Ball Girl #052: Why does Igor Shesterkin look like a skinny Hopper from Stranger Things

Talk about a plot twist

Can I have your number?

• 4: Number of NBA players to average at least 30.0 points, 5.0 rebounds and 5.0 assists in multiple NBA Finals. Following the NBA Championship this past Thursday, Stephen Curry joined Michael Jordan, LeBron James and Jerry West.

TL;DRs

⛳️ Matt Fitzpatrick won the 2022 U.S. Open (and $3.15 million) on Sunday.

🏀 Kyrie Irving has until June 29th to accept a ~$40M player option with the Brooklyn Nets, but if he doesn’t, he’ll be a free agent.

🏁 Max Verstappen (Red Bull) won the Canadian Grand Prix but teammate Sergio Perez DNF. Charles Leclerc (Ferrari) won driver of the day for gaining 14 positions.

🏒 Tampa Bay Lightning won game 3 against the Colorado Avalanche in the Stanley Cup final series to make the count 2-1.

⚾ The New York Yankees became the 1st MLB team to reach 50 wins this season, with their 4-2 W over the Tampa Bay Rays on Monday.

🏈 Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ Rob Gronkowski announced that he is retiring from the NFL.

NHL

Tampa Bolts into Action

• The Avalanche dominated games 1 & 2 of the series, and 5 minutes into game 3 on Monday night, Tampa was in danger again. The Avs scored first, and early, and were beating Tampa to every puck. Then something clicked for the Lightning… maybe it was Anthony Cirelli’s weird breakthrough goal, maybe it was the energy from Tampa’s fans… whatever it was, it turned on the Bolt engines. Tampa burst out, scoring 6 goals to Avalanche 2, and Vasy had one of the best games of his life. We have a series on our hands now.

Most likely to succeed

NHL awards happened last night, which is essentially senior superlatives for a bunch of French Canadiens.

• Auston Matthews (Maple Leafs) won the season. He took home the Hart Memorial trophy (league MVP) and Ted Lindsay trophy (most outstanding player).

• Cale Makar (Avalanche) won the Norris trophy for best defenseman.

• Igor Shesterkin won best hair the Vezina trophy for best goaltender.

• Moritz Seider (Detroit Red Wings) won the Calder trophy for rookie of the year.

MLB

Story Time in Fenway

• After a rough start to the season, the Boston Red Sox have really turned things around. The Sox are 28-12 in the past 40 games.

• In last night’s 5-4 win vs. the Detroit Tigers, Boston’s Trevor Story hit a 3-run bomb in the 4th, to give Boston the lead. To top it off, Story made one hell of a play at 2nd base, jumping up to catch a line drive headed to center field in the 7th inning.

• Ranked 3rd in the American League East, the Sox are creeping up on the Toronto Blue Jays for the #2 spot in their division.

The 2022 MLB All-Star ballot is out

• Every year, the MLB has an All-Star game the where the National League (NL) and the American League (AL) go head-to-head.

• The NL and AL All-Star teams are made up of the player at each position with the most votes from the MLB All-Star Ballot.

• ICYMI, the 2022 MLB All-Star ballot is OUT… so go pick your faves! There are two rounds of voting. Round 1 ends on June 30th and round 2 begins on July 5th. Here’s how voting looks so far:

Nifty 50 😎

• The New York Yankees have been absolutely RAKING this season. With their 4-2 win over the Tampa Bay Rays on Monday, the Yanks became the first 2022 MLB team to reach 50 wins.

• Yankees’ Gerrit Cole had an unreal outing on Monday, pitching a no-hitter through 7 innings.

Golf

Fitzpatrick takes the US Open dub

• This one came down to the wire…probably because the players were competing for a sliver of the largest purse in major championship history ($17.5 million), after the Tour decided to up the ante by $5 million year-over-year. Seems like a pissing contest against LIV if you ask me… Matt Fitzpatrick took home the 1st place prize of $3.15 million, after beating out Will Zalatoris and Scottie Scheffler ($1.56 million each). Fitzpatrick finished at 6-under, while Zalatoris and Scheffler finished at 5-under.

• Up next? The Travelers Championship at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, CT. $8.3 million purse.

F1

Canadian Grand Prix was like my high school reunion- some people glowed up, some glowed down, but all in all…everyone’s personality was the exact same.

• The Prom Queen: Charles Leclerc: Ferrari’s pretty boy started in P19 on Sunday as a penalty for having a new engine but finished his race at P5. He gained 14 positions, and this social climber was celebrated with the driver of the day award

• The Drama Queen: Sergio Perez: mercury seems to be in retrograde for this red bull driver lately; during qualifiers, he crashed and so had to begin the race at P13. Then in during the race, he had a mechanical issue, has to pull over, and walk through the adjacent WOODS in the rain back to the Red Bull Pit like gdamn little red riding hood. F1 drivers do not belong in the forest.

• And why no one has actually changed: Max Verstappen still finished first, George Russel still finished in the top 5, and Ferrari still made conservative (and detrimental) strategy calls that cost them points.

Must Watches This Week

Wednesday, June 23rd:

• 8:00pm ET, Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Colorado Avalanche, NHL: The series lies 2-1 with the defending champs down. Need we say more?

Time Out for the Tea

Draymond F-BOMB Green

• Now that Draymond Green has won an NBA Championship, he appears to think he’s above all. At the Golden State Warriors Championship parade, Green dropped the f-bomb multiple times.

• Brittney Griner’s detention in Russia extended…again. here