FOR WHAT IT’S WORTH:

It’s almost over, this summer of our discontent, with a dangerous virus and outrage over another police shooting of a Black man roiling the world of sports.

Uncertainty looms and sports activism is on the rise.

In an unprecedented protest, the Milwaukee Bucks and Milwaukee Brewers boycotted their games after the shooting this week of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The police shot the 29-year-old Blake in the back seven times, leaving him paralyzed. Several other teams, across most major sports, followed suit.

The Bucks’ owners said they supported their players “wholeheartedly.”

Doc Rivers, coach of the Los Angeles Clippers and a former Celtics coach, reacted emotionally to the shooting, saying it was “amazing” to him that Black people keep loving America when America doesn’t love them back.

Sometimes sports doesn’t seem about sports, does it?

Meanwhile, the NFL’s kickoff game is set for Sept. 10, when Houston will play the defending Super Bowl champions, the Kansas City Chiefs.

QUIZ OF THE WEEK: The Boston Bruins have four players left who played in the 2011 postseason on their way to the Stanley Cup title. Who are they? (Answer below.)

LINE OF THE WEEK from LeBron James in response to the Wisconsin shooting: “People get tired of me saying it but we are scared as Black people in America.”

In Foxboro, the quarterback saga continues, with the smart money on Cam Newton as starter, but Coach Bill has surprised us before.

Not all NFL teams are on the same page when it comes to live fans at games. The Bears, the Washington Football Team and the Raiders are not allowing fans at any of their home games, while other teams, such as the Patriots, will host no fans through at least September.

From The Boston Globe: Boston College has become the outlier in New England college football, forging ahead with plans to play their ACC schedule, while Harvard, UMass, UConn, URI, Brown, Bryant and other schools have deferred to the pandemic.

Does the fact that BC gets about $30 million in ACC TV money every year have anything to do with it?

You tell me, Bunky.

From The New York Times: There have been at least five season-ending injuries for NBA players during the league’s restart in the bubble, fulfilling predictions made by medical experts that the players would be prone to injury with only three weeks of practice following a four-month hiatus.

The NFL’s Chiefs have banned the wearing of ceremonial headdresses and Native American-style face paint by fans at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City.

Did you see where the Red Sox became the first team to lose 20 games since the 2020 MLB season began this summer?

Is it over for Dustin Pedroia and no one has told us yet?

He may be 83, but James Lee Burke keeps hitting them out of the ballpark. His latest book, “A Private Cathedral,” doesn’t disappoint.

What’s worse in this age of coronavirus: Having a parent in a nursing home or kids heading off to school? Just asking.

Let’s see, this week I could have watched the virtual Republican convention on TV or the NBA playoffs.

I think that’s what they call a no-brainer.

Clemson came in first in The Associated Press’ list of top-25 college teams this year, followed by Ohio State, then Alabama.

Speaking of Alabama, head coach Nick Saban once said that working under Belichick, when he was head coach of the Cleveland Browns in the early 1990s, was the “worst four years” of his life.

If you’ve ever seen HBO’s “Belichick and Saban: The Art of Coaching,” you know the two are friends. If you haven’t seen it, it’s worth checking it out.

It’s official — Trump versus Biden for the most important position in the world.

Who says the cream rises to the top?

UConn is about to get a 5-foot-11-inch guard from Minnesota — Paige Bueckers — who was named high school female athlete of the year by Sports Illustrated and called “the most electrifying high school player in the world” by Slam Magazine.

Bueckers already has more than 550,000 followers on Instagram and she hasn’t even packed her bags for Storrs yet.

QUIZ ANSWER: Zdeno Chara, Patrice Bergeron, Brad Marchand and David Krejci. (Goalie Tuukka Rask was on the team but didn’t play in the playoffs.)

From the New York Post: Seven million people watched Fox News on the opening night of the Republican Convention, compared to roughly 2 million each for CNN, ABC and NBC.

So long to summer 2020, the season of sharks, masks and empty stadiums. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.

RIP Phil Coen, 91, a longtime Rhode Island high school and college coach, high school principal and superintendent and mentor to innumerable young athletes, including me. They didn’t make them any better.