards, two touchdowns and two turnovers while Rouse caught five passes for 80 yards and had three touchdowns on the night that helped his team to a 34-18 victory. “Bottom line is we’re in the playoffs and we played a real good football team,” Holt continued. “Every team we face from here on out is just going to keep getting better.” The Warriors (11-0, 5-0) will now look to get better as well and stay unbeaten as they advance to take on Calabasas (6-5, 2-1), who won 47-41 over Buena last Friday night. South High Unfortunately for the South High Spartans, their team wasn’t as lucky as the Warriors in their opening game of the first round of the playoffs last Friday night where they took on the Ventura Cougars. The Spartans played a great second half, but unfortunately for head coach Joshua Waybright and company, the game was already way too out of hand to venture a comeback as the Spartans were eliminated from the playoffs with a 49-7 loss at Ventura. The game may have changed for good when the Spartans lost their quarterback, Gabe Zuniga, to injury late in the first half of the game. Ventura, however, was able to get on the board early and often against South High, scoring a touchdown on the opening drive of the game to put a quick throttlehold on the Spartans. The second quarter is when things really got out of hand, though. Ventura was able to put 28 points up on the board to jump out to a 35-0 lead at the half. Ventura scored again first in the third before South was finally able to get on the board for the first time with under a minute left in the quarter. Another touchdown in the fourth quarter by Ventura’s Chase Gardner put things away for good though as the Spartans fell 49-7 to end their season. The Spartans rollercoaster season has come to an end. After a strong start to the year in which they won four straight games, Waybright’s team tailed off toward the end of the year as they were plagued by injuries, taking a two game losing streak into the playoffs. In addition to Zuniga, the Spartans lost receivers Carl Richardson and Zack Leets coming into the game, perhaps adding to South’s inability to get anything going on the offensive side of the ball. The Spartans (6-5, 2-3) simply met their match against a better Ventura (10-1, 4-0) team and will look to learn from their experiences and come back even stronger next season. North High The North High Saxons unfortunately wound up in the same boat as their rivals from the South, See Tournament, page 7
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