Jeff Landes | Yes, I'm still here

Jul. 29—In early June, Alex (Rychwalski, for those that don't know him. And if you don't, it means you're not reading our sports pages. Shame on you.), declared in a column that he was going to write a column for every print edition of the summer, provided he wasn't on assignment, covering a game or taking a day or two off.

I told him good luck with that, because it's not as easy as it sounds.

But there he was, promising a daily column (and delivering, 23 of them to date) when I hadn't written one in months.

Not that I didn't want to. But by the end of the day, after putting another paper to bed (journalism lingo) and handling administrative duties, offering my opinion on pertinent sports topics didn't seem all that important.

As a co-worker likes to say, I'll try to do better.

I like June. It's summer. Longest daylight days of the year and all that.

Then there's July. I don't like July so much. Too hot most of the time ... and it seems to be getting hotter.

But the real reason I'm not a fan of July is because it welcomes August.

And for us August equals busy — or back to work — and we're usually busy from August through May until early June.

Another reason I've grown to like June.

July has 31 days, but it doesn't feel like it. Didn't we just watch the Fourth of July fireworks? Wasn't that yesterday?

Now, we have NFL teams in training camps, soon to be followed by preseason games and then, come September, another regular season.

For me, it will be hard to top last year as my Rams finally won another Lombardi Trophy. They did age me, though, winning the last three by field goal margins — and coming from behind in the last two against the Niners and Bengals.

Colleges are counting down. West Virginia visits Pitt at Heinz Field on September 1, a Thursday. (I know, it's Acrisure Stadium now. I agree with Mountaineer head coach Neal Brown. It's still Heinz Field. I will miss the ketchup bottles opening and pouring out their contents when the Steelers reach the Red Zone. That was cool.) College Gameday is going to be there for the return of the Backyard Brawl which is now only 33 days away.

Frostburg State will open at home and debut its new head coach, Eric Wagoner, that same night against American International.

Maryland's first game will be two days later when it hosts Buffalo at noon.

But football around here begins in West Virginia the last Friday in August and the first Friday in September for Maryland.

The Mountain State gridders — as well as all West Virginia fall sports participants — begin practicing Monday. Golfers can actually start competing that day. The Free Staters' fall season practices begin 10 days later on Wednesday, Aug. 10. Golfers, likewise, can begin competing then, too.

For us, it will kick in on Monday as well.

Requests for fall schedules and rosters have been posted and emails sent as well as notifications for when team photographs will be taken.

Soon we will be contacting football coaches — pestering, actually, to find out what we can about their teams and their thoughts about that team's chances for our upcoming previews.

From the second week of August until the first week of September, this will take up the majority of our time as we prepare the publications.

Other sports deserve previews, too, is a complaint we often receive.

I don't disagree, but it's called Friday Night Lights for a reason. High school football is a happening in this region — the nation, actually — beginning in late August and for those fortunate and good enough, to late November and early December.

We will, however, try to incorporate team pictures, rosters and schedules for all other sports in the coming days and weeks.

Coaches of those sports' teams can provide those to us at the following email address — sports@times-news.com. This goes to all members of the sports staff: Alex, Kyle Bennett, Jordan Kendall and myself.

Also beginning Monday, Jordan Kendall, a 2022 graduate from Towson University, will officially join the Times-News and the sports staff. I'm excited to see what he has to offer, what his insight and opinions will be as he begins to cover athletics in Western Maryland and the Potomac Highlands.

So, it's time to get back to work. Summer is over for us.

Jeff Landes is the Sports Editor for the Cumberland Times-News. Follow him on Twitter at @wvuramfan.