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1) We moved our family to Columbia, MO on my youngest son's first birthday. He graduated from high school this weekend.
I know you come to this space to find out what's happening in Mizzou sports and get my take on it. I appreciate that. But I'm going to ask you to indulge me starting out somewhere different this Monday. Or skip to thought number three. Whatever. Your call.
Anyway, my son graduated from Rock Bridge on Friday night. They managed to have an in-person ceremony. They split the class in two and each half could last no more than 75 minutes due to Mizzou Arena protocols (maybe COVID finally gave us something good?), but they had it. We had a family gathering on Friday night and then a party on Saturday for his friends and ours. I was talking with a friend, it's funny how we mark an occasion that has always been known to be happening. For the vast majority of us, graduating from high school isn't a surprise. It is expected. It's not that big of a deal. But it is. It's a chance to look back at how far we've come.
We moved here on hope when Turner was a year old. I'd been fired from my job in TV and after a few months had gotten an offer to work for Jon Kirby at PowerMizzou.com. I'd never heard of the site, or Rivals in general. I knew nothing about football recruiting (like, I literally didn't know it was a thing people cared about) and only a little bit more about the Internet and message boards. But it was a job and I needed one. So we packed up and drove a UHaul 850 miles from Rapid City, South Dakota to CoMo with a stop off to have birthday cake with my parents in Kansas City.
That was almost 18 years ago now. We've bought a house and graduated a kid from college and will send another one off in September. The players on the first Mizzou team I covered are turning 40, the first class of recruits I wrote about are now in their mid-30s, I've lost a little weight and a lot of hair and this random little website has turned into a small business and an actual career. But more than that, it's turned into a second family.
A lot of you have met my wife and kids. Most who haven't have read about them and some of their accomplishments over the last 18 years. Twitter and Facebook and Instagram didn't exist when I started working here. Message boards and social media have now become not only vital tools for doing this job, but they've also become the way we all connect with each other. You're here because you want to know everything there is to know about Mizzou sports, but over the years, that's really turned into just a part of it. This site has become a place where we share our triumphs with people we've mostly never met. It's become a place we come to share our struggles and to ask for a kind thought to be sent our way when our families are hurting. It's the way we connect to a group of people whose only real commonality is that we all cheer for the same laundry on fall Saturdays and winter Tuesdays and Wednesdays. We gather to congratulate each other on achievements, to ask for answers when we have questions. We've grieved the loss of some of our own together.
When I started writing this particular section of this weekly feature, I didn't really have any idea where I was going with it. I just started typing. I guess where I've ended up is here: Thank you.
Thank you for giving me a place to work and for investing your time and your money and your energy in it. Thank you for reading, whether it was about one of the greatest games in Mizzou history or one of the worst. But more than that, thanks for reading and indulging me when it wasn't about Mizzou sports. Thank you for giving me an avenue not only to provide for my family, but for me to share part of a small part of it with you. From time to time I may get told to stick to sports (some of you are probably even thinking it now), but this site truly has become a community where people with a common interest start to care about everyone else, even if we've never met. I think it's good for all of us to remember that from time to time.
2) So, anyway, my youngest will move into a dorm at the University of Chicago exactly four months after he graduated from high school. We'll have no more kids in the house (well, if we do, I'm going to have a chat with a doctor about how something must have gone wrong). I'm not sure what that's going to be like. The last time I wasn't responsible for a child every day, I was 22 years old.
But then, I'll still be responsible for two children. They just won't live with me anymore. On Friday night, my sister sent me a text "Congratulations on being done with the hard part." In a way, that's obviously true. But as my mother-in-law said this weekend "You're never done."
You spend 19 years doing everything you can to make sure your kids have the best (and usually easiest and most care-free) life they can possibly have. You try to teach them some lessons and instill some principles in them. You try to shield them from all the bad stuff. Virtually everything you do for those 19 years is in some way centered around the question: How is this going to impact my kids? And then you hit the day where you send them off on their own. They're never really on their own--even less so now with cell phones and constant communication just a click away--but they are much more so than they've ever been before. It seems like that should be easier. In some ways it is. In other ways, it's even harder.
I have no doubts my son is ready to leave the nest. He's been taller than me for four or five years, smarter than me for probably about ten and arguably more mature than me for at least 15. He's ready. I think I am too. Guess we'll find out.
3) What's that? You'd rather read about sports? Cool. Here we go.
Mizzou softball just finished its most impressive weekend of the season. The Tigers blew through NCAA Regionals with three consecutive shutout victories, culminating with a 5-0 victory over Iowa State thanks to a Jordan Weber no-hitter. On the weekend, Missouri scored 17 runs and gave up none. The Tiger pitchers (Weber and Lauren Krings) pitched 20 innings and allowed two hits. None of the games was ever in doubt.
That performance moved Mizzou into the Super Regionals (basically the Sweet 16). Awaiting the Tigers are the James Madison Dukes, who won the Knoxville regional hosted by No. 9 seed Tennessee. The Dukes are one of just three non-top 16 seeds to move into this round. They're obviously good enough to be here and could beat the Tigers. But Missouri is certainly favored to move on to the Women's College World Series for the first time in a decade. What an achievement that would be for Larissa Anderson and a group of players that has been through a coaching change, NCAA probation and a worldwide pandemic in the last four years.
The first game is Friday night at 8 on ESPNU. Game two is Saturday at 6 on ESPNU. Game three, if necessary, will be at either 11 or 1 on Sunday. We'll be there to cover them all.
