Four more bowl games? Really? . . . Did you see the Tebow Eclipse?

The next college football bowl season might feature four more games. Seriously! The cities of Austin, Texas; Little Rock, Ark.; Tucson, Ariz.; and Orlando, Fla., all have applied to play host to games. Should all four be accepted there would be 43 games on the schedule. . . . With that many on tap, the team that misses the CFL playoffs might end up in a bowl game. . . . Outfielder Tyson Gillies of Kamloops was in training camp with the San Diego Padres and now is with the San Antonio Missions of the Double-A Texas League. Gillies, 26, got into two spring-training games with the Padres, going 1-for-1 with a walk. . . .

“Chicago prospect Kris Bryant says he’s ready for the majors,” writes Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe, “but Theo Epstein and the Cubs say he needs more time in the minors. And how can you argue against a franchise with such a tradition of winning?” . . . “Off the coast of North Carolina,” Hough notes, “a man was rescued from atop his overturned sailboat after being lost at sea for 66 days. Presumably, they’ve already optioned Tom Hanks for the movie.” . . .

“Tiger Woods’ private jet reportedly landed in Augusta,” reports RJ Currie of SportsDeke.com. “Word is its approach was decent, but it took four tries to get it in the hangar.” . . . One more from Currie: “Maryland researchers successfully gave a female rat’s brain the characteristics of a male rat. Now she wanders lost in a maze for hours instead of asking for directions.” . . . Headline at SportsPickle.com: Pre-med student gets NHL team-physician job after accurately identifying upper body, lower body. . . .

“There is a report of a ringside seat for Mayweather-Pacquiao selling for $87,000,” notes Cam Hutchinson of the Saskatoon Express. “If I have to pay to watch old guys fight, I’d take Kapp-Mosca over this sham.” . . . If John Garrett’s Vancouver Canucks are going to get through the first round of the playoffs, they are going to have to find a solution for the woes of Henrik Sedin and Linden Vey in the faceoff circles. When you are playing the same team game after game, losing faceoffs the way those two do will wear you out. . . .

Scott Ostler of the San Francisco Chronicle is having a tough time as MLB training camps wind down. “I hate the dead-arm period of spring training,” he writes. “I can hardly lift my beer.” . . . “The Sacramento Kings new 7-foot-5, 360-pound center, Sim Bhullar, of Indian descent?” Ostler tweeted. “They're calling him Mahatma Grande.” . . . Ostler followed that with: “Sim Bhullar, in first game of 10-day contract with the Kings, did not play. So it was Bhullar's day off.” . . .

Four items from Bill Littlejohn, our South Lake Tahoe., Calif., correspondent: “Wrigley Field now has a JumboTron. What's next? The Taj Mahal hosting Keeping Up With The Kardashians?” . . . “Joni Mitchell's reaction to Wrigley Field renovations: 'They paved paradise, And put up a JumboTron.’ ” . . . “The Florida Marlins plan a year-long Back to the Future promotion. Ironic, considering every time they've gotten good, they fire sale their future.” . . . “Saturday morning's lunar eclipse was the briefest total lunar eclipse of this century. They’re calling it the Tebow Eclipse.” . . .

The referee stepped in to stop a recent light heavyweight bout between Marvin Jones and Ramon Luis Nicolas, when a cell phone fell out of Jones’ trunks. “Also falling out of his trunks,” wrote Rick Chandler of SportsGrid.com, “in succession and making a loud clatter: Car keys, horseshoe, nunchucks, loose change, flashlight, several DVDs, framed family photo.” . . . Three rounds later, Jones was on the canvas and out like this phone. . . . “In Quebec,” reports Brad Dickson of the Omaha World-Herald, “thieves broke into a sporting goods store and stole about 100 hockey sticks.  Because it’s Canada, police dropped their investigation into a string of armored car robberies to find the hockey stick thieves.” . . . Dickson, again: “Two visiting Americans were arrested for carving their names into the Roman Colosseum. Is it perhaps time to require an IQ test in order to get a passport?” . . .

Arnold Schwarzenegger was riding a bicycle in Australia when police stopped him because he was helmetless. “If he got a concussion,” wondered NBC-TV’s Seth Meyers, “how would you know?” . . . The Canucks recalled F Sven Baertschi from the AHL’s Utica Comets on Friday and the way social media reacted you might have thought it was the second coming of The Great One. . . . Such is life in Vancouver where the wind blows nicely when the Canucks win. . . .

Conan O’Brien of TBS wasn’t at all impressed by the Notre Dame basketball team’s run to the Sweet 16 in March Madness. As he put it: “I’m sorry, but if I want to watch the Fighting Irish I’ll visit my parents.” . . . “To celebrate a victory in a Russian junior game the other day, players on MHC Loko impersonated a line of tumbling dominoes,” reports Ian Hamilton of the Regina Leader-Post. “The performance resembled NHL teams falling all over themselves to get Connor McDavid.”

(Gregg Drinnan is a former sports editor of the Regina Leader-Post and the late Kamloops Daily News. He is at gdrinnan.blogspot.ca and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears here on weekends, except when it doesn’t.)

There has never been a subscription fee for this blog, but if you enjoy stopping by here, why not consider donating to the cause? Just click HERE. . . and thank you very much.

“Michael Oher was recently cut by the (Tennessee) Titans,” writes contributor Bill Littlejohn. “Michael took the news fine, but Sandra Bullock had to be escorted off Titans property.” . . . Littlejohn, again: “Joba Chamberlain's new contract with the Detroit Tigers includes a Cy Young bonus. Isn't that like Vin Diesel's new contract including an Oscar bonus?” . . . A Littlejohn hat trick: “David Ortiz is upset over some of the new pace-of-play rules, including one where the batter has to keep one foot in the box after each pitch. Just think how upset Big Papi will be if a rule comes out speeding up home-run trots.” . . .

Ian Hamilton of the Regina Leader-Post has another idea that would help MLB speed up the process: “Give infielders and base umps a cattle prod to use on Boston Red Sox plodder David Ortiz during his home-run trots.” . . . Here’s Hamilton, again: “Media reports suggest England’s Radio 1 has banned Madonna’s songs because she’s old and irrelevant. Does that mean TV networks won’t show Tiger Woods anymore?” . . .

After a brief flurry of NHL deals on Wednesday, Ray Ratto of CSNbayarea.com wrote: “If this ruins Deadline Day, I will hate them all forever. But if it leaves all those Canadian TV guys on the set dissecting five-day-old news and literally begging teams on set to do something, anyway, my mood will be assuaged.” . . . It has to be a helpless feeling to be one of the TV hockey panelists watching all of the trade activity over the last few days. . . . What’s left for Monday’s trade deadline? No, I won’t be tuning in at 5 a.m. . . . With all of the NHL trade rumours being spewed by the talking heads these days, you have to wonder if the NHL is the leakiest ship in the navy. . . .

RJ Currie of SportsDeke.com reports: “Two Tennessee high school girls basketball teams got banned from the post-season for intentionally trying to lose a game to avoid the top seed. The first thing that gave them away? They came out in tank tops.” . . . Currie, again: “Complex Sports called Michael Jordan the most clutch player in Bulls history. Derek Rose may go down as the most crutch.” . . .

The next time you’re looking at that last strip of bacon and debating, don’t bother. Just eat it and think about Matt Stonie while you’re doing it. Matt Stonie? He’s a competitive eater and holds the world record for most strips eaten in five minutes. That would be 182. . . . Is this a great world, or what? . . . Outfielder Tyson Gillies of Kamloops, who was released last summer by the Philadelphia Phillies, is in Peoria, Ariz., with the San Diego Padres. He signed a minor-league deal with the Padres on Friday. . . .

“Donald Trump said that he is ‘more serious’ than ever about running for President in 2016,” reports Janice Hough, aka The Left Coast Sports Babe. “And Jon Stewart is thinking ‘well, maybe I can delay that retirement just a bit.’ ” . . . Finally, Manny Pacquiao and Floyd Mayweather are scheduled to climb in a ring together and duke it out. Noted ABC-TV’s Jimmy Kimmel: “I’m glad to see Manny and Floyd are finally putting aside their differences to fight.” . . . The last info I saw on tickets had the cheap seats at $3,500. That would buy a lot of bacon. . . . “If you thought the Mayweather-Pacquiao promoters couldn't get any greedier,” reports Vancouver comic Torben Rolfsen, “they've added Crosby-Dubinsky II to the undercard.” . . . One more from Rolfsen: “Rough week for Chicago sports fans: Patrick Kane injury, Derrick Rose injury, and the Cubs are back.” . . .

It was Larry King — yes, that Larry King — who tweeted this the other day: “The rat is perfectly named.” . . . Think about that for a moment. Is that a profound thought, or what? . . . I didn’t watch much of the Academy Awards, but I did get to see Lady Gaga’s tribute to The Sound of Music. Who saw that coming? . . . “What a strange world we live in,” tweets Steve Buffery of the Toronto Sun. “Everybody wants a bigger and bigger TV screen, but they don't mind watching stuff on tiny mobile devices.” . . .

“Alex Rodriguez reported to the Yankees’ spring-training complex in Tampa, Fla., three days early,” reports Dwight Perry of the Seattle Times. “Apparently clubhouse attendants needed the extra time just to haul in all his baggage.” . . . “According to Delta Dental research,” Perry notes, “kids in the U.S. received an estimated $255 million from the Tooth Fairy last year. In a related story, Alex Rodriguez still has $61 million coming from the Yanks.” . . . After A-Rod delivered that hand-written apology, and everyone laughed, Will Leitch of Sports on Earth wrote: “We have reached the point with A-Rod that everything he does is reflexively seen as venal and murderous; if A-Rod jumped on a grenade to save the President's life, the New York Post headline would be 'A-Rod Stains West Wing Carpet, Fails to Clean It Up.' ’’ . . .

“Junior hockey franchise officials are threatening to move their teams out of state if they are forced to pay players under child-labor laws,” writes Ron Judd in the Seattle Times. “Oh and they also want a new arena. And a PlayStation.” . . . One more from Judd: “Seattle is considering capping rents at $618 a month on ‘micro-apartments,’ defined as those containing less living space than the single box of a stereo speaker you owned in your 20s.” . . .

It was the late Dean Smith, the long-time head coach of the North Carolina men’s basketball team, who once said: “If you make every game a life-and death proposition, you’re going to have problems. For one thing, you’ll be dead a lot.” . . . Only in today’s NHL could Jaromir Jagr, now 43 years of age and slower than slo-motion, be traded to a team that appeared to be getting younger and faster. . . . Only in today’s NHL could David Clarkson, with one of the worst contracts in history, be traded for Nathan Horton, who has a big contract and back problems, and may never play again. . . . Yes, it’s OK to slap your forehead.

(Gregg Drinnan is a former sports editor of the Regina Leader-Post and the late Kamloops Daily News. He is at gdrinnan.blogspot.ca and twitter.com/gdrinnan. Keeping Score appears here on weekends, except when it doesn’t.)

There has never been a subscription fee for this blog, but if you enjoy stopping by here, why not consider donating to the cause? Just click HERE. . . and thank you very much.

Gillies excited about being added to Phillies' 40-man roster

GILLIES

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor

Tyson Gillies’ run in baseball’s Arizona Fall League is over.
The outfielder, who is from Kamloops, didn’t put up outstanding numbers with the Scottsdale Scorpions, but he finished what he started and that, more than anything else, was the key.
And the Philadelphia Phillies thought enough of what they saw to add Gillies to their 40-man roster on Friday. That was the deadline for teams to add players to the roster, which protects them from the Rule 5 Draft on Dec. 8.
“It’s very exciting, that’s for sure,” Gillies, 23, said Friday from Missouri, where he will spend the U.S. Thanksgiving holiday with friends before moving on to Clearwater, Fla., the home of the Phillies’ minor-league complex.
Gillies hit only .178 and struck out 24 times in 90 at-bats over 27 games. But the numbers weren’t as important as how he felt and how his legs did. His game, in centre field and on the base paths, is built on speed.
“It was good,” he said. “I had a lot of fun being out playing again every day. That was my main focus . . . stay on the field, stay healthy and make sure my body felt good.”
The Phillies acquired Gillies from the Seattle Mariners in a deal that involved left-hander Cliff Lee almost two years ago. Since then, however, Gillies has been plagued by hamstring and leg problems that kept him off the field for most of two seasons. He got into only 26 games with the Double-A Reading Phillies in 2010 and was to return there for 2011. However, the Phillies shut him down after just three games with the Florida State League’s Clearwater Threshers.
That’s why he was so thrilled to run out onto the field in Arizona a few weeks ago.
“Everybody could tell how happy I was . . . just running everywhere,” he said. “I was happy and having a good time just being out there.”
It also was great to be able to stay out there, something he hadn’t been able to do since the 2009 season when he was with the California League’s High Desert Mavericks.
“Besides the offensive part of it, not getting the hits and things I wanted to . . . that wasn’t my main focus,” Gillies said. “But I still had some frustrating times because you always want to do well, no matter what.
“But I had to look at the bigger picture. I’m happy, running everywhere, feeling good. Just being able to play the game was very important to me.”
The Arizona Fall League is where major league teams place many of their top prospects, wanting them to get a little extra work before winter. The Scorpions’ roster also included outfielders Bryce Harper, 19, of the Washington Nationals, who is considered perhaps the best prospect of them all, and Mike Trout, a highly touted prospect with the Los Angeles Angels.
While Gillies struggled at the plate, he felt he more than held his own on defence.
“I played well. I thought I played really well,” he said. “I got really comfortable. I got reads on balls and made some great plays. That’s a big thing. My defensive side of the game is really important to me. I was happy I was able to feel comfortable.
“I think I’m pretty much where I’ve always been. I’m feeling good. I’m starting to feel more like me every day.”
When he returns to Clearwater late this month, he will work with hitting instructors on recreating his swing. He did hit .341, with 17 doubles, 14 triples, nine home runs and 44 stolen bases, with High Desert.
“There were times where I came back to the dugout after lining out or hitting a ball hard,” he said of his AFL stint, “and was telling myself, ‘I’m seeing it, I’m feeling good.’ But when you’ve been away from something for so long, the consistency doesn’t come back right away as you would like it to.”

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter

Gillies back on diamond

 For the Tyson Gillies fans out there. . . .

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor
The smile is back in Tyson Gillies’ voice.
Gillies, who missed almost all of last season with hamstring problems, is back playing professional baseball again. And he couldn’t be happier.
“It’s been awesome,” a joyful sounding Gillies said Wednesday from Clearwater, Fla. “The first game, I felt like I’d been playing for a month so it’s been going well.”
Gillies, 22, is from Kamloops and is considered one of the Philadelphia Phillies’ better outfield prospects, despite having sat out most of last season.
When his left hamstring flared up on him again earlier this year, the Phillies sent Gillies to see Ron Hruska, who specializes in postural restoration, at the Hruska Clinic in Lincoln, Neb.
Gillies, who had only 113 plate appearances with the Class AA Reading Phillies last season, admits he was “worried” prior to his first trip to Lincoln.
“But working with Ron Hruska . . . he was such a positive guy about everything,” Gillies said. “He wasn’t the slightest bit worried about it. That definitely helped.”
It helped, too, that Hruska almost immediately recognized the problem.
“He looked at me, kind of moved my leg . . . then he wanted to do a couple of tests with me,” Gillies recalled. “He knew right away which test I would be very good at and which one I wouldn’t even be able to do. He was dead-on on all of them. He was pretty impressive.”
According to Gillies, Hruska said that a slight groin tweak suffered in spring training in 2010 may have started the whole process.
“It could have gone downhill from there,” Gillies stated.
The bottom line, Gillies said, is that his left groin and right hip weren’t working together.
“They weren’t firing,” Gillies said. “They weren’t working properly. My left hamstring was compensating for both of those not working, which is why it wasn’t healing. It was like a mild hamstring strain and would never heal because those two things would never start working.”
The prescription was a series of exercises that Gillies has “to do every day now to fire up the groin and the hip . . . a lot of hip stuff and a lot of groin stuff.”
The result has been that Gillies said he feels “great . . . I’m more balanced, more in line. I can feel it just walking.”
But, of course, it’s one thing to walk, and another to run. And, if Gillies is going to make it to the majors, he will do it because of his running speed.
“It’s been great and I haven’t had any problems with my leg in a while now,” he said. “Being able to be out there and run again . . . that’s been my life always. That’s the only thing I know.
“It’s great being out and playing every day. I’m happy.”
To date, he has played seven games on his rehab assignment in Clearwater, and he is hitting .435. Combine that with how well he feels and he thinks he could be back with Reading in a week or 10 days.
“They’re trying to make sure that I’m 100 per cent before I get out of here,” Gillies said. “They don’t want me to take a step back and have to come back here. They’re being very cautious.
“It’s definitely a frustrating thing to go through, but the last thing I want to do is go start playing for my team again and not be ready.
“But I should be going up soon.”

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter

Gillies in commercial shoot with Jeter

TYSON GILLIES
(Ralph Trout Photo/Reading Phillies

By GREGG DRINNAN
Daily News Sports Editor

Tyson Gillies doesn’t report to spring training for 10 days, but his baseball season is off to quite a start.
Gillies, a 22-year-old outfielder from Kamloops who is in the Philadelphia Phillies organization, spent most of Thursday in St. Petersburg, Fla., hanging out with Derek Jeter, the captain of the New York Yankees.
The two weren’t quite bumming around on a beach. Rather, they were shooting a Ford television commercial. Jeter, 36, has long been an endorser of Ford products.
“I was Derek Jeter’s double,” Gillies told The Daily News late Thursday night, after the shoot had wrapped. “I had to do everything he did the whole day. I was basically following him around all day doing everything he did. It was great.
“I was the Derek Jeter look-alike. . . . It’s been a great day. It’s been a blast.”
Hmm, Gillies as Jeter? Well . . .
“I’m a centre fielder; he plays shortstop,” a chuckling Gillies said. “But on camera I was looking pretty well like him when we were running and from behind and the side . . .”
This all began when Pat Davis, a Clearwater, Fla., firefighter who is a close friend, asked Gillies if he was interested in accompanying him to Orlando for an audition. Davis told Gillies the production company also was looking for professional baseball players.
Gillies, who has been in Clearwater, the home of the Phillies’ training complex, preparing for the season, said “why not and I ended up getting a part.”
Did Davis get a role?
“No, unfortunately,” said Gillies with a laugh. “Other guys said that’s usually how it works.”
Gillies auditioned on Feb. 9.
“That was very short,” he said. “They were trying to figure out what kind of baseball skills you had and your history in the game.”
He got called back for pictures two days later and found out Sunday that he had the role.
Which is how Gillies came to be in a St. Petersburg ballpark on Thursday, along with Jeter and former major league pitcher Anthony Telford, 44, who last played in 2002 with the Texas Rangers.
“We were in one of the older stadiums in St. Petersburg,” Gillies said. “It was awesome. It was fun work . . . a lot of scenes, for sure . . . a lot of sweating outside but it was a blast.
“There were tons of cuts and takes and ‘Do it again’ and everything like that.”
There was one other part of the day that Gillies said he really enjoyed.
“There was a lot of good food. That was the best part,” he said. “I definitely took advantage of that.”
Then he laughed and added: “If it’s free, I’m there.”
Gillies said he has no idea when the commercial will begin airing and he’s not sure what it will look like.
“You’ll also see me probably doing other stuff,” he said, “but I’m not too sure on everything they’ll have going on.”
Jeter goes into this season with 2,926 career hits. He is the Yankees’ all-time leader and also has more hits than any other shortstop in major league history.
“He was great,” Gillies said. “It was cool. It’s awesome just to be able to talk to him just like you talk to any normal individual. It was great.”
If Gillies is going to make it to the major leagues, his legs will get him there. His game, on offence and defence, is built on speed. Last season, he was plagued by hamstring problems that brought a premature end to his fourth professional season. He was in his first season at Class AA, with the Reading, Pa., Phillies, Philadelphia having acquired him from Seattle in the deal that had left-hander Cliff Lee, the former Cy Young winner, go to the Mariners.
So guess what Gillies chatted about with Jeter?
“He talked to me about how to stay healthy,” Gillies said. “I asked him some things about his legs and hamstrings. He gave me some advice on some things to do to be able to stay healthy and keep your body in shape to play every day.”
Gillies has worked hard to get his legs healthy again.
“The legs feel good right now,” he said. “They’ve been good. I continue to do therapy every day to make them stronger.
At the end of the day, though, this wasn’t about getting ready for another season or thinking about training camp. It was about one professional baseball player trying to soak up everything he could from one of the best to ever have played the game.
As Gillies said: “It was definitely not something you get to do every day . . . hang out with Derek Jeter all day.”

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
     
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
     
Taking Note on Twitter

A young man's thoughts turn to baseball . . .

Tyson Gillies of the Reading Phillies rounds
second base and heads for third.
(Photo by Ralph Trout/Reading Phillies)

There is nothing quite like the glint in a young man’s eyes as he contemplates baseball.
After all, baseball, of all the sports, is the one that most attacks the senses.
The start of a new baseball season is signalled by the warmth of a new spring, by the sight of fathers playing catch with their sons, by new grass turning from yellow to green, and by the smell of that first cut.
Not to mention the crack — OK, the ping — of bat on ball, and the smell of oil on leather.
As Jim Bouton wrote to conclude his legendary book Ball Four: “You spend a good piece of your life gripping a baseball and in the end it turns out that it was the other way around all the time.”
No other sport has that kind of hold on a person.
And as I sit across from Tyson Gillies while we enjoy a late lunch at the Frick and Frack Tap House it is evident that baseball has him in its steely grip.
The excitement is palpable, in his eyes and his voice, as he contemplates returning to Florida in mid-January and resuming his pursuit of a job in the outfield of a Major League Baseball team.
Gillies, who turned 22 on Oct. 31, says he has learned that one of the important things for a minor league baseballer is to focus on getting to the major leagues. Period. Don’t get zoned in on one team — even the big league team that holds your rights — because the goal is to get to the major leagues. Period.
A year ago, Gillies was closer than he has ever been to getting there. He had been part of one of the biggest trades in recent MLB history as he and two other prospects were dealt by the Seattle Mariners to the Philadelphia Phillies for left-hander Cliff Lee, a Cy Young winner.
Gillies, who is from Kamloops, was coming off a terrific season with the Mariners’ top Class A team.
(He hasn’t forgotten his Kamloops roots, either. He mentions Ray Chadwick and Sean Wandler and he talks of perhaps one day going into business here. The city, he says, is badly in need of some batting cages. So maybe some day . . .)
The Phillies couldn’t get him into Class AA quickly enough, assigning him to the Reading Phillies, the Eastern League affiliate that is located about 40 minutes from Philly.
But soon after landing in Reading, everything — yes, everything — went south.
A slow starter throughout his career, Gillies was just warming up — he was, as they say, finally seeing the ball and hitting the ball — when he blew a hamstring. An outfielder with blazing speed, it was one of the worst injuries he could have experienced.
To make matters worse, Gillies tried to return to action before he should have, and, of course, he reinjured the hamstring, which only lengthened his stay on the disabled list.
“I was hitting the ball so well when I got hurt, though,” he says, seemingly feeling a need to explain why he rushed back even though something told him he wasn’t yet ready.
He says, however, that he has learned.
Oh, has he!
He talks of having learned the value of patience, something that often is in short supply when one is young and full of pith and vinegar.
Most of all, he says, he has learned not to put himself in situations that might lead from one thing to another, like winding up in the back of a cop car after a night of revelry in Clearwater, Fla., the home of the Phillies’ minor league complex. It was in late August. He hadn’t played in two months and was in Clearwater rehabbing his injury. He had been in a bar and was waving his shirt around outside in the hopes of landing a ride back to his hotel. He got a ride, but it was to the Crowbar Hotel, not La Quinta Inn.
Police later claimed that Gillies was sharing the back of that cruiser with a baggie containing cocaine and charged him with possession. The Florida State attorney’s office in Pinellas County dropped the charge in October.
Kevin Hayslett, Gillies’ lawyer, told The Daily News at the time that “a drug screen that was done within hours of the incident showed that (Gillies) clearly had no drugs at all in his system.
“All the screens and all the evidence they had showed that he did not possess or consume or ingest any narcotics. Upon their investigation, after they had the benefit of the evidence that I was in possession of, they determined to drop all charges and basically vindicate Tyson.”
Still, the damage was done and Gillies knows it. If he has doubts, all he has to do is Google his name.
Gillies, who is legally deaf and wears hearing aids, has done a lot of work with young, hearing-impaired people. He knows the damage he did to his reputation. As he says, “It’s part of me now . . . it always will be.”
But nothing compares to the pain he knows he caused his mother. He heard the anguish in her voice and saw the hurt in her face. He says those memories, as much as anything else, will serve to guide him in the future.
Gillies and other professional and college players who winter in the Vancouver area have been working there while coaching some youngsters. Gillies came home to visit family and was to return to the Lower Mainland late last week. He will spend some more time working out and coaching, and then it will be time to head south.
Gillies is in constant touch with players like Dominic Brown, an outfielder who got a taste with the Phillies last season and now is on their depth chart in right field. Those conversations fuel Gillies’ excitement.
The hamstring, he says, has healed  and he is anxious to get to Florida and get back to work.
As he gets up to leave, he moves with the litheness of an athlete whose muscles are just waiting to propel him forward in a burst of speed. There is nothing herky-jerky about Tyson Gillies. He doesn’t get up and out of the booth. No. He unfolds.
Nor does he climb into his car. Rather, he slides into it, all smoothness and grace. He drives east on Victoria Street but, really, he is headed to Florida. You wonder as he drives away . . . is that John Fogerty?
“Put me in, coach — I’m ready to play today;
“Look at me, I can be centerfield.”

gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca
gdrinnan.blogspot.com
Taking Note on Twitter

Gillies free of drug charge

By MARK HUNTER
Daily News Sports Reporter
Tyson Gillies can finally get back to baseball.
Gillies, a 21-year-old outfielder in the Philadelphia Phillies' system, learned Friday that the Florida State attorney's office in Pinellas County has dropped a cocaine possession charge against him. Gillies was arrested on June 11 in Clearwater, Fla., and charged on Aug. 20.
Kevin Hayslett, Gillies' lawyer, said Friday that the state looked at the evidence and decided not to proceed with the case against Gillies.
“I'm glad that this ordeal is over,” said Gillies, a Kamloops Minor Baseball product, from Clearwater. “But I'm still very upset that it happened to me and that my character, which I've worked so hard to build, can even be questioned.”
Gillies started the season in Reading, Pa., playing for the Phillies' double-A Eastern League affiliate. He injured his left hamstring in May, and was on a rehab assignment in Clearwater when the incident happened on June 11.
According to the Pinellas County Sheriff's Department, an officer found Gillies, who had been in a bar, trying to flag down a car by waving his shirt. The officer offered to give Gillies a ride back to his hotel, which Gillies accepted.
After dropping off Gillies at the hotel, the officer found a small bag of white powder on the floor near the backseat, which a test confirmed to be cocaine. Gillies was arrested and charged with one count of possession of cocaine on Aug. 20.
Hayslett entered a not guilty plea on Gillies' behalf in the Sixth Judicial Circuit Court of Florida in early September.
Hayslett said he also introduced to the state attorney's office evidence in the case, including “a drug screen that was done within hours of the incident that showed that (Gillies) clearly had no drugs at all in his system.”
“All the screens and all the evidence they had showed that he did not possess or consume or ingest any narcotics,” Hayslett told The Daily News. “Upon their investigation, after they had the benefit of the evidence that I was in possession of, they determined to drop all charges and basically vindicate Tyson.”
“I was drug tested five hours after the incident happened and it had obviously come back negative,” Gillies added. “I know who I am and what I'm about as a person and was stunned (with) the things I had to go through. (I want) to thank my family, friends  and the Phillies for their support and being behind me since Day 1. My attorney, Kevin Hayslett, did a fine job; he believed in me.”
Gillies is hoping to use the whole situation as a learning experience.
“If there's one big thing that I take from this, it's to be more aware of the situations I put myself in in the future,” he said.
With this behind him, Gillies is looking forward to preparing for spring training.
The 2010 season was a drag for Gillies, who was traded in the offseason from the Seattle Mariners to Philadelphia as part of a blockbuster that included star left-hander Cliff Lee.
After going to spring training with the Phillies, Gillies was assigned to Reading, where he appeared in 26 games. He ended with a .238 batting average, two home runs, six RBI and two stolen bases.
He injured the hamstring in May, and eventually had to go to Clearwater for rehab. The hamstring now is fine, according to Gillies, and surgery - which was a possibility during the summer - is not needed. 
“The hamstring and the leg feel really good,” said Gillies, who stands 6-foot-2 and weighs 213 pounds. “I'm doing pretty much everything right now besides playing in games. I'm good to go.”
Gillies is scheduled to head back to Canada next week, where he'll spend the winter working out in West Vancouver with running coach Brian Hoddle, who is based in the Pacific Northwest.
“I think it will be really good for preparation with my hamstrings, or anything,” he said. “With my legs, everything's so important. My legs are my life and that's the gift I've been given - it's a big part of my baseball.”

mhunter@kamloopsnews.ca

Keeping Score

While the 2010 MasterCard Memorial Cup was being played out in Brandon, with its population of around 45,000, no one was paying closer attention than the owners of the Kamloops Blazers. That’s because the ownership group, headed up by Tom Gaglardi, hopes to be in the running as potential hosts of the 2016 event. . . . Kamloops last played host to the tournament in 1995, when the Blazers won it all for the third time in four years. . . . It was shortly after that when the organization was taken in a different direction and, well, we all know how that went, don’t we? . . . If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it’s a duck. Right? So, yes, Gaglardi, the majority owner of the Blazers, is in the hunt to buy the NHL’s Dallas Stars. . . . Headline at SportsPickle.com: “Report: Pac-10 has 11, Big Ten 12, Big 12 10” . . .

Tommy Lasorda, the former Los Angeles Dodgers manager, is a spokesman for Strike Out Prostate Cancer. When asked why his role doesn’t include rectal exams, he replied: “I’ve got too many rings.” . . . Yes, that was Jamie-Lynn Sigler on the arm of New York Jets quarterback Mark Sanchez at the Tony Awards earlier in the week. Yes, she has grown up a lot since she played Tony Soprano’s daughter. . . . How bitter is the rivalry between the Boston Celtics and L.A. Lakers? “There was a time,” former Celtics forward Cedric (Cornbread) Maxwell told the L.A. Times, “if I saw a Laker on fire and I was holding a glass of water, I’d drink the water.” . . . The just-completed NBA final was about an ugly seven-game series as you will witness. . . . Gotta wonder how fans at Kamloops Blazers games are going to react the first time someone in the crowd starts blowing on a vuvuzela. . . .

Greg Cote, in the Miami Herald: “(Florida) Panthers games are set to return to WQAM. You thought the puck was hard to see in person? Try hockey on the radio!” . . . John Suomi, a catcher who played for the University College of the Cariboo Sun Demons, is one step closer to the major leagues. Suomi, who was a 22nd-round selection by the Oakland A’s in the 2000 amateur draft, now is with the Philadelphia Phillies and, earlier this week, they moved him up from Double-A Reading to Triple-A Lehigh Valley. . . . Meanwhile, outfielder Tyson Gillies returned from the disabled list in Reading this week and hopes his hamstring problems are behind him. . . . Mike Lupica, in the New York Daily News: “It now comes out that despite all the penalties from the NCAA, USC still gets to keep its 2004 national championship, and I’m sure you’re as relieved about that as I am. Pete Carroll, who escaped from L.A. one step ahead of the law, now wants us to believe he knew none of this was going on. So sometimes he was a legendary USC coach and sometimes he was Inspector Clouseau.” . . .

It was only an exhibition game, but the Saskatchewan Roughriders, who coughed up the 2009 Grey Cup game, had two touchdowns called back by penalties in that 19-17 loss to the B.C. Lions on Sunday in Regina. And you know what the critics were saying, don’t you? Such will be life with the green guys this season. . . . The Roughriders are going to pay tribute to their past (1912-47) by wearing red and black jerseys for a July 17 game. Can you say cash grab? . . . Yes, the jerseys — a limited number, of course — are available at $199.99 each. . . .

If you weren’t aware, you are now: Stan Bowman, the GM of the Chicago Blackhawks, was named after the Stanley Cup, which his club won last week for the first time in 49 years. While that was his first Stanley Cup victory, it was his father’s 12th. Scotty has nine titles as a head coach, one as a player personnel director (Pittsburgh Penguins), one as a special consultant (Detroit Red Wings) and this one as a senior adviser for hockey operations. . . . If you zip over to Grandstand Sports and Memorabilia Inc., at grandstandsports.com, you may purchase a Stephen Strasburg-autographed baseball for US$359. . . . At that price, you would think that the kid already is in baseball’s Hall of Fame. . . . If you haven’t been watching Treme, the latest treat from HBO, you’re cheating yourself. . . .

I don’t know how much Ray Chadwick is getting paid as the head coach of the TRU WolfPack baseball team, but John Anderson, who has coached the U of Minnesota Gophers baseball team for 29 years, just took a 1.15-percent pay cut on his US$139,000 salary. . . . Headline at SportsPickle.com: “Anderson Varejao reportedly not calling the shots in Cavaliers coaching search.” . . . You see that guy over there swatting at bugs? Actually, there aren’t any bugs. He’s been watching too much World Cup soccer. . . . Winger Mark Recchi, the pride of Kamloops, almost certainly will celebrate his 43rd birthday on Feb. 1 while playing one more NHL season. His agent, Ritch Winter, has had some talks with the Boston Bruins. . . .

Rick Reilly, at ESPN.com: “No wonder the English goalkeeper allowed that easy shot to give America a 1-1 tie in the Group C opener. You couldn’t stop a beach ball with those big goofy things. What, is Hamburger Helper a sponsor? Why must they be so huge? Doesn’t Roger Rabbit need them back? And where do the batteries go? How are goalkeepers expected to hang on to the ball with them on? And is it difficult to play goalie while also taking things out of the oven?” . . . ESPN’s Bill Simmons, live blogging during Game 7 of the NBA final: “Just talked to someone who paid 30K per ticket for courtsides. The NBA . . . it’s fantastic!”

Gregg Drinnan is sports editor of The Daily News. Email him at gdrinnan@kamloopsnews.ca, or visit his blog at gdrinnan.blogspot.com. Keeping Score appears Saturdays.