S PORTS
Hermiston
A8
WEDNESDAY, JULY 15, 2015
Martinez
makes a
mark on
Mariners
SAM BARBEE
FROM THE
SIDELINES
I
t was a little more than a month
ago that the Seattle Mariners
hired local legend Edgar
Martinez as its new batting coach.
It came at a time when the Mari-
ners were swatting at baseballs like
the\ were À ies and like À ies the
balls seemed to know the bats were
coming and avoided them. It made
for some rather frustrating baseball
to watch.
But days after Martinez was an-
nounced I said that the M¶s offense
is going to look better and hoSeful-
ly the Mariners win some games be-
cause of it. This was fully realized
in my head at a wedding this week-
end when my dad turned to me and
said ³<ou know it¶s getting to the
Soint where you can¶t Must dismiss
Edgar¶s Sresence as an aberration.´
+e¶s right.
The baseball has looked better.
But the wins still aren¶t coming. <et.
The ¿ rst maMor sign is the emer-
gence of Mark Trumbo. When he
came over from the Arizona Dia-
mondbacks -une he was batting
.259 with nine home runs. After he
got to Seattle his numbers droSSed
signi¿ cantly. +e stoSSed Slaying.
+e was À ailing wilding at outside
Sitches. +e was at his worst when
swinging at Sitches a foot outside.
But then Edgar came.
Trumbo started staying with
Sitches better. +e started seeing the
ball batter. +is weak À y balls to left
or double-Slay balls turned into line
drives uS the middle. Since -uly
when his season average was at a
season-low .22 Trumbo has batted
a sweltering . 2-for- with
an on-base Sercentage of .52 and an
23S of .. Maybe Trumbo who
is a good Big /eague hitter ¿ nally
got going. But he had been in Seattle
a month before Martinez showed uS
and his bat caught ¿ re with Martinez
as his tutor. &orrelation doesn¶t eTual
causation but I see some of the Ed-
gar Effect in Trumbo.
But it¶s more than Must what Mar-
tinez can do to one hitter. Martinez
has changed the whole mentality. I
was at the ¿ rst two games of the De-
troit series last week and it was dif-
ferent watching the Mariners hitters.
They¶ve Tuickly become better still
not great though at situational hit-
ting: driving in the runner from third
with fewer than two outs; hitting be-
hind a runner at second to move him
to third; not striking out when you
need to Sut the ball in Slay. These
are things we watched the Mariners
do for three months and they¶re
starting to break those habits.
They also don¶t care when
they¶re down. 2n Monday the
Mariners were down 3-0 early until
Logan Morrison tied things with a
three-run shot. The ne[t night the
Mariners were again down 3-0 until
Austin Jackson lined one off the vis-
itor¶s bullSen roof for a grand slam.
I¶m not ready to say that these
aren¶t the Mariners of old that
they aren¶t going to come uS short
yet again. But at least they¶re fun
to watch again. That has a lot to
do with Martinez. Any Slayer will
say he¶s been a godsend with his
talent for teaching. We¶ll see what
the longterm bene¿ ts are because
they¶ve been wonderful in the short
term.
— Sam Barbee is a sports
reporter for the Hermiston Herald
and East Oregonian based in
Hermiston. He can be reached by
phone at 541-564-4542 or by email
at sbarbee@hermistonherald.
com. Follow him on Twitter @
SamBarbee1 and follow Herald
Sports @HHeraldSports.
HERMISTONHERALD.COM
3-on-3 to the 10th power
Spokane’s Hoopfest
instrumental in success
of local event
By SAM BARBEE
Staff Writer
Starting in 990 SSokane
Washington has hosted a 3-on-
3 basketball tournament called
+ooSfest that has blossomed
into a 000-team e[Serience
that describes itself as the big-
gest basketball event in the
country if not the world.
Ten years ago a small grouS
of Hermiston residents decid-
ed to try its luck with a 3-on-3
tournament. In the fall of 200
in conMunction with the &ham-
ber of &ommerce Larry 8sher
Joe ThomSson Mike .ay and
about 10 others met with the
chamber to Slan a tournament
to take Slace that July. They
settled on the third weekend of
the month to avoid HooSfest
but the chamber decided to go
another route by winter and
droSSed out.
FILE PHOTO
So a small grouS of si[ or
eight stayed Two adult men’s teams battle it out on the street courts last summer during the ninth-annual Takin’ it to the
with
the Streets three-on-three basketball tournament on Main Street in Hermiston.
BASKETBALL SroMect. 8sh-
er¶s
wife
.arissa came uS with the
tourney¶s name ² Takin¶ It to
the Streets ² after the famous
track by The Doobie Brothers
of the same name.
This year Takin¶ It to the
Streets invades downtown
Hermiston Friday and Saturday
By SAM BARBEE
for the 10th annual 3-on-3 bas-
Staff Writer
ketball tournament.
To tell the origin story
That small grouS since the
of Takin¶ It to the Streets
idea was hatched has been in
Hermiston¶s
three-on-
contact with HooSfest. And
three basketball tour-
ThomSson said their helS has
nament you must first
been a huge Sart of their suc-
start 20 years ago with a
cess and he couldn¶t say enough
now-defunct town-wide
about the generosity and wel-
event called SSudFest.
comeness they received from
If you recall SSudFest
the giants of outdoor 3-on-3
was a weekend in Herm-
basketball.
iston that included a car
³We reached out to them
show face Sainting en-
on our ¿ rst day and they were
FILE PHOTO
graving and three-on-
e[tremely helSful and gener-
ous´ ThomSson said. ³They Hundreds of people lined Main Street last summer to watch teams
compete in the ninth-annual Takin’ It to the Streets 3-on-3 basketball
See STREETS, A9
tournament.
See BASKETBALL, A9
Takin’ It to
the Streets is
not a revival
Softball team reps Hermiston at state
By SAM BARBEE
Staff Writer
The 10/11-year-old team
is the only Hermiston soft-
ball sTuad to advance Sast
districts and that has them
looking ahead to comSete
in the 10/11-year-old state
tournament this weekend in
Gresham.
³It¶s Must that we¶re the
only Hermiston softball
team going which makes
me even more motivated
to win´ shortstoS .ayleigh
Billsborough said.
SimSson wouldn¶t sin-
gle out any of the 11 Slay-
ers on the roster saying that
they¶ve bonded as a team
and ³we hold onto each
See SOFTBALL, A9
STAFF PHOTO BY SAM BARBEE
STAFF PHOTO BY SAM BARBEE
Akira Pierson of the Hermiston 10/11-year-old softball team headed to the state
tournament this weekend À elds a ball at third base while shortstop .ayleigh
Billsborough backs up Tuesday at Field of Dreams in Hermiston.
Breanna Simpson center À elder for the Hermiston 10/11-year-
old softball team headed to their state tournament this week-
end, makes a catch in shallow center in front of teammate
Abigail Findley at Tuesday’s practice at Field of Dreams in
Hermiston.