The Best Thing About the College World Series

Also in Traina Thoughts: A perfect Father’s Day moment at an MLB game; wild parade speech; we must acknowledge an anniversary and more.

1. Baseball fans have descended upon Omaha, Neb., over the past few days to enjoy the College World Series.

While there are been plenty of exciting games, the most thrilling contest may be away from the field.

Thanks to Rocco's Pizza & Cantina  and the Twitter account  CWS Jello Shot Challenge, we can all follow along with the amount of $5 Jell-O shots that are consumed by the fan bases of the CWS teams.

This was the first update from last Thursday, the first day of the tournament.

Your 5pm update! As some have predicted @LSUbaseball takes the early lead in the Shot Challenge but @TCU_Baseball and @GatorsBB fans have been great as well. Settle in folks it's gonna be a lonnng week. #cws2023 #RoccosOmaha pic.twitter.com/lBrOyJQ0GX

— CWS Jello Shot Challenge (@CWSShotBoard) June 15, 2023

Going into Monday, though, LSU fans have dominated the competition like Joe Burrow in his senior year.

31,215 shots were sold last year, 27,367 have been sold this year. Will y'all break the collective record today or are y'all a little tired from the weekend? #cws2023 #RoccosOmaha pic.twitter.com/V53pRYVocD

— CWS Jello Shot Challenge (@CWSShotBoard) June 19, 2023

Virginia and Stanford, however, just didn’t come to play. Cavaliers alum Chris Long was especially disappointed in his school’s performance.

We got smoked by stanford, a bunch of guys going to the seminary & whoever lives in Winston Salem.

— chris long (@JOEL9ONE) June 19, 2023

Last year, Ole Miss fans won the competition with a total of 18,777 Jell-O shots, Can LSU set a new record in 2023? We will certainly be refreshing @CWSShotBoard like crazy to find out. 

2. Just a truly perfect moment between a dad and his two young sons at yesterday’s Red Sox game.

3. The Golden Knights’ William Karlsson gave what might be the most memorable parade speech of all time over the weekend.

Wild Bill. Absolutely lmao pic.twitter.com/w8Dm1u41nw

— Dimitri Filipovic (@DimFilipovic) June 18, 2023

4. Chris Paul told Good Morning America on Monday that he found out he was getting traded from Phoenix to Washington while on a flight to the ABC morning show.

“I was surprised too … in this league anything can happen.”

Chris Paul says he found out on a flight to NYC on Sunday about reports of being traded to the Washington Wizards by the Phoenix Suns.@CP3#NBA pic.twitter.com/MbDpnf129h

— Good Morning America (@GMA) June 19, 2023

5. File away this tweet from the Trail Blazers’ Jusuf Nurkić, who will most likely be right about the situation in Phoenix after the Bradley Beal trade.

Brooklyn situation all over again 😂

— Jusuf Nurkić 🇧🇦 (@bosnianbeast27) June 18, 2023

6. This week's SI Media With Jimmy Traina features a conversation with ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt.

The popular SportsCenter anchor, who is also ESPN’s main golf host, shared his thoughts on the PGA-LIV merger and tried to give us as much insight as possible on what it all means, despite the lack of information out there.

Van Pelt also revealed that he doesn’t plan to host SportsCenter for too much longer. When asked whether he’d be host in three years, he said, “Nah.”

• Other topics covered with SVP include:

• U.S. Open betting tips

• Pat McAfee’s joining ESPN

• The night he lost his voice on live TV

• The beauty of his “Bad Beats” segment

You can listen to the podcast below or download it on Apple, Spotify and Google.

You can also watch SI Media With Jimmy Traina on YouTube.

7. RANDOM VIDEO OF THE DAY: Terrible, awful, brutal job by me Friday. It was the 29th anniversary of the greatest live-TV prank call in history and I forgot to post it. I failed you and I apologize.

Be sure to catch up on past editions of Traina Thoughts and check out SI Media With Jimmy Traina on Apple, Spotify or Google. You can also follow Jimmy on Twitter, Instagram and TikTok.