David Price, one of the best left-handed pitchers in the League, recently signed a $217 million deal with the Boston Red Sox.
The former Blue Jays pitcher received the highest signing deal for a pitcher, and the seventh highest in baseball history. The deal with the Red Sox calls for 7 years, no deferred money and a three-year opt-out. Price had one of his best season in 2015, going 18-5, 225 strikeouts over 220+ innings.
Last Saturday, the Slippery Rock Football team won against Assumption College. That win takes them to this Saturday's game against Shepherd in West Virginia. This is the first time since 1998 that Slippery Rock will be playing in the NCAA quarterfinals. 1998 was the only time that Slippery Rock made it to the national semifinals. This will be the fifth time that the two teams meet. The Rock have a 3-1 advantage in the all-time series. Shepherd will have the home field advantage this Saturday. The winner of this game will play in the national semifinals on December 12. Let's Go Rock!
In 2007, my family started a tradition that has lasted ever since. Every Thanksgiving my entire family, 30+ people, come to my house for Thanksgiving dinner and its related festivities. At about 2 or 3'clock we play our annual Turkey Bowl Football Game. The tradition, spearheaded by my dad, has a complete set of rules and regulations. An MVP trophy is awarded at Christmas and the recipient may keep it until the following Thanksgiving at which time it must be returned. Each MVP recipient gets their name engraved on the trophy. The football game itself ranges in player's ages from 6 to 85 years old. The game is two hand touch, for obvious reasons. Rules are usually made up as the game goes seeing as the officials are on the field playing in the game as well. The second year of its installment, I won the MVP award, the first girl in our family to do so. It is always a crazy but fun time spent with family.
For my Intro to Sport Management class, we were required to interview a professional in our career interest area. After looking around, I finally settled on interviewing John Monsted, the Chief Financial Officer of the YMCA in the Harrisburg Area. I interviewed John last Wednesday and we had a great conversation. It was a great experience and I gained some very insightful knowledge. I learned that there are major differences in how nonprofit and for-profit organizations operate. Nonprofit organizations do not have the budget to pay more employees than they need. Because of this, they lack a Human Resources Department. As CFO, John also handles and heads all Human Resource responsibilities. After talking with John for almost an hour and a half, I walked out of there with a practicum for this upcoming winter. It was a great experience and it was a pleasure to talk to such a humble individual. Needless to say, I am very anxious to begin my practicum in December.
Last Wednesday, I settled the dates and responsibilities that I will be doing for my winter practicum. This will be my first practicum. I am doing it with the YMCA in Harrisburg, PA. I will be supervised by the CFO of the Harrisburg Area YMCA, John Monsted. Some of my responsibilities will include:
participating in and/or observing regular financial and non-financial operations
For financial operations:
Accounts Payable
Payroll
Human Resources
General ledger reconciliation
end-of-year reconciliation and closing
various internal audits
working with external auditors
W-2 preparation
United Way applications
For non-financial operations:
membership operations
Development Department initiatives
Marketing Department initiatives
sports-related operations that occur throughout the Association while I am completing my practicum.
I am looking forward to starting this new and exciting experience on December 14th.
On November 24, Yogi Berra and Willie Mays were both awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Over the summer, in my Sports in the 21st Century class, I wrote a blog post about Yogi Berra and his legacy that he left not only on baseball, but those around him. In the post I also stated how at that time, there was a petition to award Yogi Berra with this Medal of Freedom. It was fulfilling and great to see all the people who recognized his legacy and sign the petition. Yogi not only played as catcher for the New York Yankees for 14 seasons, but he also served in World War II in the Normandy Invasion. He was just shy of personally receiving the award; Berra passed away in September of this year. He is a well deserving individual and is certainly continuing with his witty "Yogisms" up in heaven.
Yogi's son Larry Berra receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom
Despite the Kansas City Royals winning the World Series this year, the New York Yankees lead the charts in the most Twitter followers and the most Facebook fans. The Boston Red Sox follow the Yankees on the leader board. The Royals don't come in until 12th and the New York Mets at 14th. Even though the Yankees are at the top, the NBA team, the Los Angeles Lakers, have more followers on Twitter than the Yankees and Red Sox combined. This just goes to show that MLB has a lot to do to capture the attention of the social media world.
In Back to the Future 2, one of the many predictions about the future is that in 2015, the Chicago Cubs will win the World Series. Last night, this hoping prediction was put to rest as the New York Mets swept the Chicago Cubs in Game 4 in an 8 to 3 win. This also all ironically happened on Back to the Future Day, the day that Marty McFly and Doc Brown travel to the future and the day that they predicted the Cubs to win the World Series. Hopefully next season the Cubs will end their then 108 year drought and win all the marbles.
This past weekend, I visited my brother at the All American Quarter Horse Congress in Columbus, Ohio. Many people often forget that riding and showing horses is in fact a sport. It is actually an industry that generates millions of dollars. Many trainers have horses that are worth hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars; not to mention the amount of money it takes to take care of these large majestic animals as well as the transportation of not only the owners but the animals as well. Many of these people easily spend at least $200,000 on a truck and trailer alone to transport their prized investments. In the horse industry, in showing alone, $10.8 billion is directly contributed to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the U.S. It is definitely an entire different world from your common basketball, football, and baseball arenas, but it is well worth the experience to see just how amazing the industry really is.
This past Sunday, my intramural Softball team lost in the semifinals of the playoffs. In the quarterfinals, we annihilated our opponent in a 18-8 defeat; the run limit was reached to end the game after 5 innings. Our second game was not as easy. We were in the lead the entire game until the final inning when our opponents scored two runs to gain the lead 6-5. We had great hitters on our team and our defense was decent but was not enough to stop our opponents. We settled for fourth in the final scheme of things. In the end we all had a lot of fun, which is the main reason I played on the team. All I can do now is wait until the spring for intramural basketball.
The Chicago Cubs haven't won a world series title in over 100 years, the last being in 1908. Last night in Game 3 of the NL Division series against the St. Louis Cardinals, the Cubs made post season history. They hit six home runs which became the new record for the most home runs hit in a single postseason game. The last time the Cubs had made it to the playoffs was in 2008. Hopefully they will keep their momentum going and make it to the NL Championship Series for the first time since 2003 and then go on to win the World Series for the first time in over 100 years.
From my last blog post, you all know that I went to my very first Yankees game last Thursday. I can honestly say that I thought I was living in a dream. I had to tell myself that it was actually happening; I was at a New York Yankees game. Beside the nostalgic feeling of being in Yankee Stadium, the game was definitely one that will go in the history books, not only mine but Major League Baseball's as well. The Yankees clinched their 10,000 win. 10,000 WINS! The same game, they also reserved a spot in the playoffs in the wildcard game that they then lost on Tuesday to the Houston Astros. Our seats were in right center field and we had the pleasure of being seen on TV when not one, but two home runs were hit by the Yankees in our direction. Even though it was rainy and cold, it was well worth the 9+ hour drive. There was no greater feeling than that of hearing Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" play as the team rushed the field to celebrate.
Today one of my lifelong dreams is coming true. I am going to my very first Yankees game. Not just any Yankees game; however, a Yankees game against the Boston Red Sox. The sports rivalry that leads in sports rivalries. This rivalry is the oldest and biggest rivalry in sports history.
I have been a Yankees fan since the day I was born and 20 years later, I am making it to my very first game. It is the Yankees last regular season home game of the year and hopefully in this last game of the series against the Red Sox, they will win to make the series 1-3. It will definitely be an interesting game with the oncoming hurricane.
The first pitch with be thrown out at 7:05 in the Bronx and I will be there, after a 6+ hour drive there; which is well worth the drive. It is safe to say that today will probably be the best day in my life thus far!
On Saturday, September 19, I had the opportunity to volunteer at SRU's football game against Millersville. As is common in Slippery Rock and coming up nothing short of the town's name, it decided to storm. We first stood in the cold rain with the wind blowing and right before kickoff lightning struck and a lightening delay was called. The student volunteers as well as many of the band members squished into a small garage underneath the stadium.
Finally, at 7 o'clock, the rain subsided and the game was underway. I had the opportunity to usher fans to their seats in the reserved section of the stadium seating; however after the lightning delay, the game was free and people could sit where they wanted. Rock Football crushed Millersville in a 75-0 defeat. It was definitely a memorable experience and I will most likely volunteer to work another game in the near future.
My name is Marissa Zimmerman and I am a junior finance major at Slippery Rock University. I am from Newport, PA which sits 30 minutes north of Harrisburg. In conjunction with my major, I have two minors; sport management and Spanish. I plan to graduate in May 2017 with a BSBA in Finance. I may also like to obtain my Masters in finance to increase my knowledge and make myself more marketable to employers. My goal is to eventually work in the finance department for the New York Yankees. My family has always been passionate fans of the Yankees ever since the team was first established.
To reach my goal I need to gain ample experience working in finance. I will do this through internships and various job opportunities. I chose a sport management minor to make myself more marketable in the sport industry. With both a finance degree and experience and knowledge of the sports industry, I will hopefully be a better candidate than someone with just a finance degree.
This past weekend, I visited my brother at the All American Quarter Horse Congress in Columbus, Ohio. Many people often forget that riding and showing horses is in fact a sport. It is actually an industry that generates millions of dollars. Many trainers have horses that are worth hundreds of thousands and even millions of dollars; not to mention the amount of money it takes to take care of these large majestic animals as well as the transportation of not only the owners but the animals as well. Many of these people easily spend at least $200,000 on a truck and trailer alone to transport their prized investments. In the horse industry, in showing alone, $10.8 billion is directly contributed to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the U.S. It is definitely an entire different world from your common basketball, football, and baseball arenas, but it is well worth the experience to see just how amazing the industry really is.
