The Sports Report: Serena Williams will soon end her legendary tennis career

Howdy, I’m your host, Houston Mitchell. Let’s get right to the news.

From Helene Elliott: Serena Williams never did conform to anyone’s expectations. She’s not about to change that now, as she inches toward the end of a career that made her one of the greatest and most influential athletes of her time — or any other.

She and her older sister Venus launched their tennis ambitions on rundown courts in Compton, where they didn’t have the manicured country club lawns or teams of coaches that many of their competitors took for granted. They were two Black girls who were pushed by an insistent father on a journey that would take them to the top of the predominantly white tennis world, where elegant Venus would win seven Grand Slam singles titles and perfectionist Serena would win 23, the second-most by a male or female player. That wasn’t supposed to happen. Not that way.

Serena didn’t look like an athlete was supposed to look according to the narrow-minded standards that once prevailed. She wasn’t slender and willowy and ponytailed. She was muscular, powerful, a fearsome server. She and Venus wore beads in their braided hair, true to their heritage.

The tennis establishment didn’t know what to do with them or their outspoken father, Richard. Or their beads. They responded by winning. And winning. And winning again, all the while opening doors for Black kids and others who might have thought tennis was closed to them because of their skin color or economic status.

Just as she forged her own unlikely path from Compton to tennis immortality, she’s writing her own narrative for a departure that appears imminent.

Speaking in an essay published Tuesday in the September issue of Vogue magazine — a day before her second-round match in a tournament in Toronto that’s a warmup to the U.S. Open — Williams strongly hinted she will soon bid farewell. She didn’t outright say the Open, which starts Aug. 29, will be her finale. But she’s clearly thinking beyond the next match and to the next stage of a fascinating life. She’s not retiring. She’s moving on. Moving up. Moving.

“I have never liked the word retirement. Maybe the best word to describe what I’m up to is evolution,” she said in the essay. “I’m here to tell you that I’m evolving away from tennis, toward other things that are important to me.”

DODGERS

From Mike DiGiovanna: Walker Buehler, the Dodgers’ top starting pitcher, is slowly working his way back from mid-June surgery to remove bone spurs in his elbow. Another lower-back injury sent Clayton Kershaw, the three-time National League Cy Award winner, to the injured list last week for the second time this season.

A team that is running away with the National League West title might seem to be down a pair of aces, but if you’re worried the Dodgers might not have a starter worthy of taking the ball in Game 1 of a playoff series in October, fear not, manager Dave Roberts says. He’s got a guy.

Julio Urías continued to cement his status as the staff ace Tuesday night, giving up one earned run and five hits, striking out eight and walking none in seven innings of a 10-3 victory over the Minnesota Twins before a crowd of 47,874 in Dodger Stadium.

The Dodgers extended their win streak to nine, improved to 31-5 since June 29 and are a major league-best 76-33 on the season.

Urías had pinpoint control of his 93.6-mph fastball, 81.5-mph curve and 86.5-mph changeup, throwing 72 of his 90 pitches for strikes. The left-hander improved to 12-6 with a 2.49 ERA in 22 starts this season and is 9-0 with a 2.16 ERA in his last 10 starts.

In five starts since a rocky five-run first inning in an 11-9 win over the Chicago Cubs on July 10, Urías is 5-0 with a 1.09 ERA, striking out 31 and walking two in 33 innings.

“Julio expects a lot himself, and I think there was just a point where he wanted to be looked at, you know, as the guy,” Roberts said. “And how do you do that? By going out there and performing.”

ANGELS

Shohei Ohtani pitched six scoreless innings to go with his team-leading 25th home run, reaching yet another monumental milestone as the Angels beat the Oakland Athletics 5-1 on Tuesday night.

The two-way Japanese star joined Babe Ruth (1918) as the only players in major league history to have at least 10 home runs and 10 wins in the same season. According to the Angels, two players from the Negro Leagues also did it: Bullet Rogan of the 1922 Kansas City Monarchs and Ed Rile of the 1927 Detroit Stars.

Ohtani singled and scored on Taylor Ward’s three-run homer in the fifth, then connected for a towering drive off Sam Selman leading off the seventh as a throng of red-clan fans sitting behind the Angels dugout roared.

On the mound, Ohtani (10-7) was mostly crisp. He had five strikeouts, allowed four hits and retired seven of his final eight batters.

RAMS

From Gary Klein: After leading the Rams to two Super Bowls and a championship in five seasons, Sean McVay ranks among the NFL’s most successful coaches.

Now he is no doubt among the highest paid.

McVay said Tuesday that he has a new contract, and though the Rams did not release details McVay is thought to have received a five-year deal that puts him at or near the top of the NFL coaches’ salary list.

McVay, 36, has compiled a 55-26 regular-season record and is 7-3 in the playoffs, including a 23-20 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals in February in Super Bowl LVI at SoFi Stadium.

CHARGERS

From Jeff Miller: It was the most fan-pleasing play on a day when the Chargers’ training-camp practice was closed to fans.

So, instead, Ja’Sir Taylor had to be content receiving only the hoots and shouts of his defensive teammates.

With the offense operating the two-minute drill and facing third down, Taylor stepped in front of Keenan Allen in the right flat, intercepted Justin Herbert’s pass and returned it for a touchdown.

“He’s a savvy guy,” defensive coordinator Renaldo Hill said. “He’s one of those guys who, if he made one mistake that day, he won’t make the some mistake again.”

A rookie, Taylor was a sixth-round pick — No. 214 overall — out of Wake Forest. Along with JT Woods in the third round and Deane Leonard in the seventh, he was one of three defensive backs the Chargers drafted in 2022.

USC

From Ryan Kartje: When USC partnered with an outside media company to launch BLVD LLC, the hope was that its unique approach to facilitating name, image and likeness endorsement deals for Trojan athletes would help stave off the rise of a donor-run collective — and keep USC out of the crosshairs of any future NCAA crackdowns.

But less than two months later, The Times has learned that a group of deep-pocketed USC donors and diehard fans are proceeding with their own NIL operation against the school’s wishes.

The group plans to soon launch “Student Body Right,” a third-party collective they say is essential for USC to properly compete with other top schools that feature collectives. They’re hardly alone among Trojans football fans, especially those frustrated by BLVD.

Within USC, however, the effort to start a collective outside of the university’s reach is being viewed as an existential threat that could invite serious scrutiny if the NCAA opts to enforce its NIL policies.

UCLA FOOTBALL

From Ben Bolch: As a result of UCLA’s recruiting under coach Chip Kelly, high school players are becoming an endangered species.

Just check the numbers. The size of each of his high school recruiting classes has dwindled, from 27 players in 2018, to 22 in 2019, to 20 in 2020 ,to 18 in 2021 and 11 in 2022. For the Class of 2023, the Bruins have only six players who have orally committed.

Meanwhile, the number of transfers has soared. UCLA imported two transfers in Kelly’s first season, three in his second season, five in his third season and eight in his fourth season. When the Bruins trot onto the Rose Bowl field for their season opener against Bowling Green on Sept. 3, their roster will include 13 new transfers.

Don’t expect those trends to change given what Kelly called a “year-to-year” approach to roster construction in the transfer portal era.

“It’s no longer, you’re bringing in 25 freshmen, then we’ll redshirt them all and develop them and five years from now, we’ll be good,” Kelly said Tuesday. “Five years from now, you’re probably not gonna be around, so everything’s year to year. We don’t really look at it as recruiting anymore, we look at it as team-building, so how do we build the best team for the 2022 season and that’s a combination of high school [players] and transfers.

SPARKS

From Thuc Nhi Nguyen: Latricia Trammell tried to settle into her bed for the night. Far from a luxurious hotel room, the Sparks assistant coach was sizing up four faux-leather airport terminal seats with cracked black upholstery and chipped piping around the edges.

“These players deserve better,” Trammell wrote on Twitter at 1:45 a.m. in Washington D.C. as half of the Sparks team spent the night in the airport when their travel plans went awry after a 79-76 win against the Washington Mystics on Saturday.

The WNBA’s struggle with commercial flights entered another round as several Sparks players slept at the airport after their cross-country flight was canceled at 1 a.m. local time and rescheduled for 9 a.m. Players were offered rooms at several different hotels because there was not enough space at one location, but because of the location, late hour and early flight, some chose to sleep in the airport Monday morning.

By Tuesday night, the Sparks were caught sleepwalking at Crypto.com Arena with their playoff hopes hanging in the balance. The team committed a season-high 21 turnovers and got outrebounded 40-23 in a 97-71 loss to the Connecticut Sun that kept the Sparks (13-21) one game out of a playoff spot with two games remaining.

The Sparks have lost seven of their last eight games, an ill-fated, late-season slump interim head coach Fred Williams credited to fatigue. Nneka Ogwumike, who finished with 16 points, noted the team’s exhaustion.

“It’s playing with team in mind, not the individual,” Ogwumike said. “When things get hard, sometimes it’s easy to focus more so on what’s going on with my situation and that’s something I think we can be better at in this next game on Thursday and also on Sunday.”

SOCCER

From Kevin Baxter: Like many soccer clubs in Mexico, Tigres of Monterrey rings their stadium with large banners of some of the team’s top players. But unlike many soccer clubs in Mexico, every other banner features a woman player.

“There is a lot of affinity with the women’s team,” men’s coach Miguel Herrera said in Spanish. “We do not belong to different clubs. We wear the same crest and we all represent the institution.”

The idea of one club with two teams was underscored when Mauricio Culebro took over as president last summer and promised to make Tigres the best club in North America, then quickly clarified “not only the men’s team, but the women’s.”

Culebro could argue the club is already the best in Mexico. Since the women’s league began play in the 2017 Apertura, Tigres have played in seven of the nine championship games, winning four. The men have won two titles. No team has won more over that span.

On Wednesday, Tigres’ Femenil will attempt to expand their dominance beyond Mexico when it meets Angel City, a first-year NWSL club, at Banc of California Stadium. It’s another step in what Culebro and Mexican league president Mikel Arriola hopes will become a partnership between NWSL and the Liga MX Femenil, similar to one Mexico’s men’s league has with MLS.

BOB MILLER

From Helene Elliott: Exhale. Bob Miller is fine.

That’s important to clarify because Miller, the play-by-play voice of the Kings for 44 seasons and a Hockey Hall of Fame honoree, disappeared in mid-sentence while paying tribute to Vin Scully during the Dodgers’ postgame show on Spectrum Sportsnet LA a week ago.

One moment Miller was speaking via a video link, praising Scully for setting a high standard for sports broadcasters. The next, he vanished from the screen without explanation. Miller, who retired in 2017, is approaching his 84th birthday. It was all too easy to imagine ominous reasons for his disappearance.

Not to worry. It was merely a technical glitch that cut off his memories of the man who made poetry out of ordinary baseball games and was unfailingly kind in word and deed. “I had many more wonderful things to say,” Miller said by phone the other day.

Too bad he didn’t get to speak at length. Few people are better qualified to speak about Scully than Miller, who joined with Scully and Chick Hearn to form an unparalleled triple crown of Hall of Fame announcers for decades in Los Angeles.

Hearn, who called Lakers games for 41 years before his death in 2002, invented much of the language of basketball. Scully made the language of baseball sing through an incredible 67 seasons.

Miller used his microphone to educate new hockey fans and entertain those who know the game, scolding the Kings when they underachieved, celebrating them when they triumphed, and humanizing players whose individuality was hidden beneath helmets and pads. He brought to vivid life a sport whose speed and strategy don’t translate well on TV, a rare talent.

A Chicago native who called University of Wisconsin hockey and football games, Miller came to Los Angeles in 1973 after being hired by Hearn. Being from the Midwest, Miller hadn’t heard much of Scully’s work. That soon changed.

Not long after Miller arrived, he had an appointment downtown. He was surprised to see the attendant at the lot where he’d parked his car listening to Scully on a transistor radio, and he saw more radios held up to more ears as he walked to his destination. It was a phenomenon. “I thought, ‘Gee, everybody’s listening to the Dodger game,’” Miller said.

“I think I said, ‘I hope someday I’ll be able to make that kind of an impact.’ Not that it happened, but people would want to tune in and listen to Kings games. I had no idea at that time I’d be here for 44 years.”

BASEBALL

From Helene Elliott: Pay close attention during the tryout scene in the first episode of Amazon Prime’s series “A League of Their Own.”

Two women, one wearing a plaid jacket and the other in a red sweater that contrasts with her puffy white hair, are sitting in the stands and applauding while a group of brave women show off their pitching, batting and fielding skills in hopes of winning spots in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.

The two spectators are smiling, as if they know something you don’t. They look like people you should recognize but can’t quite place.

Who are they? Why are they there? Too quickly, the camera moves on.

The woman on the left is Shirley Burkovich, who spent three seasons in the AAGPBL and died in March at 89. Beside her in the red sweater is 95-year-old Maybelle Blair of Sunset Beach. She’s one of the few surviving players from the AAGPBL, which was launched in 1943 to keep baseball alive while many major leaguers were serving in World War II. By every definition, Blair always has been in a league of her own.

Leg injuries limited Blair to one game in one AAGPBL season with the Peoria Redwings, barely longer than her time on screen in Amazon Prime’s reimagined take on the marvelous 1992 movie “A League of Their Own.” But she has had a lasting impact on baseball through her efforts to keep alive memories of the AAGPBL and her passionate advocacy for giving women chances to play baseball.

THIS DATE IN SPORTS

1900 — The first Davis Cup is held with the United States beating Britain, 3-0.

1949 — Ezzard Charles knocks out Gus Lesnovich in the eighth round at Yankee Stadium in his first world heavyweight title defense.

1975 — Jack Nicklaus wins the PGA Championship for the fourth time with a two-stroke victory over Bruce Crampton and Tom Weiskopf.

1980 — Jack Nicklaus wins his fifth PGA Championship with a record score of 274, seven strokes ahead of Andy Bean.

1984 — The much anticipated matchup between American world champion Mary Decker and South African Zola Budd in the women’s 3000-meter race at the Los Angeles Olympics ends in controversy. Just past the midpoint of the race, Decker steps on Budd’s heel, causing Budd to stumble and Decker to trip over Budd. Budd gets back into the race and Decker goes down with an injured thigh. Romania’s Maricica Puica, who had set the fastest time in 1984, wins the race and Budd finishes seventh.

1995 — Michael Bradley, a third-year pro without a tour victory, shoots a record-tying 63 in his first PGA round to lead the PGA Championship.

1996 — Cigar’s bid for a 17th straight victory ends when longshot Dare and Go passes the super horse in the upper stretch and pulls away to win the Pacific Classic at Del Mar. Cigar, 3 1-2 lengths behind Dare and Go, fails to break a tie with Citation for the record winning streak by a North American-based horse this century.

2008 — In Beijing, Michael Phelps begins his long march toward eight gold medals by winning the 400-meter individual medley in 4:03.84 — smashing his own world record. The U.S. women’s 400-meter freestyle relay team, anchored by 41-year-old Dara Torres, takes the silver behind the Netherlands’ Olympic record effort. It’s the 10th medal of Torres’ career.

2008 — Ireland’s Padraig Harrington rallies from three shots behind to win the PGA Championship, closing with a 4-under 66 at Oakland Hills to become the fourth player to win the British Open and PGA in the same year. Harrington, the first European to win consecutive majors, closes out Sergio Garcia with a 15-foot par on the 18th for a two-shot victory.

2012 — The United States wins the women’s 4x100-meter track relay in a world-record time of 40.82 seconds to give the Americans their first Olympic victory in the event since 1996. Tianna Madison, Allyson Felix, Bianca Knight and Carmelita Jeter combine for a perfect trip around the track that ends a string of disappointments for the U.S. in the marquee relay.

2012 — Maurice Purify catches a record seven touchdown passes and the Arizona Rattlers win the Arena Bowl with a 72-54 win over the Philadelphia Soul.

2014 — Rory McIlroy wins his second straight major championship and fourth of his young career, rallying on the back nine in the PGA Championship. The tournament finishes in near-darkness at Valhalla Golf Club, with the final two groups essentially morphing into a foursome as they race to beat nightfall. McIlroy rallies from a three-shot deficit at the turn, to shoot a 3-under 68 to beat Phil Mickelson by one stroke. McIlroy finishes at 16-under 268.

2016 — Daryl Homer becomes the first American to win an Olympic silver medal in men’s individual sabre in 112 years.

2016 — Kristin Armstrong wins the road cycling individual time trial, finishing with a time of 44:26.42 for her third consecutive gold in the Olympic event.

Compiled by the Associated Press

And finally

The Mary Decker-Zola Budd incident at the 1984 Olympics. Watch and listen here.