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How new-school data and old-school communication are helping Orioles hitters jump on starters

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Austin Hays remembers a time when iPads weren’t in the Orioles’ dugout.Hays made his big league debut in 2017, one year after MLB began allowing teams to access the devices during games. But the Orioles, under the previous regime, didn’t have iPads containing vast amounts of data available for players to use during the game, Hays said.Now, though, the days of simply asking fellow hitters coming back into the dugout questions about the pitcher’s velocity, movement and release point are mostly in the past.“We actually have numbers and diagrams for that now,” Hays said. “We don’t have to ask those questions anymore because we’re totally prepared.”The data on the iPads — which MLB in 2021 broadened to include in-game video recordings — is just one tool, co-hitting coach Ryan Fuller said, that has allowed the Orioles to jump on starting pitchers earlier than the club did in 2022 and better than any other team in base...

Traffic collision kills 7 police officers in Pakistan’s SW

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

ISLAMABAD (AP) — A head-on traffic collision in Pakistan’s southwest killed seven police officers who were returning home for the Eid holidays, an official said. They died at the scene of the crash on a national highway in the Khuzdar area of Baluchistan province on Saturday night, according to police official Fahad Khoso.Khoso said the collision was between the officers’ vehicle and a truck. The seven men had finished a course at police training college.In a separate incident, a shootout in the country’s restive northwest killed two soldiers and eight militants.The Pakistani army said late Saturday there was an intense exchange of fire between security forces and militants during the raid on a hideout in South Waziristan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.Weapons and ammunition were recovered from the slain militants, the army said. The country is seeing a rise in militant attacks since the end of a cease-fire last November between the banned group Tehreek-e-Taliban Pak...

Letters: The true genius of democracy

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

The genius of democracyI appreciated George Will’s Thursday piece, (“How, ‘I despise, therefore I am,’ locks in the political status quo”), in that I think I actually understood most of it.What is happening to American politics? It is like the IQ of our elected officials has plummeted to a level moronic. I have seen better reasoning in operation with my preschool grandchildren. People keep trying to reassure me that it’s no worse than usual.Thank goodness we live in a democracy, whose true genius, I have come to think, is that no one gets their own way for long enough to do much harm.G.J. Mayer, Forest Lake Financing health careMy heart goes out to the people described in your article, “States confront medical debt that’s bankrupting millions.” What a burden it must be to face financial ruin after being arbitrarily stricken by a medical condition. The article points out that half a million Americans experience that nightmare every year.The so...

Ask Amy: My friends walked out of the funeral, and I was frozen in shock

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Dear Amy: I appreciate the conversation in your column about funerals.While I understand that these events can be healing for family members, they can also be traumatic for some.Many years ago, I lost my partner to AIDS. He came from a very religious family who had always treated me kindly.My partner had requested that his parents be allowed to handle the funeral service, as it was important to them, and I agreed.I flew to his childhood home with my mother and several of our mutual friends, and was welcomed warmly by the family at the viewing and treated as the grieving widower that I was.However, at the funeral the next day, the officiant went on and on about how my partner would be going to Hell and would remain there until his mother passed and “redeemed” him for his sinful “life choices,” along with many other remarks about his “lifestyle.”Many of our mutual friends walked out.Sitting in the front pews with my mother, I simply sat in shock. I was horrified and devastated, but th...

Sunday Storms in Store

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Well hopefully you enjoyed the sunshine and dry weather conditions Saturday because storms unfortunately return to the forecast. A front near the central Gulf Coast this Sunday morning will reach South Florida tomorrow morning, elevating our rain chances from Sunday afternoon through Monday evening.Expect a bright and mostly dry start to the day this Sunday with temperatures heating up into the mid to upper 80s by the early afternoon hours. By this time, showers and storms are then expected to develop inland and will get a push toward the east coast metro. Therefore, scattered showers and thunderstorms are expected from the mid-afternoon hours through the evening, generally between 3pm and 9pm.Some of these storms could contain heavy rain, so flooding is a concern especially in Broward County which has received so much rainfall over the past week. There will also be the threat for isolated severe storms today with some of the storms producing strong winds and small hail.The risk for...

Japan prime minister vows to boost G7 security after smoke bomb attack

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida said he would increase security at G7 meetings taking place in his country, a day after a man threw a smoke bomb at him at a campaign event. Kishida was campaigning Saturday ahead of next week’s by-elections for the Japanese parliament when an explosive device was hurled toward him. Footage on Twitter appeared to show a bodyguard kicking a smoke bomb away from the prime minister and bundling him away, after the device landed near them. A 24-year-old man was arrested at the scene.Japan will host the leaders of the Group of Seven most industrialized nations at a summit in Hiroshima next month.On Sunday, speaking after emerging unscathed from the smoke bomb incident, CNN quoted Kishida as saying: “Japan as a whole must strive to provide maximum security during the dates of the summit and other gatherings of dignitaries from around the world.”G7 foreign ministers are meeting Sunday for a three-day conference in Karuizawa, where they...

Who will the Chicago Bears select at No. 9? Brad Biggs’ NFL mock draft 2.0.

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Unless Jalen Carter falls to No. 9, which would be a sign teams seriously dinged the Georgia defensive tackle for character and makeup concerns, there might not be a premium defensive player on the board for Chicago Bears general manager Ryan Poles to select.The Bears could deem Carter’s Bulldogs teammate Nolan Smith, who measured 6-foot-2, 238 pounds, large enough to fit in Matt Eberflus’ scheme as a hybrid pass rusher. Perhaps Carter will experience a wait when the draft kicks off April 27 and he’s there for the Bears to consider.If not, the Bears — who have made only marginal improvements to a shoddy pass rush and defensive line — would have to go a different direction. It’s impossible to say how things will shake out, and maybe a talent no one expected will remain when Poles has the chance to make the first first-round pick of his tenure.This dilemma, the one the Bears surely are working through, is the price the Bears had to pay to get wide r...

Column: Chicago Bulls and White Sox provide a double dose of agony for dual Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

It was a bad day at the office for Jerry Reinsdorf, who exited the Chicago White Sox game before the end of Friday’s 6-3 loss to the Baltimore Orioles.In his suite at Guaranteed Rate Field, the two-team chairman watched the Sox bullpen blow a 3-0 lead to drop four games under .500 while also keeping tabs on the Bulls as they collapsed down the stretch in their 102-91 play-in loss to the Miami Heat.It was a one-two punch to the midsection. Poom. Poom.Making matters worse, his $215 million star, Zach LaVine, scored one point in the fourth quarter and finished 6-for-21 from the field. And his new starter, Mike Clevinger, thumbed his nose at the world by choosing Kanye West’s song “Gold Digger” as his entrance music leaving the bullpen, an apparent reference to the domestic abuse allegations he was cleared of by an MLB investigation.If Reinsdorf woke up Saturday and used “agony” as his starting word in Wordle, no one would’ve blamed him. He has ...

Howie Carr: Massachusetts Democrats to the people — ‘What’s ours is ours and what’s yours is ours’

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

This is what a one-party state looks like.On Thursday, the Massachusetts House voted 128–26 to gut a law passed by the voters that provided tax relief to the working classes on those rare occasions when the Commonwealth collected too much money.Last year, the taxpayers — not to be confused with Democrats — were refunded $3 billion of their own money under the provisions of the law, known as 62F.The hackerama was outraged that people who worked would get back some of their own money. They were determined to get rid of 62F. It was priority number one once the state Republican party committed mass suicide last year.How many Democrats, you ask, voted to abide by the will of the people and uphold the referendum question that passed easily in 1986 with a 54 percent majority?Two. Exactly two Democrats voted to continue giving taxpayers a break — Reps. Colleen Garry of Dracut and Jeff Turco of Winthrop.When it comes to the subject of working people and their money, the Democrats on Beacon H...

ASK IRA: Does Bucks in five sound about right against Heat?

Published Fri, 07 Feb 2025 14:08:27 GMT

Q: Ira, why can’t the Heat do to Milwaukee what they did in the bubble? They had Giannis Antetokounmpo figured out and we saw Friday that Playoff Jimmy Butler remains a thing. We’re going back to the Finals. – Eddie.A: And there is nothing wrong with believing and with dreaming. So if this bursts your bubble, I apologize in advance. But since the Heat got past the Bucks in 2020 at Disney, they were summarily swept by Milwaukee the following postseason in the first round. Giannis Antetokounmpo has gotten better as a player since then, and the Bucks have gotten better as a team. I agree that Playoff Jimmy still is capable of swinging a game, but I’m not sure that this is a series Jimmy Butler can swing. So take it one step at a time. First show you can win one, preferably before Game 4, then move forward from there. There is a reason one team enters as a No. 1 seed and the other as No. 8. The disparity between the teams has been that significant this season.Q: ...