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Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

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When the going gets tough …

A GRIP ON SPORTS

You know it's going to be a tough morning when you set the alarm for 5 a.m. You know it's going to be even tougher when your browser crashes at 5:26 a.m. You know it's going to be so tough you'll want to throw your computer against the wall when all your work is lost. Read on.

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• Luckily, the final part of that opening paragraph didn't come true. If it had, we wouldn't still be typing. But it was close. And because of the problems running down links, we're running out of time to get this on the blog. We have a self-imposed deadline due to some personal matters, so we're not going to delve into any one subject in-depth this morning other than to say I wish I had the ability to watch the Olympics' opening ceremonies. Not because I'm a big pomp and circumstance type of guy, but I follow a couple of Olympic athletes on Twitter and their tweets from the stadium made me appreciate how they felt about the whole deal. I've always kind of downplayed such events, but it is obvious the opening ceremonies are a big deal to the athletes, especially the first-time Olympians who have been dreaming of this day their entire athletic life. There is no pressure, that will come later. All there is is the realization they have achieved their dream. How cool is that?

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• Washington State: There's a bunch of things we could begin with this morning, but we choose to start with the statue of Steve Gleason's punt block (left) outside the Superdome that was introduced to the public yesterday. How cool is that? ... CBSSports.com has a couple of items from the Pac-12 media day, including Jeff Tuel looking forward to running Mike Leach's offense and the aforementioned Leach returning to college football. ... That new start is also the subject of this story. ... The Cougars' first opponent in about a month is hoping to get off to fast starts. ... ESPN.com's Ted Miller has his weekly mailbag and it includes a question from Spokane. How cool is that? ... Stanford has settled on a new athletic director. ... Arizona is actually recruiting an in-state basketball player.

• Gonzaga: Mark Few tells Jeff Goodman of CBSSports.com assistant coach Tommy Lloyd will replace him whenever Few retires. Lloyd is the third coach to assume the mantle of coach-in-waiting, following Billy Grier (now at USD) and Leon Rice (at Boise State).

• Eastern Washington: Southern Utah knows playing football in the Big Sky Conference won't be easy.

• Indians: Spokane (left) had a chance to rally for a bottom-of-the-ninth win last night but couldn't get it done, losing 8-6 to Yakima instead. Jess Brown has the story.

• Mariners: If the M's could play just one team for 162 games a season, don't you think it would be the Kansas City Royals? The two teams met again last night in Safeco and the M's won once again, this one 6-1 behind another stellar start from Blake Beavan and a three-run home run from John Jaso. How cool is that? ... Randy Johnson and Dan Wilson are being inducted into the Mariners Hall of Fame and Johnson took the occasion to defend himself once again concerning his poor 1998 get-me-out-of-here showing. Johnson is upset people think he "tanked" to get traded. I think it's a matter of semantics. Johnson thinks tanking is when a player doesn't try, saying that never occurred. He does admit he was distracted by all that was going on and didn't pitch as well as he could. OK. ... The Angels bolstered their pitching staff by adding Zach Grienke.

• Seahawks: The Hawks have some questions they need to answer before the season. One of those questions, the biggest one really, is who will be the starting quarterback.

• Sounders: With a match tonight at Colorado, the Sounders made some roster moves. They traded midfielder Alvaro Fernandez to the Chicago Fire and filled his spot on the roster with German midfielder Christian Tiffert. There also may be more moves today.

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• That's it for this morning. Tomorrow's post will be a bit later than usual as we have some early morning commitments. But we will sit down and get your post ready after we finish. Until then ...



Vince Grippi
Vince Grippi is a freelance local sports blogger for spokesman.com. He also contributes to the SportsLink Blog.

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