A Grip on Sports: There are numbers that are so high they play tricks with the mind and then there are numbers that seem to be too low to believe

A GRIP ON SPORTS • There are a lot of numbers thrown out there that are near-impossible to wrap your mind around. How about $36 trillion, which Google’s AI informed me is the U.S. debt as our nation closes in on its 250th July 4. Or the $52.6 million the L.A. Lakers will pay a 40-year-old LeBron James to play next season. Or the $5.23 (or so) it costs Hoopfest to give each winner and consolation champion a T-shirt.

•••••••

• Five dollars, and the effort it took to earn it, rarely brings smiles to faces anymore. And yet everyone who earned one of the coveted Hoopfest shirts seemed to be smiling. At least they were in the photos posted on their socials.

And why not? Hoopfest is a celebration of, well, hoop. And the local hoop culture celebrates winning one of those shirts, no matter what level is played. They were NIL long before NIL became a thing.

How do I know?

I wore my one runner-up T-shirt until it became so tattered it disappeared. Our sons’ championship shirts are put away in a safe space, waiting for their mother to finish her oft-promised sports-themed quilt. As you pass by playgrounds this week, or watch summer high school games or even standing in a line to see “F1,” you’ll probably see more than your share of the shirts.

And not just on Parker Kelly or Mike Hart, members of the Hub Northwest elite men’s team that just won its seventh consecutive title. Heck, I would bet more money on Kelly having a 2005 champion T-shirt – when he was 10 – in a drawer somewhere than I would on Malik Beasley signing a LeBron-lite free-agent deal this summer.

After all, Kelly grew up in Spokane, a place where many boys and girls see playing in Hoopfest as a summer staple, whether they play basketball competitively or not.

If you drove around the Inland Northwest at all last week you saw it, parks overrun with groups getting ready for the weekend. And not just kids, either.

My favorite is the 40-something headband guy who was dribbling up the bike trail on his way to my neighborhood’s Hoopfest-built basket last Thursday. As I watched him have to chase down the ball a couple times in just the area behind our home, I figured he wasn’t about to come home with a champion shirt. But, hey, there is always the Loser King one. A prize I always wanted. And never earned. I hope he did.

• There was a stretch in which my team went about five years never playing a game on Hoopfest Sunday. We would either win one and lose two, or lose, win, lose. It was such a joke our team name became Never on Sunday.

Then we lost two consecutive Saturday games. A chance for a coveted 13th-place shirt? Nope. We lost on Sunday morning too.

Hey, our name made it clear we didn’t play on Sunday, right?

• I shared a story earlier this week about a Hoopfest team I played on and how an injury forced the three remaining members – including an out-of-shape me – had to play every second the rest of the weekend. The injury? An Achilles tear.

Ever since I’ve been acutely aware of how often athletes go down with one.

In fact, there were nine of them – reported – downtown this weekend. That about matches the number that occurred in the NBA playoffs. OK, it was three times as many, expected considering the let’s-play-hoop-once-a-year nature of the event. But the three that hit the playoffs – NBA All-Stars Tyrese Haliburton, Jayson Tatum and Damian Lillard – were not just higher profile, they were a culmination of a disturbing trend in the league. A trend that is probably born in basketball’s play-all-year-from-a-young-age culture.

OK, that culture isn’t just a basketball thing. It’s every sport, from baseball to football to soccer. At a younger and younger age, athletes are often asked to give it their all 12 months a year. Or told to do so by some authority figure.

It wears on bodies. Frays tendons and muscles. Leads to injuries. And it’s not changing. The pot of gold at the end is too big a temptation.

• One last thought as you start your work week. Another casualty of the demise of the traditional Pac-12? Heck, conference realignment overall? Coaching feuds.

Some of them took years to build. Others, like our favorite one this century between Pete Carroll (USC) and Jim Harbaugh (Stanford), bubbled to the surface pretty quickly. Which gives me faith for the 2026 season. It’s possible WSU’s Jimmy Rogers and Boise State’s Spencer Danielson can come up with a “what’s your deal?” moment of their own. One can only hope.

•••

WSU: Around in the (current, old and future) Pac-12 and the nation, the only football stories we have to link just prove one of my constant themes. Recruiting never stops. The proof is from Tucson. And Fort Collins. … Fresno State may just turn to Olympic sports to give its athletic department a financial boost.

EWU and Idaho: Around the Big Sky, a couple former Weber State men’s basketball players will have a chance to show their talents to the NBA this summer.

Indians: One of the sad parts of having a minor league team in town is how the best players are always just passing through. Maybe even after less than half a season. Such was the case for the Indians yesterday, as, following the 13-9 win at Hillsboro finished, Dave Nichols passed along the news the Rockies promoted Charlie Condon and the upcoming promotion of Jared Thomas, the Indians’ two best hitters.

Mariners: We watched much of Sunday’s game, what ultimately was a 6-4 M’s win that gave them a series victory as well. In the time we flitted in and out during the day and the Root replay late in the evening, we never saw a run scored. All part of the M’s up-and-down offense, right? … That offense is just one of the keys for the second half. … That and getting Cal Raleigh some lineup protection, no matter how that happens. … Luis Severino is available. Might not be a bad idea to bolster the starting staff. Just don’t let him pitch in Sacramento and he’ll be fine.

Seahawks: What is the one question still lingering for the Hawks this offseason?

Wimbledon: The tournament has begun. Can Carlos Alcaraz hold off Jannik Sinner and win again? Now that Aryna Sabalenka and Coco Gauff have made up – and made TikTok videos together – will their rivalry lose an edge? Can’t wait to find out.

Kraken: We can pass along a story on these seven interesting names Seattle may target in free agency. How many of them will the Kraken actually sign? Zero would be a good guess – if the Mariner ownership was in charge.

Sounders: The USMNT needed to win its Gold Cup quarterfinal against Costa Rica yesterday. Goalkeeper Matt Freese needed a redemption match. Both happened, with the U.S. earning a 4-3 penalty-kick victory in Minneapolis. The U.S. team will face Guatemala in Wednesday’s semifinal.

Hoopfest: Greg Woods filled a time-honored tradition. The WSU beat writer has often covered the tourney’s Elite battles. Greg fills that role today. … We mentioned the injuries above and have a link to Corbin Vanderby’s story about them as well. … There were a couple Hoopfest stories in Sunday’s paper we didn’t link, so we do it today.

Storm: The expansion Valkyries are surprisingly good in their first year. And they are 2-0 against Seattle after Sunday’s 84-57 rout over the visiting Storm.

•••       

• I want to give everyone a heads up for the holiday weekend. I haven’t worked on the Fourth of July in years, mainly because Kim and I have a tradition of rising early that day and taking advantage of one of the great hikes in our area. I have always wanted to watch the sunrise from the Rocks of Sharon, but I’m not sure that is on our agenda this year. I’ll figure something out. Also, I won’t be writing Sunday either, as she and I will be in the Seattle area for basketball. Until later …