Upcoming events mean sports beat will kick into high gear

As summers go, this one has been pretty average on the sports department’s busy scale.

That is all about to change.

At the end of July, the Women’s National Boxing Championships will be held at the Spokane Fairgrounds.

Before you dismiss this as glorified girl fight, check out the resume of one of the headliners. Allison Porter has undergraduate degrees in astronomy and astrophysics from Harvard University. But wait, that’s not all. She is also the reigning Miss Washington. The topper, though, is she can box. She handed local boxing phenom Andrea Kallas her only loss in the 2004 Tacoma Golden Gloves.

On Aug. 3, the Northwest League all-star game takes place at Avista Stadium. Keep an eye out for our rankings of the top NWL players at every position.

The Seattle Seahawks start training camp at Eastern Washington University on Aug. 2 and the local college football teams start gathering for the new season.

A week later, the Olympics start. The opening ceremonies will be on Friday the 13th. I’m not that superstitious, but don’t these Olympics already have enough working against them?

Amidst the summer flurry, we will complete a few staff changes. For starters, we have finally hired a reporter to replace Carter Strickland in Pullman. Glenn Kasses starts at The Spokesman-Review on July 26.

Kasses recently worked for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and was part of a team that covered the St. Louis Rams. He got a good taste of beat work by spending nearly every day at the Rams’ camp and covering home and away games.

A graduate of Northwestern, Kasses, originally from Massachusetts, also had internships at the Palm Beach Post, Sports Illustrated.com and Pro Football Weekly.

Other changes include Chris Derrick’s move to the sports copy desk. Derrick has written about high school sports and Spokane Indians baseball for more than 10 years. It is a big change for Chris, but his skills as a thorough and painstakingly accurate writer will translate well on the copy desk.

Copy editor Jeff Bunch will split his time on the copy desk with writing about the Spokane Chiefs. Bunch, an avid hockey fan who can’t stop bragging about his rec league hat trick, will replace Dave Trimmer on the beat.

Trimmer will continue to cover Eastern Washington University football and women’s basketball and will add Eastern men’s basketball to his list of beats. He will also return to the high school track and field beat in the spring.

Jim Meehan will continue to keep tabs on University of Idaho athletics and pitch in on Washington State University football coverage. Meehan will also cover the Seahawks’ camp in Cheney and cover the Seahawks’ regular season home games.

Change can be good. It adds energy. I think you’ll agree.