Vince Grippi

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Sports

A Grip on Sports: Keep those presents under wraps a little while longer folks. A Christmas-in-October Mariners World Series berth is still not assured

Tue., Oct. 14, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Here we are, looking through frost-covered windows on a Tuesday and still enthralled by the baseball season. Seems odd, doesn’t it? At least in the Pacific Northwest. As the tomato plants fight for life, usually it’s time to start focusing on college basketball.

Sports

A Grip on Sports: It was pretty apparent at about 9 p.m. Sunday that we had just experienced a special day in Northwest sports

Mon., Oct. 13, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • I spent a little time this morning flipping through the mental Rolodex that makes up the timeline of my long life. And was unable to come up with many better Sundays than the one we all experienced together yesterday.

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A Grip on Sports: There is a chance Sunday’s results could make all of the recent pro sports’ positivity go down the drain with alacrity

Sun., Oct. 12, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Being a pessimist sucks. Looking at a glass overflowing, seeing a small flaw near the bottom and wondering just when the darn thing is going to crack open, spill its contents to the floor and cut my hand when I reach to save it. It’s especially tough on a day like this one.

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A Grip on Sports: Though the box score swears it was the Mariners, exhaustion finally won last night, at least for those of us who watched at home

Sat., Oct. 11, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Open your eyes. It’s over. Finally. Not the M’s season. Nope. That rolls on for at least four more nerve-wracking, stomach-churning, why-the-heck-do-I-put-myself-through-this games. What’s over is that breaking-ball-fest that broke out in T-Mobile last night. After 15 glorious, fingernail-chewing innings, matched by just, if not more, wasted chances. For both teams.

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A Grip on Sports: Will there be joy in Mudville, aka Seattle, tonight? Or will the Tigers and Tarik Skubal rain on the M’s parade?

Fri., Oct. 10, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • There is more than one contest to watch on TV this weekend. But there really isn’t. The M’s. The Tigers. Winner moves on to the American League championship. The loser bemoans a meltdown. Tonight at 5:08. On Fox.

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A Grip on Sports: The first chance to eliminate Detroit slipped through the Mariners’ fingers Wednesday, leaving a must-win game Friday

Thu., Oct. 9, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • One more cross-country flight. One more chance. One more home game. And, just maybe, one more “we had it in our hands and let it slip away” moment.

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A Grip on Sports: It’s time to celebrate another year running past, though what happened late last night seemed to make time stand still

Wed., Oct. 8, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Looking for the best birthday present you can think of for your favorite sports writer? How about one of those “Dump 61 Here” T-shirts? In XXL?

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A Grip on Sports: It’s always important to take notes, especially this time of the year when worlds are colliding

Tue., Oct. 7, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Life is made up of big days and small ones. Days that go by slowly but add up quickly. Days that you put your head down and trudge through and days you sit wide-eyed, watching it all run by. Why the philosophical bent? I’ll explain tomorrow. Today, I’ll pass along notes from a napkin.

Sports

A Grip on Sports: The ultimate aspect of an ‘if-only” weekend in Seattle? ‘If only’ the Mariners had held on to win Saturday

Mon., Oct. 6, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • The weekend that just finished featured four professional sporting events in Seattle’s SoDo neighborhood, any one of which on their own qualified as a shouldn’t-be-missed happening. Too bad Sunday mirrored Saturday and the Seattle teams were only able to earn a split.

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A Grip on Sports: The Mariners offense was a bloody mess Saturday night and as a result their World Series hopes were wounded quite a bit

Sun., Oct. 5, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • How are you with the sight of blood? Squeamish, like me, turning your head before the first drop hits the ground? Or do you slow down, stick your head out the window and ask the person controlling traffic what the heck happened?

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A Grip on Sports: Watching sports on a Saturday night like this one should be a team event. There is just too much to cover and one key player is out due to a coach’s decision

Sat., Oct. 4, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Watching film of today’s sports TV schedule, it’s harder to find gaps in the coverage than it was when the Legion of Boom was in its heyday. Glancing around, just about every minute of every hour has something pretty spectacular going on.

Sports

A Grip on Sports: Another chapter of Inland Northwest basketball history closes with Don Monson’s passing Wednesday

Fri., Oct. 3, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Friday’s columns are all about looking ahead. Usually. And I’ll get there. Eventually. But there has to be a more-than-glancing look in the rearview mirror today as once again a titan of Inland Northwest college basketball has left us.

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A Grip On Sports: The NCAA does one thing really well – making everyone wait while the organization drags its feet

Thu., Oct. 2, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • The NCAA’s bureaucracy moves in strange ways. Slowly, too. That hasn’t changed despite the earthquakes that have hit the organization in the past decade or two.

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A Grip on Sports: It’s not even the legal equivalent of halftime, but the Pac-12 takes a big lead over the Mountain West in poaching lawsuit due to a ruling Tuesday

Wed., Oct. 1, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • It’s tough to keep track but there has to be a ledger somewhere. Just how often in the past few years has news concerning legal proceedings been the story of the day in college athletics? If you want to guess more than 10% of the time, you’ll get no argument here. Legal or otherwise.

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A Grip on Sports: September’s last gasp, and its final day, has an deep-into-October feel to it, doesn’t it?

Tue., Sept. 30, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • It’s not October. Not just yet. But it seems as if the month of fall foliage, ghosts and goblins is starting a day early. And not just because this last day of September will not hit 70 degrees in Spokane. Nope. It’s baseball time. Playoff baseball time. Wild, huh?

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A Grip on Sports: A September to remember hits hard when you are out of the country as the month includes a series of Northwest highlights

Mon., Sept. 29, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Where were we? That’s a rhetorical question I write every time when returning from a day off in the past 13 years. Today, having missed three consecutive weeks, it’s not all that rhetorical. The answer? In Italy.

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A Grip on Sports: Before we take a hiatus, we take the chance to evaluate the Seahawks first big blown chance of the new season

Mon., Sept. 8, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • It’s hard to say goodbye, even if it’s only for a while. A long while, actually. But I will choke it out, which gives me something in common today with the Seahawks.

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A Grip on Sports: Despite the cracks showing in the sport overall, watching college football is still fun, especially when the home team performs as well as WSU did in topping San Diego State

Sun., Sept. 7, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • College football is broken in a lot of ways. But the cracks and chasms – depending on your perspective – that highlight the offseason haven’t crushed the on-field product just yet. Games can still be exciting, mainly when they match opponents with like resources. As illustrated by the games in Pullman and Corvallis on Saturday.

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A Grip on Sports: WSU is playing another night game in Pullman, this time hosting San Diego State. It’s better than some alternatives, which much of the rest of the schedule illustrates

Sat., Sept. 6, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Not going to keep you. Or me. This is my last Saturday in Spokane for the month and I want to make the most of it. Have some empathy, as well, for your time, being the Cougar game is – checks TV schedule – 7:15 tonight? What, again? Another home night game? Darn TV folks.

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A Grip on Sports: If time really begins on Labor Day, then this weekend is the first true golden one of the year

Fri., Sept. 5, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Friday again? Already? Time flies when fun is passing you by. Or there is smoke in your eyes, as is the case in Spokane. It’s supposed to be unhealthy today and into the weekend. Which means the TV sports schedule takes on added importance if just walking around outside may induce a coughing fit.

Sports

A Grip on Sports: The NFL begins again tonight, though watching the Eagles/Cowboys clash is not as easy – or cheap – as it might be

Thu., Sept. 4, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • Tonight’s the night. Thursday night. Thursday Night Football, the first game of the most highly anticipated NFL season since, well, last season. Anticipation of the NFL’s start is at 100%. Has been for decades. And no matter what your junior high football coach screamed, no one can give 110%. Not even the NFL. Or its fans.

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A Grip on Sports: George Raveling never forgot his time at Washington State and what it meant for himself and the game of basketball

Wed., Sept. 3, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • George Raveling lived a diverse life. A life with basketball supplying a foundation but not in one bit defining who he was. And that’s why his death Tuesday at age 88 touched so many. Just as his life did.

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A Grip on Sports: Hate watching is a thing, one some of us try to avoid, though right now whenever the M’s come on, it’s hard not to hate what’s happening

Tue., Sept. 2, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • To paraphrase one of America’s most-overrated public figures: Old coaches never fade away. They just lose on national TV. And endure barbs on social media.

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A Grip on Sports: It seems like a great day to celebrate the times when we used to be able to do nothing in the way of labor all summer

Mon., Sept. 1, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • September starts today, if you happened not to know – and, yes, I’m projecting a bit here. It’s a month that’s seared into my mind because of a few things. One of my sisters’ birthday, Labor Day, football. And the darkest day on most every kid’s calendar, the first day of school. The day when you traded a notebook for nothing.

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A Grip on Sports: Yes, the Cougars’ win over Idaho was not as impressive as the school’s football fans hoped, but we experienced another win Saturday night with a deep Cougar connection

Sun., Aug. 31, 2025

A GRIP ON SPORTS • It was a pretty eventful Saturday. For me certainly. For you probably. For Lee Corso and Arch Manning definitely. All due to college football. Unless you are one of those folks who live and die with the regional MLB team. Good luck with that in September.