By TERRY LYONS, Executive Editor of Digital Sports Desk
BOSTON – It’s the best time of year – the Sports Equinox – when the NFL is in full swing, baseball is enjoying its Fall Classic, and the NHL and NBA are just underway. Toss in the WNBA Finals and the MLS season and you have a six pack of sports offerings. Add College Football and (soon-to-be) College Basketball with exhibitions ongoing, NASCAR Cup, the Premiership from England, and next week’s Breeders’ Cup horse racing extravaganza, and you’ve got something for everyone. Now, add the PGA Tour which is puttering away in Bermuda or NASCAR rip-roaring away at Talladega, and you’ve got it all.
And, just think! In nine days, all of the political ads will be gone.
All of the action is enough to make a sports fan move to Las Vegas, just to see all the games at once in the incredible Circa Sports Book.
There’s a couple of the sports listed in our equinox that aren’t getting their proper due. The two being short-changed are Major League Baseball with the 2026 World Series and the WNBA Finals, featuring the Golden State Valkyries and the Atlanta Dream.
First – Baseball:
Let’s remember. For the entire 2026 season, the Tampa Bay Rays and Milwaukee Brewers were atop their respective league ladder and the best two teams come postseason time. Tampa went 98-64, good enough to be 4.5 games ahead of the second-ranked New York Yankees.
In the National League, the Brewers went 103-59, three full games better than the Los Angeles Dodgers (100-62). Both teams finished on an (8-2) run.
In the postseason, they proved their worth.
The Brewers’ pitching staff finished the regular season with a 3.51 ERA and a 1.18 whip. Jacob Misiorowski, the Brewers’ ace pitched to a league leading 1.73 ERA with 227 strikeouts. He’s regularly throwing 103 mph four seam fastballs. His whip registered at 0.80 and he forced his opponents to bat a filthy .157 over 174 innings pitched.
The Brewers’ rotation of Misiorowski, Kyle Henderson, Aaron Ashby and Logan Henderson form a very respectable rotation of semi-no-names (outside of the great place on the Great Lake).
Tampa sports the best overall pitching crew in baseball.
Drew Rasmussen, Ian Seymour, and Nick Martinez have carried the load after Shane McClanahan (left forearm tightness) was shut down for the season. That brought Freddy Peralta into the mix after his midseason trade.
On the offensive side, the teams are mirror images of themselves and they’ve shown they can hold on and win games. They each manufacture runs, take advantage of miscues of their opponent and can win games in the 3-2 fashion of Game 1 of the World Series.
When you put all of those basics together, you have a model match-up and one of the very best World Series that very few fans outside of Milwaukee and Tampa-St. Pete will see. And, that’s a crying shame.
At the WNBA Finals, it’s much the same.
Golden State (32-12) finished one game behind Western Conference leader in the Minnesota Linx (33-11). The Dream topped the East at (30-14). The clubs were mirror images in terms of home-road records during the season.
After the Valkyries took Game 1 of the WNBA Finals, the Dream reversed the trends and went up 2-games-to-1. On Saturday (Oct. 24), the Valkyries evened it up, 2-2.
One major issue facing the WNBA and its Finals is the fact the series is being played in mid-to-late October, head to head with the NFL, College Football, the World Series and everything else. Saturday’s game was held at 1:00pm in Atlanta in the heart of the south and its love of college football. While the Georgia Bulldogs had a bye week, the vast number of SEC and ACC teams were in action, including Georgia Tech hosting Boston College in an ACC match-up at Tech.
Out West, only Cal at SMU might’ve caused a distraction now that the PAC-10 (12) was blown to bits and Stanford beat NC State in that Friday night ACC tilt alongside Palo Alto.
Regardless of the competition, the WNBA Finals is providing fans with a high brand of basketball. But, it’s been done in relative obscurity. With the series tied 2-2, there will be added awareness and interest in the outcome.
Maybe the original WNBA game plan of a Memorial Day to Labor Day schedule might be re-examined?
HERE NOW, THE NOTES: Back to MLB, the battle of the small market cities (Milwaukee and Tampa, as compared to New York, Los Angeles or Chicago), makes it difficult for the Major League Baseball team owners to claim they need to change the mechanism of delivering team salaries. If the Milwaukee Bucks and Tampa Bay Rays can put together a team at bargain basement prices, why should the MLB Players’ Association worry about what the Dodgers or Yankees pay their players? … The NBA season is off to a good start and some momentum following a tremendous ‘26 NBA Playoffs and a busy and interesting offseason. Tuesday’s 76ers-Knicks and Thunder-Spurs doubleheader was the NBA’s most-watched opening night ever, averaging 6.41 million viewers on NBC/Peacock. The 76ers’ victory over the Knicks was the league’s most-watched primetime opening night game ever, averaging 7.71 million viewers and peaking at 9.1 million viewers at 9:45pm (ET).
ESPN’s NBA Opening Wednesday doubleheader averaged 2.5M viewers, up 7% from last year, according to Nielsen Big Data + Panel. The audience ranks as ESPN’s second most-viewed Opening Wednesday ever.
TIDBITS & NUGGETS: Don’t look now but the Edmonton Oilers are 8-1-1 going into Saturday’s home game against the Toronto Maple Leafs. The Oilers are 5-0-0 on the road. … Sunday’s matchup of St. John’s hosting Texas will be the Storm’s third exhibition game of the preseason. The Johnnies downed Drexel, 81-52, on Oct. 14 at Carnesecca Arena before outlasting Rutgers, 104-99, in a four-overtime marathon this past Sunday at Madison Square Garden. … The Texas Legends selected 2026 NBA champion Jeremy Sochan (6-8, 230, Baylor) with the first overall pick in the 2026 NBA G League Draft, which was held virtually on Saturday. During the 2025-26 season, Sochan played 28 games with the San Antonio Spurs and 16 games with the New York Knicks. In 228 career NBA games across four seasons, the 23-year-old averaged 9.9 points and 5.4 rebounds. The Motor City Cruise drafted Isaiah Carr (6-11, 235, Drake) with the second overall pick and the Osceola Magic selected Kasean Pryor (6-10, 228, Louisville) third overall. … Can’t say which is worse. MLB deciding regular season games by placing a ghost runner at 2B or the College Football overtime rules.
CUSP PODCAST with MIKE BREEN: Celebrating 20 years for Columbia University’s sports management program and 40 years of New York’s very own (via Fordham) Mike Breen, the voice of the NBA Finals and the NBA on ABC/ESPN.
THIS JEST IN: The Pittsburgh Steelers and New Orleans Saints will play their regular season game Sunday (today, October 25) in Paris. It’ll (hopefully) be the first NFL regular season game in France. While the people of Paris and Marseilles worry about their cities burning amidst protests, Aaron Rodgers and the Steelers seem to be more concerned with jet lag. … The Saints headed for Paris last Sunday, deciding to get a full week of practice and adjusting to the time zone/jet lag. Pittsburgh opted to travel from the USA and land in Paris on Friday, a “cutting-it-tight” tactic employed by the LA Rams earlier this season when they opened up in Melbourne, Australia. Of course, the Rams were smoked 27-7 by the San Francisco 49ers who flew much earlier in the week.
The thought process of Rams coach Sean McVay was to stay on Pacific time, rather than attempt to make a big, week-long adjustment. That strategy backfired.
A basic concept to go by, after years and years of experience traveling to time zones all over the world, is to not make a “big deal” about it. The bigger deal the front office, coaches and advisors make of the travel, the more it gets into the players’ heads.
That works in both directions.
When the NBA first began its international regular season efforts with the NBA Japan Games 1990, the Phoenix Suns and Utah Jazz made the trip, with the teams splitting the two games. Both clubs did quite well in their travels to the games.
The issue was the return, when Utah complained about returning jet lag all the way to Christmas. After winning their first game after returning, the Jazz dropped four straight. Truth be told, the Jazz ran off five consecutive victories from November 21 to 30, then after a lone loss at Portland, they won another six straight from December 3 to 13. They finished 54-18.
YOU CAN’T MAKE IT UP: Britt McHenry, the disgraced former ESPN sideline reporter, is in hot water again after being caught on video dousing a fan with her drink at the Milwaukee at Washington basketball game. The video went viral and she was soon-after asked to resign her post at the Trump-Rubio led State Department where she held a role as press advisor. The Mt Holly, NJ native and Stetson/Northwestern grad, did a stint with ESPN from 2014-17 but that ended abrubtly when she was, again, caught on a security video berating a parking lot attendant after McHenry had illegally parked her car and it ended up in the clink. In 2020, she battled a serious brain lesion and had it surgically removed at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore. That escape sent her to the political realm and an ill-fated PR role that is no longer. With her credentials tainted, she might be the perfect fit for White House press spokesperson doing a daily brief now that Katie Zacharia has had her 14 minutes of fame.