(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Thursday’s sports events:
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL
INTERLEAGUE
Baltimore Orioles 5, San Francisco Giants 3
AMERICAN LEAGUE
Cleveland Guardians 3, Minnesota Twins 2 Toronto Blue Jays 4, Texas Rangers 0 Seattle Mariners 3, N-Y Yankees 2 Tampa Bay Rays 2, Boston Red Sox 0 Houston Astros 3, L-A Angels 1
NATIONAL LEAGUE
Atlanta Braves 15, Cincinnati Reds 3 L-A Dodgers 20, Miami Marlins 4 Arizona Diamondbacks 5, Milwaukee Brewers 1 N-Y Mets 10, Philadelphia Phillies 6 Pittsburgh Pirates 3, St. Louis Cardinals 2 Chicago Cubs 7, Washington Nationals 6
NATIONAL FOOTBALL LEAGUE
N-Y Jets 24, New England Patriots 3
WOMEN’S NATIONAL BASKETBALL ASSOCIATION
Atlanta Dream 78, New York Liberty 67 Connecticut Sun 87, Chicago Sky 54 Washington Mystics 92, Indiana Fever 91 Los Angeles Sparks 68, Minnesota Lynx 51 Las Vegas Aces 98, Dallas Wings 84 Seattle Storm 89, Phoenix Mercury 70
(NEW YORK) — Here are the scores from Wednesday’s sports events:
MAJOR LEAGUE BASEBALL
INTERLEAGUE Tampa Bay Rays 6, St. Louis Cardinals 4
AMERICAN LEAGUE Toronto Blue Jays 7, Baltimore Orioles 6 LA Angels 9, NY Yankees 4 Detroit Tigers 3, Seattle Mariners 4
NATIONAL LEAGUE San Francisco Giants 9, Washington Nationals 5 San Diego Padres 7, Pittsburgh Pirates 6 Milwaukee Brewers 16, Atlanta Braves 7 NY Mets 9, Colorado Rockies 1 Cincinnati Reds 10, Miami Marlins 4 Philadelphia Phillies 6, Arizona Diamondbacks 4
(NEW YORK) — Naomi Osaka is opening up after her loss at the Cincinnati Open on Monday.
The four-time Grand Slam singles champion failed to make the main draw in Cincinnati after losing in a qualifying match against Ashlyn Krueger. On Sunday, she won her opening match in the qualifying tournament against Anna Blinkova.
On Tuesday, Osaka took to Instagram to reflect on the loss and said that what she’s feeling is similar to “being postpartum.”
“In a weird way I’ve come to appreciate losses, you don’t play tennis for 20+ years without your fair share of them,” Osaka began. “You learn from a loss and then eagerly await your next opportunity to put what you learned to test.”
“My biggest issue currently isn’t losses though, my biggest issue is that I don’t feel like I’m in my body,” she continued. “It’s a strange feeling, missing balls I shouldn’t miss, hitting balls softer than I remember I used to. I try and tell myself ‘it’s fine you’re doing great, just get through this one and keep pushing’, mentally it’s really draining though.”
“Internally I hear myself screaming ‘what the hell is happening?!?!'” she added.
The two-time U.S. Open champion went on and acknowledged that Monday’s loss is possibly part of “a small phase from all the new transitions (clay, grass, clay, hard etc),” but said she could only like the feeling that she’s experiencing to “being postpartum.”
“That scares [me] because I’ve been playing tennis since I was 3, the tennis racquet should feel like an extension of my hand,” she said. “I don’t understand why everything has to feel almost brand new again. This should be as simple as breathing to me but it’s not and I genuinely did not give myself grace for that fact until just now.”
Osaka said that she is learning and will continue to put in the work every day — which is something she hopes to teach her daughter.
“I love the process (though the process doesn’t love me sometimes haha), putting in work everyday and eventually having the opportunity to get to where you want to be,” she said. “I know life isn’t guaranteed so I want to do the best that I can with the time that I have, I want to teach my daughter that she can achieve so many things with hard work and perseverance. I want her to aim for the stars and never think her dreams are too big.”
“Nothing in life is promised but I realized that I can promise myself to work as hard as I can and give it my best shot till the very end,” she added.
Osaka ended her message with, “See you in New York ♥️,” noting that she will play again at the U.S. Open at the end of the month.
2024 marks Osaka’s tennis comeback a year after welcoming her daughter in July 2023.
Last month, she competed in singles at the Olympics but lost to Angelique Kerber in the first round.
(NEW YORK) — Rachael Gunn, the Australian breakdancer known as Raygun, is speaking out after her 2024 Paris Olympics performance went viral and was mocked both online and off.
Gunn, a 36-year-old college professor with a Ph.D. in cultural studies, said in a new video posted on Instagram Thursday that the “hate” she has received has been “devastating.”
“I just want to start by thanking all the people who have supported me. I really appreciate the positivity, and I’m glad I was able to bring some joy into your lives. That’s what I hoped,” Gunn said in the video, her first since competing in Paris. “I didn’t realize that that would also open the door to so much hate, which has frankly been pretty devastating.”
Gunn did not earn a medal in Paris, where she competed against fellow b-girls in their late teens and early 20s.
After losing her three round-robin battles by a score of 54-0, Gunn’s unique dance moves quickly became the focus of memes and jokes on social media.
On social media, some users dubbed one move by Gunn “the kangaroo,” while others compared her dance moves to when a child asks you to watch their performance.
“I’d like to personally thank Raygun for making millions of people worldwide think ‘huh, maybe I can make the Olympics too,'” one user wrote on X, alongside a photo of Raygun’s Olympic performance.
The criticisms online against Gunn also included unsubstantiated claims that she had manipulated the selection process to make it to Paris, where breaking was included for the first time in Olympic history.
In her new video, Gunn defended herself against those claims, calling them “allegations” and “misinformation.”
“While I went out there and I had fun, I did take it very seriously,” she said. “I worked my butt off preparing for the Olympics, and I gave my all, truly.”
She continued, “I’m honored to have been a part of the Australian Olympic team, and to be part of breaking Olympic debut. What the other athletes have achieved has just been phenomenal.”
Gunn also directed her followers to statements made by the Australian Breaking Organization and the Australian Olympic Committee defending her selection and performance in Paris.
In 2023, Gunn won the QMS Oceania Championships in Sydney to earn Australia’s first-ever spot in the b-girl competition at the Olympics, according to her Olympic bio.
“The Oceania Olympic selection event (The QMS 2023 WDSF Oceania Breaking Championships) in October 2023 brought together the top Breakers, both Bgirls and Bboys. A panel of 9 international adjudicators, a head judge and a chairperson who oversaw the competition, using the same judging system at the Paris Games and trained to uphold the highest standards of impartiality. These judges are all highly respected in their respective communities and in the international Breaking scene,” the Australian Breaking Organization said in an Aug. 13 statement shared on its website. “Ultimately, Rachael Gunn and Jeff Dunne emerged as the top performers in exactly the same process, securing their spots to represent Australia in Paris. Their selection was based solely on their performance in their battles on that day.”
Australia’s Chef de Mission, Anna Meares, issued public support for Gunn on Aug. 10, in a news conference.
“I love Rachael, and I think that what has occurred on social media with trolls and keyboard warriors, and taking those comments and giving them airtime, has been really disappointing,” Meares told reporters, according to ESPN. “Raygun is an absolutely loved member of this Olympic team. She has represented the Olympic team, the Olympic spirit with great enthusiasm. And I absolutely love her courage. I love her character, and I feel very disappointed for her, that she has come under the attack that she has.”
The following day, on Aug. 11, the head judge of the breaking competition in Paris defended Gunn, while the head of the World DanceSport Federation said officials are looking out for her “mental safety” after the online criticism.
Gunn said she is taking “pre-planned downtime” in Europe following the Olympics, and asked for privacy for her family and friends.
“I’d really like to ask the press to please stop harassing my family, my friends, the Australian breaking community and the broader street dance community,” Gunn said. “Everyone has been through a lot as a result of this, so I ask you to please respect their privacy.”
When not breaking, Gunn is a researcher and lecturer at Macquarie University in Sydney, where she studies the “the cultural politics of breaking,” according to her university biography.
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