What’s New

With COVID-19 cases continuing to rise, the city is cracking down on businesses that don’t enforce the recently enacted indoor mask mandate.

The city issued 16 “notices to correct” and 20 citations to businesses between Aug. 20 and 29, city officials said Tuesday.

Under the mandate, which went into effect Aug. 20, a business can be issued a notice to correct or a citation for either failing to require masks or for not displaying a mask mandate sign.

“As cases continue to rise in Chicago, [the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection} is putting all businesses on high alert and letting them know that we will be strictly enforcing the City of Chicago mask mandate,” the city said in a statement.

Businesses receiving notices or citations ranged from a music school to a Karaoke bar to an Italian restaurant.

The city is encouraging the public to call 311 to report mask violations.

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Good afternoon. Here’s the latest news you need to know in Chicago. It’s about a 5-minute read that will brief you on today’s biggest stories.

This afternoon will be mostly sunny with a high near 82 degrees. Tonight will be partly cloudy with a low around 64. Tomorrow will be mostly sunny with a high near 78.

Top story

Former suburban CEO becomes first Illinoisan to plead guilty in U.S. Capitol breach

The former CEO of a Schaumburg tech firm tossed a chair toward U.S. Capitol police officers who were “dozens of feet away” and had to be dragged behind a police line to be arrested during the Jan. 6 breach that interrupted the Electoral College vote count.

Those details surfaced as Bradley Rukstales, 53, of Inverness, today became the first known defendant from Illinois to plead guilty to his role in the breach. He entered his plea during a video conference before a federal judge in Washington, D.C.

Rukstales told the judge he did not mean to hit anyone with the chair that he tossed.

Rukstales then pleaded guilty to parading, demonstrating or picketing inside a Capitol building, for which he faces up to six months behind bars. U.S. District Judge Carl J. Nichols set Rukstales’ sentencing hearing for Nov. 12. Rukstales has also agreed to pay $500 in restitution to help make up for the estimated $1.5 million in damage done to the Capitol building, according to his plea agreement.

Federal prosecutors have charged 12 additional Illinoisans in connection with the riot, which has led to what they say will likely be the largest criminal investigation in U.S. history. Rukstales was the first Illinoisan to be charged, and he apologized in a statement in January.

Jon Seidel has more on the charges facing Rukstales and other Illinoisans at the insurrection here.

More news you need

According to an internal audit disclosed today, Chicago continues to deposit millions of tax dollars in banks that engage in predatory lending practices. That’s because the Department of Finance is not using the tools at its disposal to stop those practices, the audit found.

Surveillance video captured last weekend in River North shows two men getting beaten and robbed in the middle of the street as onlookers danced and cars drove by. Police responded about six minutes after the altercation began early Saturday, but by then both men were lying on the pavement and had been robbed.

After a series of egg attacks, a Facebook group called Chicago Egg Hunters worked to find who was responsible. The group’s founder now says they’ve cracked the case, something he hopes shows how a community can fight back.
CPD yesterday backed off its decision to keep two officers in 24 high schools that had voted to remove at least one of them. The department’s initial decision to keep the cops in the schools angered students, teachers and school board members and appeared against the wishes of CPS officials.

DuPage Med-ical Group yesterday announced it will mail letters to- 600,000 patients notifying them their personal information may have been compromised last month when its computer network was hacked. DMG is the largest independent physician group in Illinois.

Advocates of removing the state’s lead service lines said yesterday a newly signed law moves the state closer to addressing the issue and ensuring all Illinoisans have clean water to drink. It’s estimated that Illinois has about an eighth of all known lead service lines in the country, State Rep. Robinson said.

Kanye West fans were wowed last week when the artist’s “Donda” listening experience centered on a replica of his boyhood home. But the fake home was only built after the city denied him permission to go through with his initial plan — move the real thing from South Shore to the center of Soldier Field.

A bright one

Pilsen reform school receives grant for youth development, restorative justice programs

Carina Gutierrez always considered herself a “troubled youth.”

At 17, she was incarcerated. On her 18th birthday, she was ordered to enroll in school or face re-incarceration. But it was the middle of the semester, and most schools refused to admit her.

Then her mother told her of a school not far from their Little Village home: Pilsen’s Instituto Justice and Leadership Academy, an alternative school focused on restorative and social justice.

“Without hesitation, they took me in,” Gutierrez said.

Yesterday, the school’s dedication to Gutierrez and other students in similar situations was recognized with an $80,000 grant through Cook County’s Justice Advisory Council.

School staff member Carina Gutierrez poses for a portrait at the Instituto Justice and Leadership Academy at 2570 S. Blue Island Avenue in Heart of Italy, yesterday.Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times

When she graduated in 2009, Gutierrez wanted to remain part of the school’s community and help youth facing the same struggles she had. In 2014, she applied for a position in the registrar’s office.

Now, Gutierrez is entering her seventh year working on enrollment, attendance and program coordination for the school at 2570 S. Blue Island Ave. The school offers a two-year program for students 15 to 21 years old.

The grant is part of a $1.5 million investment in community-based organizations through the Justice Advisory Council, said Toni Preckwinkle, president of the Cook County Board.

The council aims to reduce the population of Cook County Jail and Cook County Juvenile Temporary Detention Center through criminal and juvenile justice reform and public safety policy development.

The Rudy Lozano Leadership Program will benefit most from the grant, covering staff stipends, case management and mental health services, college and career counseling, and restorative justice training.

Cheyanne M. Daniels has more on the grant and its projected impact here.

From the press box

Your daily question ?

If you got to rename any building in Chicago, which would it be and what would you call it?

Email us (please include your first name and where you live) and we might include your answer in the next Afternoon Edition.

Yesterday we asked you: What fictional place would you like to visit most? Here’s what some of you said…

“I’ll limit myself to three (fictional universes) 1. Hogwarts, HogsMeade, Ottery St Catchpole, Godric’s Hollow, etc. 2. St. Mary Mead, Woodleigh Common, Much Benham & Market Basing etc. 3. Osiris, Persephone, Bellerophon and Beaumonde, etc.” — Kassandra Veritas

“Kin-iro Mosaic High School.” — Will Cerne

“The Smoke Ring, from Larry Niven’s books of that name and ‘The Integral Trees,’ a gaseous ring, around a star, fully habitable and all in nearly free fall. Given the author, I presume theoretically possible, if unlikely.” — Carey Schug

“Brigadoon! The mythical village in the old-time musical.” — Jean Ceithaml

“Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory! Having seen the original movie, I would know how to behave. I’d have countless sweets, and I’d interview Willy and the Oompa Loompas about their lives and working conditions for a human interest story or potentially an expose.” — Paul Lockwood

Thanks for reading the Chicago Afternoon Edition. Got a story you think we missed? Email us here.

Sign up here to get the Afternoon Edition in your inbox every day.

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I am addicted to Old Style beer.

My passion for Chicago’s self-appointed hometown brew began last summer, when I was working as an enumerator for the U.S. Census Bureau. Every day, I walked the streets for seven or eight hours in 85 degree heat, ringing doorbells, climbing stuffy stairwells to the top floors of three flats, badgering building engineers for the identities of missing tenants. Toward the end of a shift, the only thing that kept me staggering to the next address was the thought of a cold tall boy in my refrigerator.

When I came home, hot and thirsty, I wanted an uncomplicated, unchallenging lager I could pour down my throat as fast as possible. No extra hops. No floral aroma. Let the Hopleaf crowd sip a $12 glass of Brasserie Dupont, with its “touch of honey sweetness, grassiness, a bit of hop bitterness, some of the distinctive Dupont yeasty funk & a nearly perfect amount of spritz.” 

Old Style got me through a tough job, so I’ve remained loyal. I still drink it almost every day. I even bought an Old Style t-shirt from Etsy. But even as I’m drinking more Old Style, Chicagoans are drinking less. Despite its reputation as a Chicago beer—some people have joked that an Old Style sign outside a neighborhood tavern is the civic flag—Old Style is far from the city’s most popular brew. That title now belongs to Modelo Especial, which in 2019 surpassed Miller Lite in dollar sales as a result of marketing itself to the city’s burgeoning Latino population. (As of 2019, Chicago was the fifth U.S market it had conquered, after Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Diego, and Las Vegas.) According to the website BeerBoard, Old Style doesn’t even rank among the city’s 10 favorite beers.

Given all that, does Old Style deserve to call itself Chicago’s beer? Did it ever? Old Style’s identification with Chicago has always been more a matter of marketing than any real connection with the city. The beer was originally produced by the G. Heileman Brewing Co. of La Crosse, Wis., and poured throughout the Midwest. Old Style began a sponsorship deal with the Chicago Cubs in 1950, making it the beer of choice at Wrigley Field. In the 1970s, Old Style salesmen began offering free signs to taverns, with the beer’s emblem above the words “COLD BEER,” “CERVEZA FRIA,” or “ZIMNY PIWO,” depending on the neighborhood’s native language. In 1991, Old Style aired a series of ads starring professional Chicagoan Dennis Farina, in full cop mode, trying to stop New Yorkers and Angelenos from drinking Old Style. “It’s our great beer and they can’t have it,” he declared.

They didn’t need it. This was before the craft beer era, when every city had its own sex-in-a-canoe local lager. Narragansett in Boston. Genesee Cream Ale in Rochester. National Bohemian in Baltimore. Iron City in Pittsburgh. Stroh’s in Detroit. Hamm’s in Minneapolis. Rainier in Seattle. Old Milwaukee in… you know. Cheap, summer cookout beers with very little body, they were regional variations on the same recipe, and as a result, they all tasted pretty much the same.

There were, in those days, other beers more deserving of calling themselves Chicago’s Very Own. Sadly, they didn’t survive into the modern marketplace, which, as Salon once put it, “seems increasingly divided between corporate behemoths and twee craft brews.” Meister Brau was produced in Chicago, by the Peter Hand Brewery, at 1000 W. North Ave. It actually still exists, sort of. In 1967, Meister Brau introduced one of the first low-calorie beers, Meister Brau Lite, “the light and lusty beer.” When the Miller Brewing Company bought out Peter Hand in 1972, it used the Meister Brau Lite recipe as the template for its monstrously popular Miller Lite. Meister Brau staggered on as a legacy budget brand until 2005, when Miller canned it, preferring to peddle Milwaukee’s Best in that niche.

And then there was Falstaff. While actually a St. Louis beer, Falstaff operated a malting plant on the Southeast Side of Chicago. Grain silos painted to look like Falstaff cans were visible from the Skyway. Falstaff was best bottled, though: it was sold in yellow plastic crates that held a dozen bottles, each with a rebus under the cap. (The rebuses became progressively more difficult to decipher as the crate emptied.) Falstaff, once the nation’s third-largest brewery, suffered a decline similar to Meister Brau’s, eventually becoming a subsidiary of Pabst, which also stopped brewing it in 2005.

Beer blogger Jay Theriot theorized that Meister Brau and Falstaff failed because they were neither good enough to be craft beers, nor bad enough to be corporate.

I found Meister Brau to be a solid and delicious beer. On the other hand, this was somewhat of a throwback beer, with its formidable bite, roasty taste profile, and hoppy finish. At the time, with bland being the style of the day, and with Meister Brau not fitting the craft beer niche, it was destined, like Falstaff, to die on the vine. One wonders what could have happened to it (and Falstaff, for that matter), if the brand could have held on just a few more years until the hugely successful retro/hipster beer movement swept the nation. Had that occurred, Meister Brau (and Falstaff as well) may have been brought back to a prominent position. But, it’s gone (and probably forever).

So Old Style survived the corporate/craft beer shakeout not because it was Chicago’s best beer, but because it was the blandest. Even Old Style is now becoming an atavism, as the type of drinker with whom it’s associated—white, ethnic, blue collar—is replaced by Modelo-drinking Latinos and Goose Island-drinking professionals. In 2013, Old Style lost its Wrigley Field sponsorship to Budweiser. The brand is now owned by Pabst, as part of its Local Legends portfolio, which also includes Schlitz, Old Milwaukee, Olympia, Lone Star, Stroh’s, and Schmidt’s. Chicago beer historian Liz Garibay once told WBEZ that “Old Style signs are a relic of 1970s industry. They hearken back to a time when neighborhood bars like Frank & Mary’s opened at 7 a.m. to serve drinks to factory workers coming off overnight shifts.” 

Old Style could, at this point, change its motto to “it’s our mediocre beer and they don’t want it.” The older I get, though, the less I want to drink craft beer, and the more I want to be Clint Eastwood in Gran Torino, drinking PBR out of a cooler on my porch. At $4.69 a six pack, I can drink all the Old Style I want.

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Bishop Sycamore is trending for all the wrong reasons.

A blowout loss in a game on ESPN supposedly against two elite high school football teams has drawn national attention and questions about the legitimacy of Bishop Sycamore as a football program and an educational institution.

The school claims to be based in Columbus, Ohio, though there’s no address listed on the website. On Sunday, it lost to the second-ranked team in the country, IMG Academy of Florida, 58-0.

Andre Peterson, who played for Jim Tressel at Youngstown State in the 1980s, is Bishop Sycamore’s founder, director and currently coaches the football team’s offensive and defensive lines.

On Tuesday, he told USA TODAY Sports that the football coach, Roy Johnson had been fired Sunday after the game. Peterson also defended Bishop Sycamore’s purpose of giving players a better chance of playing college football and denied any inkling of a “scam” related to Sunday’s game or Bishop Sycamore.

“There’s nothing that I’ve gotten out of this that would constitute it as a scam because I’m not gaining anything financially from what we’re doing,” Peterson told USA TODAY Sports on Monday night. “The reality of it is that I have a son (Javan) that’s also in the program and has been in the program for four years.

“If it’s a scam and the kids are not going to school and not doing what they’re supposed to do, then I’m literally scamming myself. And most importantly, I’m hurting my own son. So when people say stuff like that … I would literally be taking my son’s future and throwing it in the trash.”

In addition to lacking basic information about the school, Bishop Sycamore’s website looks more like a football blog with advice on how to be recruited.

“We have to make sure that website also includes the academic part of it. There’s things that you learn,” he said. “There’s growing pains that you have. We realized that’s an issue. The reality of it is we’ve caused some of the questions by not doing some of the things that should have been done before. So that’s understandable. I totally get that.

“We have to make it an actual school website.”

However, the Ohio Department of Education lists no charter school for 2021-22 by the name Bishop Sycamore, and last year the department listed Bishop Sycamore as a “non-chartered, non-tax supported school,” a type of school that “because of truly held religious beliefs, choose to not be chartered by the State Board of Education.”

On multiple occasions, Peterson said the school has existed for four years, only to later say it was founded in 2019.

When asked why Bishop Sycamore’s listed address is a P.O. box, he said the school’s actual location is private to protect students who were harassed at their pre-pandemic location. Bishop Sycamore rents space in a building in the Easton neighborhood of Columbus, according to Peterson.

“Prior to COVID, the design of it is they go into the building, they have their computers, they sit down, they do their classes, we have some (adults) that are there that monitor what they do,” Peterson said.

Peterson said it was suggested to him on Monday that he fold the program.

“I can’t,” Peterson said. “I have kids that are dependent on what we do. For me to start all over and send them home and say ‘Hey, you work it out for yourself,’ would be a disservice to them. I just know that we have things to get right.

“We have to make this to where every question that’s asked, there’s an answer to it.”

Read more at usatoday.com

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In the search to find an eventual long-term replacement for Tom Brady in New England, a new quarterback will get his chance.

The Patriots have released veteran passer Cam Newton, clearing the way for rookie first-round selection Mac Jones to be the Week 1 starter, the Boston Globe reported Tuesday.

Newton, who started last year in his lone season in New England, had been involved in a battle with Jones over the starting job throughout training camp. Newton, 32, had been inconsistent in camp and then was eventually forced to sit out five days and three practices after he was placed in the NFL’s COVID-19 list over what the team called a “misunderstanding” of the league’s rules.

In that time, Jones shined as he played most first-team reps in practice.

The Patriots selected Jones, 22, out of Alabama with the 15th overall pick in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft in April.

Newton now becomes a free agent and will be available to sign with any team. In his one season as a starter in New England, Newton completed 65.8% of his passes for 2,657 yards with eight touchdowns and 10 interceptions, while adding 592 rushing yards and 12 rushing scores.

The Patriots went 7-9 and missed the postseason for the first time since the 2008 season.

In other cut day moves:

Philadelphia Eagles WR Travis Fulgham

Fulgham finished as the Eagles’ leading receiver last year in a breakout season, recording 38 catches for 539 yards for a passing attack that was in desperate need of reliable targets. With first-round pick DeVonta Smith coming aboard and Quez Watkins breakout in training camp and preseason, however, Fulgham didn’t fit into the Eagles’ plans.

New Orleans Saints QB Trevor Siemian

The Saints are parting with former Northwestern QB Siemian, but only for the time being, as NFL Media’s Ian Rapoport reported that the team plans to re-sign him once rosters settle after cutdown day. Siemian would serve as the primary backup to starter Jameis Winston with Taysom Hill playing a hybrid role.

New York Jets QB Josh Johnson

The veteran journeyman’s stay with Gang Green was a short one, with the team releasing him less than a month after he was signed. The job backing up rookie Zach Wilson now is set to go to Mike White.

Green Bay Packers WR Equanimeous St. Brown

There will be no NFC North rivalry between St. Brown and his brother, Lions rookie wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown, after the elder of the two was waived by the team Tuesday. St. Brown caught seven passes in 12 games last year.

Washington Football Team RB Peyton Barber

Barber tallied four touchdowns last season as a backup to Antonio Gibson, but the sixth-year veteran appears to have been leapfrogged by undrafted free agent Jaret Patterson, who was one of the preseason’s biggest standouts. Washington also cut 2020 fourth-round pick Antonio Gandy-Golden.

Detroit Lions LB Jahlani Tavai

A second-round pick out of Hawaii in 2019, Tavai was taken ahead of the likes of Tennessee Titans wide receiver A.J. Brown and Seattle Seahawks wide receiver, among others. He started 10 games for Detroit last year and received a positive review from linebackers coach Mark DeLeone, who said the third-year player was in “a really good position right now” to make the roster. Ultimately, however, Tavai couldn’t latch on with the new regime of first-year general manager Brad Holmes and coach Dan Campbell.

Miami Dolphins C Matt Skura

Despite signing the veteran blocker to a one-year deal in March, Miami is already moving on from Skura as it reshuffles its offensive line. The Dolphins also parted with linebacker Benardrick McKinney, whom the team acquired in a trade with the Houston Texans this offseason.

Dallas Cowboys QBs Garrett Gilbert, Ben DiNucci

The Cowboys appear to have settled their backup quarterback battle, keeping Cooper Rush while parting with Gilbert and DiNucci, who each started a game last year when Dak Prescott was injured.

New Orleans Saints RB Devonta Freeman

The former Atlanta Falcons standout won’t get a chance to jumpstart his career with an old NFC South rival, as Freeman didn’t make the cut in New Orleans after signing with the Saints earlier in August.

Green Bay Packers tackle David Bakhtiari

The Green Bay Packers won’t have David Bakhtiari for the start of the season as the All-Pro left tackle continues his recovery from a torn anterior cruciate ligament. Bakhtiari’s agent, Mark Humenik, confirmed Tuesday that Bakhtiari will begin the season on the physically unable to perform list. The designation means Bakhtiari won’t be available for at least the first six weeks.

Read more at usatoday.com

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NEW YORK — Javier Baez and Francisco Lindor have apologized to Mets fans after Baez revealed that a thumbs-down celebration gesture adopted by players was in part a dig at New York fans who have booed the underperforming ballclub.

Baez and Lindor took turns saying they were sorry less than an hour before first pitch of a game Tuesday against the Miami Marlins. That followed a stern statement from team president Sandy Alderson on Sunday night disavowing the gesture, as well as a team meeting Tuesday in which players said they would stop making it.

“I didn’t mean to offend anybody,” Baez said.

The 28-year-old Baez was acquired from the Cubs on July 30 and has hit .210 with four homers and a .709 OPS in 17 games since. Mets fans booed him and others throughout August, when the team has gone 8-19 to fall out of playoff position after leading the NL East for nearly three months.

Players began making the thumbs-down gesture toward their dugout after base hits and other positive plays while at Dodger Stadium from Aug. 20-22.

“When we don’t get success, we’re going to get booed,” Baez said Sunday. “So they’re going to get booed when we have success.”

Lindor and manager Luis Rojas said Tuesday they believe Baez — whose first language is Spanish but doesn’t use an interpreter when speaking to media — misspoke when he said Mets players were booing the fans.

“I didn’t say the fans are bad, I love the fans, but like, I just felt like we were alone,” Baez said Tuesday. “The fans obviously want to win, and they pay our salary like everybody says, but like, we want to win, too, and the frustration got to us. And, you know, I didn’t mean to offend anybody, and if I offend anybody, we apologize.”

Lindor also said the gesture was not explicitly about fans.

“Thumbs-down for me means adversity, the adversity we have gone through in this whole time,” Lindor said. “Like the negative things, we overcome it, so it’s like, ‘We did it! We went over it!’

“However, it was wrong, and I apologize to whoever I offended. It was not my intent to offend people.”

Baez and Lindor spoke to reporters in front of the Mets’ dugout. Lindor was booed by a few fans when he emerged, and two young boys held up thumbs-down signals behind him while he spoke.

Lindor was booed before his first at-bat and again after laying down a successful sacrifice bunt. Baez was not in the lineup for the resumption of a game postponed by rain on April 11.

A four-time All-Star, Lindor was acquired from Cleveland over the offseason in the first major move for the team since Steve Cohen purchased the franchise. Lindor signed a $341 million, 10-year deal to remain in New York, but he has been jeered often during a season in which he is hitting .224 with 11 homers and a .686 OPS.

He was hopeful the gesture wouldn’t spoil his relationship with the fan base he is committed to through 2031.

“I hope this doesn’t stick around because it wasn’t meant to offend anybody, to disrespect nobody,” he said. “This is just a time of trying to pick each other up. We’re going through a rough time, and it was a gesture to pick each other up.”

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LOS ANGELES — Mike Richards is out as executive producer of “Jeopardy!”, days after he exited as the quiz show’s newly appointed host because of past misogynistic and other comments.

Richards is also no longer executive producer of “Wheel of Fortune,” according to a memo to staff that was confirmed by Sony, which produces both of the shows.

“We had hoped that when Mike stepped down from the host position at Jeopardy! it would have minimized the disruption and internal difficulties we have all experienced these last few weeks. That clearly has not happened,” Suzanne Prete, an executive with the game shows, said in the memo.

Richards had signed an overall development deal with Sony in 2019, and became executive producer of “Jeopardy!” and “Wheel of Fortune” in May 2020.

He quickly became controversial when he went from behind-the-scenes to Sony’s pick for host of “Jeopardy!” — even before his 2013-14 podcast comments demeaning women and making stereotypical comments about Asians, Jews and others surfaced.

Anointing Richards as successor to the admired Alex Trebek was a questionable choice to some, especially after the studio had conducted a splashy search that included actors, sports figures, journalists — and Richards.

Questions were raised about whether Richards had put his finger on the scale in favor of himself, and whether he had the gravitas that was seen in other candidates, such as fan favorite LeVar Burton.

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In the search to find an eventual long-term replacement for Tom Brady in New England, a new quarterback will get his chance.

The Patriots have released veteran passer Cam Newton, clearing the way for rookie first-round selection Mac Jones to be the Week 1 starter, the Boston Globe reported Tuesday.

Newton, who started last year in his lone season in New England, had been involved in a battle with Jones over the starting job throughout training camp. Newton, 32, had been inconsistent in camp and then was eventually forced to sit out five days and three practices after he was placed in the NFL’s COVID-19 list over what the team called a “misunderstanding” of the league’s rules.

In that time, Jones shined as he played most first-team reps in practice.

The Patriots selected Jones, 22, out of Alabama with the 15th overall pick in the first round of the 2021 NFL draft in April.

Newton now becomes a free agent and will be available to sign with any team. In his one season as a starter in New England, Newton completed 65.8% of his passes for 2,657 yards with eight touchdowns and 10 interceptions, while adding 592 rushing yards and 12 rushing scores.

The Patriots went 7-9 and missed the postseason for the first time since the 2008 season.

In other cut day moves:

New York Jets QB Josh Johnson

The veteran journeyman’s stay with Gang Green was a short one, with the team releasing him less than a month after he was signed. The job backing up rookie Zach Wilson now is set to go to Mike White.

Green Bay Packers WR Equanimeous St. Brown

There will be no NFC North rivalry between St. Brown and his brother, Lions rookie wide receiver Amon-Ra St. Brown, after the elder of the two was waived by the team Tuesday. St. Brown caught seven passes in 12 games last year.

Washington Football Team RB Peyton Barber

Barber tallied four touchdowns last season as a backup to Antonio Gibson, but the sixth-year veteran appears to have been leapfrogged by undrafted free agent Jaret Patterson, who was one of the preseason’s biggest standouts. Washington also cut 2020 fourth-round pick Antonio Gandy-Golden.

Detroit Lions LB Jahlani Tavai

A second-round pick out of Hawaii in 2019, Tavai was taken ahead of the likes of Tennessee Titans wide receiver A.J. Brown and Seattle Seahawks wide receiver, among others. He started 10 games for Detroit last year and received a positive review from linebackers coach Mark DeLeone, who said the third-year player was in “a really good position right now” to make the roster. Ultimately, however, Tavai couldn’t latch on with the new regime of first-year general manager Brad Holmes and coach Dan Campbell.

Miami Dolphins C Matt Skura

Despite signing the veteran blocker to a one-year deal in March, Miami is already moving on from Skura as it reshuffles its offensive line. The Dolphins also parted with linebacker Benardrick McKinney, whom the team acquired in a trade with the Houston Texans this offseason.

Dallas Cowboys QBs Garrett Gilbert, Ben DiNucci

The Cowboys appear to have settled their backup quarterback battle, keeping Cooper Rush while parting with Gilbert and DiNucci, who each started a game last year when Dak Prescott was injured.

New Orleans Saints RB Devonta Freeman

The former Atlanta Falcons standout won’t get a chance to jumpstart his career with an old NFC South rival, as Freeman didn’t make the cut in New Orleans after signing with the Saints earlier in August.

Read more at usatoday.com

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Dennis Rodman’s infamous trip to Las Vegas during the 1998 NBA Finals has long been the stuff of legend. Now Hollywood wants to bring that story to life on the big screen as a feature film that involves Rodman as a producer, Variety reports.

“48 Hours in Vegas” will be a retelling of the well-publicized two days that Rodman spent away from Bulls during their Finals rematch against the Utah Jazz.

The core of the story, which was rehashed as part of the ESPN documentary series “The Last Dance,” is well known: With the Bulls on the brink of their sixth NBA championship, Rodman asked coach Phil Jackson for time off in the middle of the series against Utah. Jackson, knowing Rodman’s mercurial nature, gave him the thumbs up for a trip that soon spiraled out of control.

In “The Last Dance,” Michael Jordan said he needed to fly to Vegas and personally bring Rodman back to the team.

Variety reports that the movie, which will be written by Jordan VanDina and boasts Oscar winners Phil Lord and Chris Miller among its producers, will add another layer to the story “as the player and his anxious assistant GM develop an unexpected friendship amid the player’s Sin City revelry.”

“Dennis refused to follow the herd,” Lord and Miller said in a statement. “That is what made him a target and it’s also what made him a star. His weekend in Las Vegas is full of fun and hijinks but it is also full of important questions about the way public figures and workers are treated, especially when their individuality is expressed so vividly.”

Rodman, as basketball fans know, returned to the Bulls after his Vegas bender and helped MJ finish off the Jazz. In the deciding Game 6, he played 39 minutes, third-most on the team.

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