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SUBURBAN LEAGUE
EAST PALESTINE -- The Suburban League cross country season opens this afternoon at East Palestine City Park.
Fourteen high schools are scheduled to compete, including Beaver Local, Canfield, East Liverpool, East Liverpool Christian, Heartland Christian, Howland, Leetonia, Lisbon, Sebring, Southern, Springfield, United, Youngstown Ursuline and Youngstown Mooney.
Columbiana is at Poland, while Crestview and Western Reserve go to McDonald.
The varsity girls will start at 4:45 p.m., followed by the varsity boys at 5:20 p.m., middle school girls at 5:50 p.m. and middle school boys at 6:20 p.m.
DAVIS HITS ACE
COLUMBIANA -- Bob Davis of Lisbon hit a hole-in-one at Valley Golf Club on Sunday.
He used a 7-iron to ace the 145-yard second hole.
His playing partners were Ron Downerd of Lisbon and Jason Lindsay and Autumn Lindsay of New Waterford.
The foursome was playing in the annual New Waterford and Lisbon Eagles Challenge.
CHESTER IN TITLE GAME
BOARDMAN -- Top-seed Chester advanced to the Youngstown 50 plus baseball championship game with a 7-2 win over Springfield and then a 10-3 win third-seeded Youngstown during the weekend.
In the opener, Dave Smith went the distance on the mound scattering three hits to pick up the win.
Smith also had a double and single. Eric Sampson, Nate Six and Mike Homer each had two hits.
In the second game, Kevin Farrell picked up the win on the mound.
Doug Comm and Mike Homer each had three hits. Dave Smith, Rob Fester and Joe Krause had two hits apiece.
Youngstown and Poland will play at noon Saturday at Boardman’s Fields of Dreams. Chester will meet the winner at 2:30 p.m. for the championship.
SOUTHERN HOF
SALINEVILLE -- The Salineville-Southern Local Athletic Hall of Fame breakfast will be held at 10 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 12, in the high school cafeteria.
Tickets are $100 for adults and $50 for children ages 12 and under. Tickets may be purchased at the door.
New inductees include Christi Barlis Bates (Class of 1986), Tom Rodgers (1993), Mervin Williams (2014) and Hannah Brothers Sevek (2016).
FOR SALE
(AP) -- Chris Sale shut out the Dodgers and threw a 100 mph fastball in the process.
You could call it turning back the clock, but that would imply the Atlanta left-hander’s best days are behind him. And that’s hardly the case.
Sale struck out 11 in a five-hitter Thursday night, lowering his ERA to 2.06. Only Jacob Misiorowski’s (1.73) is better, and Sale may be the only one capable of pushing the Milwaukee ace in the Cy Young race. At the very least, Sale has a good chance to post his eighth top-five finish in a Cy Young vote. He won in 2024, his first season with the Braves.
Thursday’s 1-0 win over Los Angeles was Sale’s first complete game since 2019 and included his first time reaching 100 mph on a pitch since 2018. He was with Boston then, wrapping up a stretch of seven straight years (2012-18) finishing in the top six in the Cy Young vote. But a poor 2019 was followed by Tommy John surgery, and Sale’s future looked uncertain.
Since the Red Sox traded him to Atlanta for Vaughn Grissom, however, Sale has been an elite pitcher again. He finally won that elusive Cy Young in 2024, going 18-3 with a 2.38 ERA. He was 7-5 with a 2.58 ERA in 21 games last season, and this year he’s on pace to post an ERA under 2.20 for the third time as a starter. He also did that in 2014 with the Chicago White Sox and 2018 with Boston.
The 37-year-old Sale doesn’t have as much Cy Young hardware as Justin Verlander or Max Scherzer, but if he can pitch into his 40s like they have, his Hall of Fame case could look pretty solid. His career wins above replacement total -- per Baseball Reference -- is roughly the same as CC Sabathia’s. And Sabathia was voted in on the first ballot.