Good Morning! Today is Monday, July 8. Here’s what happened over the weekend in the world of sports.

MLB

Many of the baseball highlights from this past weekend have made their way to the Top Plays section of The Remix… there were a few games and performers, however, that earned a spot leading off this week:

• The Yankees and Red Sox series lived up to expectations. Boston took two of three very entertaining games between the rivals, highlighted by Rafael Devers recording his 1,000th career hit, blasting three home runs, and staring down Yankees ace Gerrit Cole. In New York’s win on Saturday, rookie first baseman Ben Rice hit three home runs of his own.

• Twins infielder Jose Miranda reached base 13 plate appearances in a row, recording 12 hits and one hit-by-pitch. Miranda tied the MLB record for consecutive at-bats with a hit, and is the first player to accompish the feat since 1952. It’s worth listing out the names of the other three guys– Jose Miranda, meet Walt Dropo, Pinky Higgins, and Johnny Kling.

• It was a big weekend for rookie home runs. Nationals outfielder James Wood hit his first big-league bomb, as did Twins rookie Brooks Lee. Tigers rookie Colt Keith had his first multi-home run game of his career. The future is bright!

• In other home run news, Dodgers catcher Will Smith hit four big flies in a row. Three came in one game, and then the Fresh Prince hit another in his first at-bat on Saturday.

• Paul Skenes dominated on the mound again for the Pirates on Friday and he wasn’t even the main story. The Pittsburgh hitters smashed seven home runs in a 14-2 win over the Mets. The team literally ran out of celebratory fireworks!

• Finally, the craziest game of the weekend award goes to the Padres and Diamondbacks on Friday night. The Diamondbacks scored six runs in the ninth inning to take the lead, only for the Padres to win the game on a Manny Machado walk-off home run in the same inning. 

SOCCER

We’ve made it to the semifinals! And it’s a good thing– most of the quarterfinal games were scoreless and/or went to penalty kicks. If you didn’t watch them, you didn’t miss much.

In the Euros, Spain survived in extra time against Germany. They’ll take on France, who knocked out Portugal and ended Cristiano Ronaldo’s international career. France might be the best team, but they have yet to score an actual goal this tournament. In the other semifinal, England takes on the Netherlands. It was a boring game, but England scored a pretty nice goal in their win over Switzerland. And against all odds, Ivan Toney almost made penalty kicks fun, too. We’ll see how England fares against the Dutch, who came up with a nice comeback win over Turkey,

A little bit more action took place in the Copa America. Argentina advanced and has a rematch against Canada, who advanced in penalty kicks against a talented Venezuelan team. On the other side of the bracket, Columbia thrashed Panama 5-0, led by their longtime playmaker James Rodriguez. Columbia takes on Uruguay next, who emerged from the ugliest soccer game of all-time as the winners against Brazil.

TENNIS

Week one is over at Wimbledon. We’ve celebrated great runs thatcame up short from Americans like Ben Shelton and Madison Keys. Coco Gauff and Iga Swiatek both lost before we expected. There was even a rare underarm serve that actually worked! A lot of great tennis has been played. Where do we stand now?

MEN’S SINGLES

• On the top half of the draw, the quarterfinals are set. Number one seed Jannik Sinner takes on Daniil Medvedev, and defending champion Carlos Alcaraz will face a challenge against American Tommy Paul. A stacked group of four, to say the least.

• The bottom half of the men’s draw will have the quarterfinals set after today. The top four names in this section all play each other, as Novak Djokovic faces a tough test in Holger Rune and Alexander Zverev duels American Taylor Fritz. Keep an eye on the lightning-quick Australian Alex de Minaur in case this draw opens up.

WOMEN’S SINGLES

• Upsets are the name of the game at this year’s Wimbledon. In the top half of the draw, however, we find 2022 champion Elena Rybakina. She’ll be the favorite to win it all, although she’ll have to get through Elena Svitolina, Jelena Ostapenko, and American Danielle Collins to reach the finals. In case you were wondering, Matthew McConaughey is rootin’ for Danielle.

• It’s anyone’s guess who comes out of the bottom of the draw. The home-crowd favorite Emma Raducanu was knocked out on Sunday by Lulu Sun, the first New Zealand player to make it this far at Wimbledon. Sun takes on veteran Donna Vekic in one quarter. In the other, French Open runner-up Jasmine Paolini is up against Emma Navarro, fresh off an upset over Coco Gauff. Why not cheer for Navarro, an NCAA champion at Virginia?

WNBA

Caitlin Clark became the first rookie in WNBA history to record a triple-double, and the Fever upset the New York Liberty 83-78. Meanwhile, Angel Reese set the WNBA record with her 13th consecutive double-double. To no one’s surprise, this is turning into a very special rookie of the year race.

NOTEWORTHY NEWS

The MLB all-star reserves were announced and I got a lot of my predictions wrong. Some interesting selections were made, including multiple Phillies relievers and a couple noteworthy snubs among NL position players (justice for Christian Walker!). Also of note– 32 players were named to their first all-star team.

Time to go around the world of basketball… the Sacramento Kings acquired Demar DeRozan in a sign-and-trade with the Bulls, which included Harrison Barnes going to the Spurs. Good for DeRozan, who might be the most underrated star of the past ten years. NBA Summer League started, and it hasn’t been very interesting yet. Team USA has begun training for the Olympics, and it’s actually really cool to see these stars playing together. Finally, Giannis Antetokounmpo and Greece made the Olympics for the first time since 2008… his reaction tells you how important it was to qualify.

John Cena announced he will retire next year from the WWE. Very soon, you really can’t see him… although I will be bold and say he makes a comeback sometime before the end of the decade.

We’ve got a new world record! Yaroslava Mahuchikh set the women’s high jump record in a meet over the weekend. If she wasn’t before, Mahuchikh is now definitely the favorite to bring home the gold for Ukraine at the Olympics later this month.

TOP PLAYS OF THE WEEKEND

A total of 20 plays from this weekend’s action were considered for Play of the Day honors… you’re truly getting the best of the best this Monday morning:

10: We start with a game-winning goal in extra-time from Spain. Bonus points for the little frog kick.

9: Matt Chapman’s efforts in foul territory almost didn’t make the cut, because the Giants third baseman made this catch look too easy.

8: Emma Raducanu turns defense into offense, winning this beautiful point in front of the home crowd.

7: I guarantee you’ll watch this play by Braves first baseman Matt Olson more than once.

6: Reds centerfielder Stuart Fairchild with the most nonchalant home run robbery you’ll see this year.

5: Ouch… but also respect to Blue Jays centerfielder Daulton Varsho, who laid it all on the line to make this grab.

4: To paraphrase Ron Swanson, sit back and enjoy this silky bit of Jazz. Beautifully done by the Marlins centerfielder.

3: There’s a very realistic world where this section was just “top ten shots by Carlos Alcaraz” from the weekend. Limiting myself to one selection, watch this point a couple times and try to understand how Carlitos wins it.

2: Any other day of the year, this catch would be number one. Joey Loperfido, you are ridiculous.

He faced some tough competition, but there’s no doubt that Jannik Sinner pulled off the NUMBER ONE play from the weekend.

I might just take a minute watch all of these again. Wow.

TODAY’S BIG GAMES (all times Eastern)

TENNIS: Wimbledon, 6 AM on ESPN and ESPN+

• After a long holiday weekend, there’s only a few baseball games on tonight. That means today is all about the grass courts of Wimbledon. Four men’s matches and four women’s matches, with players competing for a coveted spot in the quarterfinals. And guess what– as soon as you finish reading this, you could turn on the TV and start watching! How cool is that?

Thanks for reading The Remix! Keep an eye on your inbox this week for a special announcement…