Month: July 2019

T-Bones beat Canaries, 4-0

The T-Bones (31-30) pitching staff was on fire Thursday night as Kansas City took the second game of the three-game series with the Sioux Falls Canaries (29-34), thanks to a combined 17 strikeouts, a season high for the T-Bones.

Jose Mesa Jr. started off strong, striking out the first Canaries batter, Brett Vertigan, looking to avoid another T-Bones first inning fiasco. Danger brewed as two runners got on board, but Mesa managed to dodge any damage.

In the top of the second inning, Casey Gillaspie hit a solo shot to left off Alex Boshers, his eighth home run on the year, giving the T-Bones an early lead, 1-0.

The middle innings were nothing short of a fireworks show of strikeouts by Jose Mesa Jr, who continued to throw strike after strike after strike, 13 total, keeping the birds off of the scoreboard.

In the seventh inning, Gillaspie got a double, followed by a stolen base that brought him to 3rd. Correa’s deep drive sacrifice fly brought Gillaspie home, buying the insurance and making it 2-0, KC.

Brian Ellington took over for Mesa Jr after six innings and kept the T-Bones’ advantage, throwing strikeouts as well.

On the night, the T-Bones left four men on base, struggling once again to bring players home, making the pitching the driving force of the game.

In the 9th, again it was Casey Gillaspie who hit a 2-run home run, driving in Nava who reached first on a walk by Boshers, making the score 4-0, KC. Gillaspie becomes the first T-Bone to have a multi-homerun ballgame this season.

Carlos Diaz came in to shut the cage door on the Canaries, but it looked dicey for the T-Bones as he walked two runners and allowed two hits. With Canaries on every bag, Diaz calmed the rocky start and ended the game, 4-0, getting win 998 for Joe Calfapietra, Mesa Jr. (1-0) got the win for the T-Bones, and Alex Boshers of Sioux Falls dropped to 4-3.

KC will return for the rubber match game of the series at 7:05 p.m. Friday, July 26. Right-handed pitcher Tommy Collier (6-4, 3.97) will start for the T-Bones, and right-handed pitcher Ryan Froom (0-2, 6.23) will get the nod for the Canaries. The game will be on the T-Bones Broadcast Network at http://mixlr.com/t-bones-baseball/.

The T-Bones will head to CHS Field in St. Paul, Minnesota, on June 27 for a three-game series against the Saints but will return home on June 30 to face the Sioux Falls Canaries in a three-game series at JustBats Field at T-Bones Stadium.

Tickets to all T-Bones home games can be purchased online, by calling 913-328-5618 or by visiting the Saint Luke’s Box Office between the hours of 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. Monday through Friday. Group ticket sales are also on sale.

  • Story from T-Bones

Sporting KC visits New York tonight

Sporting Kansas City (6-8-7, 25 points) will visit iconic Yankee Stadium on Friday night for an interconference showdown with New York City FC (8-3-8, 32 points) in the Bronx, New York.

Kickoff is set for 6:30 p.m. with three hours of live coverage on FOX Sports Kansas City Plus, FOX Sports Midwest Plus and FOX Sports GO . Sports Radio 810 WHB and ESPN Deportes KC 1480 AM will also carry local radio broadcasts, with The Final Whistle postgame show running immediately afterward on 810 WHB.

Less than a week removed from a 2-0 home loss to FC Dallas, Sporting will look to bounce back at the expense of a New York City side that has just three league defeats this season-tied for the fewest in MLS and three fewer than any other team in the Eastern Conference. However, four of Sporting’s six victories and 16 of the team’s 25 points this year have come against opposition from the East.
Manager Peter Vermes’ men saw their two-game winning streak snapped last Saturday at Children’s Mercy Park, but the game wasn’t entirely void of positives for the hosts. Integral midfielder Roger Espinoza made his highly anticipated return from a knee injury as a second-half substitute, earning his first minutes since mid-April. Sporting now sits in 10th place in the West, five points shy of the seventh and final playoff position.

With Espinoza in contention for a start on the narrow Yankee Stadium pitch, Sporting’s midfield will be further bolstered by the return of Ilie Sanchez. The Spaniard’s remarkable run of 80 straight competitive appearances for Sporting ended against Dallas, as he was forced to serve a one-game suspension for caution accumulation.

Ilie, Espinoza and Sporting’s backline face the formidable task of containing an NYCFC outfit that has enjoyed plenty of success at home in recent years. The club boasts a 26-4-13 regular season home record since the start of 2017, and their four home losses during that time are the fewest in MLS (excluding 2018 expansion club LAFC).

Guided by second-year head coach Domenec Torrent, who was previously an assistant coach under heralded manager Pep Guardiola at FC Bayern and Manchester City, NYCFC occupy fifth place in the East but own the division’s second-best points per game clip. The club has at least three games in hand on each of its conference rivals and wields arguably the most balanced attack in MLS.

NYCFC’s Brazilian newcomer Heber has a team-best eight goals, while diminutive playmaker Maxi Moralez leads MLS with 13 assists to go with six goals of his own. Forward Valentin Castellanos (five goals), Alexandru Mitrita (five goals) and Ismael Tajouri-Shradi have also shown scoring pedigree over the course of 2019.

Sporting have also spread the scoring wealth this season, as they remain the only MLS team to have three players with at least seven MLS goals. Topping the charts is midfielder Felipe Gutierrez, whose eight goals are one more than his total from a year ago. Krisztian Nemeth and Johnny Russell have seven each, although neither player has found the back of the net since May.

Much like Sporting, NYCFC is expecting to receive a midfield reinforcement. Finnish international Alexander Ring missed his first game of the season last Saturday-a 2-1 road win over the Colorado Rapids-but figures to make his way back into Torrent’s lineup this time around.

Even without Ring, NYCFC managed to overturn a 1-0 deficit and find goals in either half from Heber and Mitrita at Dick’s Sporting Goods Park. The visitors played with a man advantage for the final 57 minutes after 16-year-old Sebastian Anderson-who scored his first MLS goal in the sixth minute-received a straight red card for serious foul play.

Sporting and NYCFC have met on four previous occasions and own two wins apiece. Vermes’ side won the first two meetings, prevailing 1-0 at Yankee Stadium in March 2015 before claiming a 3-1 triumph at Children’s Mercy Park in July 2016. NYCFC have won each of the last two, posting a 1-0 home result in September 2017 and emerging from Kansas City 2-0 victors on the opening weekend of 2018 behind goals from Moralez and Jesus Medina.

  • Story from Sporting KC

Early voting begins Saturday for primary election

by Mary Rupert

Early voting begins Saturday, July 27, at three locations in Wyandotte County for the primary election, according to Election Commissioner Bruce Newby.

Election Day will be Aug. 6 for the primary, and the polls that day will be open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

Early voting will take place at three locations before the election, including the Wyandotte County Election Office, 850 State Ave.; Joe Amayo-Argentine Community Center, 2810 Metropolitan Ave.; and Eisenhower Recreation Center, 2901 N. 72nd St.

The hours and days for the early voting locations:

The Wyandotte County Election Office, 850 State Ave.
 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, July 27;
8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday, July 29, through Friday, Aug. 2;
10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 3;
8 a.m. to noon Monday, Aug. 5.

Joe Amayo-Argentine Recreation Center, 2810 Metropolitan Ave.
 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, July 27;
10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 3.

Eisenhower Recreation Center, 2901 N. 72nd St.
 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, July 27;
10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 3.

Voting by mail also is available for Wyandotte County residents. So far, the election office has sent out 3,446 mail ballots, and 1,242 have been returned, he said. Mail ballots started going out July 17 to voters who requested them.

Residents have until July 30 to request a mail ballot from the election office, he said.

While mail ballots so far have a good return, about 33 percent, on Election Day Newby said he thinks it will be good to get a 15 percent turnout of registered voters.

Part of the reason is there are not a lot of contested races on the primary ballot this year.

Newby said the primary election has only six contests this year, three for Unified Government Commission and three for the Board of Public Utilities. They include:

• The UG Commission at large, District 1, where the candidates are incumbent Melissa Brune Bynum, Mark Gilstrap and Steven James;

• UG Commission, District 3, where the candidates are incumbent Ann Murguia, Mary V. Gerlt and Christian A. Ramirez;

• UG Commission District 4, where the candidates are incumbent Harold Johnson, Jorge Luis Flores and Tarence L.Maddox;

• The Board of Public Utilities at large, position 3, where the candidates are incumbent Norman D. Scott, Chiquita C. Coggs, David Haley, Rose Mulvany Henry, Melissa Oropeza-Vail, and Faith L. Rivera;

• The BPU, District 1, where the candidates are incumbent Robert “Bob” Milan, Ken Snyder and LaRon Thompson;

• The BPU, District 3, where the candidates are incumbent Jeff Bryant, Aaron Coleman, Dustin K. Dye and Stan S. Frownfelter.

Not all six contests will be on everyone’s ballot. On the ballot where he lives, there will only be two contests, one from the UG Commission and one from the BPU, he added.

In Bonner Springs and Edwardsville, there are no contests on the ballot, he added.

With voters anticipating the small number of contests on their ballots, it becomes difficult to motivate them to get out to vote, he said.

“The people who have to motivate them are the candidates themselves,” he said.

“In a primary with low turnout, it’s anybody’s game,” he said. “The candidates need to be turning their people out.”

While he would love to have a 30 percent voter turnout, they almost never have that level in a primary election, he added.

Voters who go to the advance voting sites at Eisenhower and the Amayo-Argentine centers will be voting on touch screens, he said.

Voters who go to the polls on Election Day, Aug. 6, should go to their assigned polling place, Newby said. Each voter’s household has been sent a postcard in the mail telling the location of their polling place and the details of early voting.

While it is true that a law has passed the Legislature allowing voters to vote at any polling place in their county, that law is not in effect yet here and it is at the county election officer’s discretion, he said.

The secretary of state will be writing rules and regulations for the new law, and before any county can change and offer voting at different places on Election Day, they will have to wait until the regulations are issued, he said. The rules are expected to be published by the secretary of state next year, he said.

In 2020 it still will be at the discretion of each county election officer, he said.

Currently, Newby said he couldn’t offer Election Day voting at places other than the voter’s polling place, except at the main Election Office, because he can’t offer 115 paper ballot styles at each polling place. Voters would have to use touch screens, and there are not enough touch screens currently for the entire county, he said, without long lines for voters waiting in some places to use the machines.

Potentially, voters could go to the polls with “any place” voting and see 500 people lined up to use two touch screens, he said. Lawmakers also decided each voter can spend 10 minutes at each voting booth, so the capacity of one voting machine potentially could be low if voters take all of the allotted time. They may take more time at the general election this year, he added, as there will be a long constitutional amendment on the ballot in November to change the way nonresident military and nonresident students are counted, and some voters will take some time reading through the amendment.

Newby said he felt that if he doesn’t have new equipment, including more touch screen voting machines, he can’t do the “any place” voting. New equipment expenditures would have to be approved by the UG.

Candidates have appeared at several forums held throughout Wyandotte County prior to the primary election. To see one of the forums that was sponsored by Kansas City Kansas Community College and Business West, visit the KCKCC cable television channel, or go to https://www.youtube.com/user/KCECable.

Election stories from the Wyandotte Daily are found under the tab https://wyandotteonline.com/category/election-2019/.

Those who have questions may find more voting information available at the Election Commission’s website at www.wycovotes.org, at www.wycokck.org/election, by email at [email protected] and from the office at 913-573-8500.